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If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). Just like it wouldn't be fair to compla

by jeswin 6y ago

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). Just like it wouldn't be fair to complain about macOS on a Hackintosh - sound didn't work well and had to patch the DSDT. > but there are rough edges for the power user. > I am an extreme power user, ... > In the end, I was able to replicate most of my macOS power tools setup via input hooks and shell scripts, but it took much longer than it should have. It's very hard to define who a Power User is. But if you've spent a few years on Linux, you'd be able to do many things faster on Linux than on macOS. For instance, it's easier to automate tasks with shell scripts in Linux than to attempt the same with osascript. I use macOS only when I'm forced to - because the absolute fundamentals are broken. Finder is unbelievably bad compared to Nautilus, package management is terrible, limited ability to tile windows, not even a simple way to set up an Application launch shortcut out of the box (yeah, can do with Automator).

Veen 6y ago
> But if you've spent a few years on Linux, you'd be able to do many things faster on Linux than on macOS This may be true, but the article explicitly targets people moving from Mac to Linux, not people with years of Linux experience. I’m interested why you don’t like Finder. It does the job for me. What do you think it’s missing?
- m12k 6y ago
  I can't speak for GP, but I'd pay for Path Finder even if all it did was give me cmd-x to cut, and enter key to mean open instead of rename. It does a ton more, but those two are the killer features for me (Tabs used to be one too, but Finder finally got those a while ago).
  - Veen 6y ago
    I definitely agree with you on the lack of cmd-x for cut. However, you can do cmd-c to copy, and then cmd-option-v to move files rather than copy them. Enter to rename and cmd-o to open was hard to adapt to when I moved from Windows, but it's second nature now.
    - krrrh 6y ago
      Using the distinction of paste as copy vs paste as move, instead of overloading the cut metaphor is a better choice semantically. When you cut text or images from a document with ctrl/cmd-x the content is deleted immediately. It’s weird and inconsistent that in windows the files get greyed out and if you don’t paste them they... eventually look normal again when you put something else in the clipboard? Modifying the paste with option on mac is also consistenT with option switching between move and copy while dragging files.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- stormbeta 6y ago
  Speaking personally: * No ability to show thumbnails in folder icons * No ability to use single click + hover to highlight * Relative sizing feels way off - everything in Finder always seems to be simultaneously way too spaced out while also being way too small. * Never seems to remember view preferences properly, and often defaults to confusing arrangements. * Doesn't like to stay connected to network drives, despite any number of tricks I've tried. * The usual cut/paste/delete operations being needlessly complicated to perform I do prefer macOS overall, partly because I'm tired of having to constantly tweak and fix Linux whenever I try to use it as a desktop system, and because of things like iTerm2 and BetterTouchTool. But I really hate trying to do any kind of real file management with Finder, and most third-party apps I've tried just seem to replicate everything I dislike about Finder.
  - rbreaves 6y ago
    I fixed the cut/paste/delete stuff here. https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto
csomar 6y ago
Power user according to the OP seems to be having a bunch of shortcut keys.
phendrenad2 6y ago
I never understood how someone can make a good-faith effort to document their Linux experiences and for people to label it "complaining".
- aniforprez 6y ago
  Welcome to the Linux community where every year is the "year of the Linux desktop"
  - nix23 6y ago
    Well it is/was already, it runs google-chrome as a Runtime-Environment.
- rjzzleep 6y ago
  He specifically targeted the "complain about linux drivers" part in his comment didn't he? He didn't dismantle the entire post, just comment on a specific part he disagreed with. I don't fully agree with it, especially since things such suspend, the fingerprint scanner and the LTE modem were still a mystery to be solved with the x1c6/7. But if anything, your attitude that's effectively shutting down any criticism is the problem.
carlesfe 6y ago
I clarified now in the article that the "Linux Laptop" is a Dell XPS 13" Developer Edition, which is marketed indeed as a Linux laptop, and the Ubuntu is marketed as "Ubuntu Dell".
- jeswin 6y ago
  > Screen tearing with the intel driver. Come on. This was solved on xorg and now with Wayland it's back. Since you mentioned Dell XPS, I'm thinking they'd have sold it to you with Ubuntu 20.04. But why did you choose Wayland - which IIRC is not the default in 20.04? These are the trickiest pieces of the distro, and will take years to stabilize. Especially considering that Linux aims to work across the entire set of PCs in existence.
  - carlesfe 6y ago
    It is a 2018 Dell XPS. It had a previous version preinstalled, which used Wayland. I explicitly remember having to edit the settings to run with Xorg because otherwise screen sharing in Google Meet would not work. I upgraded to 20.04 at some point. During the six months I tried both environments. I ended up with Xorg just because it works.
  - nix23 6y ago
    Unbelievable how the Linux community makes excuses (on the desktop) instead of fixing shitty software...it's always the same....
- jmkni 6y ago
  Dell don't sell any machines with Linux on them in the UK anymore (as far as I can tell).
2muchcoffeeman 6y ago
If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). So I Googled “laptops supported by Linux”. There is no official site. Ubuntu has a page. But it’s not on the first page of results. I only know about it because I’m familiar with it. Supporters keeps arguing people should jump through hoops. I’m on Linux right now, but people have better things to do. Either provide a list so people know exactly what to buy, or all complaints are valid. Apple sells you the whole package: take it or leave it. Windows supports everything and has their logo everywhere.
- zucker42 6y ago
  Again, that's like googling "laptops supported by MacOS" and expecting to find a list of Hackintosh compatible hardware. Dell and Lenovo both sell laptops pre-installed with Linux, and there are also boutique shops like System76 and TUXEDO. And I DDGed "Linux Laptops" and got all these suggestions. Of course, Linux doesn't quite have the mass market consumer experience you get with MacOS or Windows, but it's not exactly hard to find laptops pre-installed with Linux.
  - hurril 6y ago
    No it is absolutely not. That googling will find a list of hardware supported by Hackintosh and it will find Apple. Two very good responses. Laptops supported by Linux provides neither.
    - seniorivn 6y ago
      if ddg got desired results and your google didn't, it's an issue with google and how it serves you
    - rjzzleep 6y ago
      I'm all for bashing Desktop Linux but this statement is just ridiculous. Searching for exactly that search term gives me the following result: >Best Linux Laptops > > Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (8th Generation) Last year, >Lenovo shocked the Linux community by announcing Linux >laptops. ... > Tuxedo Pulse 14 Gen 1. ... > System76 Serval WS. ... > Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition 2020. ... > Purism Librem 14. ... > System76 Galago Pro. ... > Lenovo ThinkPad P53 Mobile Workstation. ... > DELL Inspiron 15 3000. > >More items... https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Laptops+supported+by+Linux https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Laptops+s...
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
galkk 6y ago
I own Thinkpad X1 extreme, that I bought with my own money, and chose as working laptop Thinkpad Carbon. Both are not working well with linux. 1. Carbon, due to it's intel chip, can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter. 2. I need to authorize dock (Lenovo's thunderbolt dock) after every reboot. 3. The screen tearing sucks. 4. I need to have pulse audio volume control window opened all the time, otherwise the laptop loses my external sound card after first call via browser, and I need to turn it off/on. On my own laptop, where I installed Ubuntu, I can boot only into 5.8.0.43 kernel (the one which I initially installed). All others, that I've got via apt-get update stuck with blinking cursor at last step of boot, and it's well known problem. The longer I'm trying to love linux for work os, the more I realize that only tool that I truly want from linux is i3. For the rest I'm happily using WSL2 on my home, and don't have choice with work. So on next hardware refresh date I think I'll choose Mac. The supplied by job laptop config is also more performant than carbon. So, hope, I'll be able to use my monitors in native res, and not put 2K into 1920x1020 mode
- hansel_der 6y ago
  > can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter. VGA ftw > screen tearing sucks it sure does. look into your os config for a compositor or drop the following into /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-intel.conf : Section "Device" Identifier "Intel Graphics" Driver "intel" Option "AccelMethod" "sna" Option "TearFree" "true" EndSection
  - tinus_hn 6y ago
    Why does it have a ‘tearfree’ ‘false’ option?
    - bicolao 6y ago
      From the man page > Thus enabling TearFree requires more memory and is slower (reduced throughput) and introduces a small amount of output latency, but it should not impact input latency
  - 6y ago
karateka 6y ago
> Finder is unbelievably bad compared to Nautilus Whats so bad about finder?
- lostlogin 6y ago
  The ones that have bugged me today: It randomly forgets view preferences. There is something weird about SMB shares where they appear mounted but actually aren’t. It doesn’t have scroll bars in its default state. MacOS is my favourite by a mile, but there are some major warts, though the finder isn’t my major gripe.
  - fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
    The scrollbar thing is system-wide, not Finder-specific: it’s definitely a somewhat annoying default.
  - nmlt 6y ago
    Well, concerning SMB shares I had the same problem in Nautilus a few days ago.
- one2three4 6y ago
  UI. Add a shortcut to a folder. Go there. Now try to go to parent folder... Open a folder with images. How on earth do you switch to visible thumbnails? And more like that. These things should be intuitive and easy to do.
  - fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
    Unless I’m completely misunderstanding you, showing Thumbnails has an obvious button on the toolbar. Go to parent is harder, but I think for the sequence you describe there’s a back button on the toolbar that will do what you want. Otherwise, you can use the breadcrumb bar at the bottom (can’t remember if this is a default setting or not) or open the Go menu and learn that Command-Up is the shortcut for “parent directory”. (A little later you discover this is symmetrical: Command-Up goes “up” out of the folder you’re looking at, Command-Down goes “down” into the selected item.)
Tainnor 6y ago
I'll be the devil's advocate even though I agree with you partially and I personally prefer Linux, both for practical and philosophical reasons. However, I use a Linux laptop privately and macOS for work, so I think by now I understand both systems a little bit. For automating tasks on macOS you can look at something like hammerspoon which is really cool (though I mostly use it to modify some of the macOS keybindings which I find ridiculous) [1]. Finder is crap, I agree. But then again, I'm mostly in the terminal, so I don't care much. I would however complain that the default terminal on macOS is really not very good and I always install iTerm2... most Linux distros seem to have a better terminal pre-installed. Package manager is better on Linux for system packages, applications, etc. (in fact, such a thing doesn't really exist on macOS, save for maybe homebrew cask, but that has problems). However, dev packages are tricky on Linux, too. Generally, for dev packages I might want to have a) a very specific (and often the latest) version of something, and b) often multiple versions installed separately. Additionally, on most Linux distros you can't install without root. On a Linux machine, I mostly have to install such tools in addition to my package managed libraries and apps, on macOS I can typically just "brew install rbenv" or so (though homebrew has its own share of problems). In general I would say that macOS makes it slightly easier to do things sort-of reasonably well for default flows but can break down quickly once you want something more custom. With Linux, while it has become a lot (!) better in the last 15 years or so, I still occasionally need to debug some audio problem or so. The upside is that problems on Linux are generally solvable (although, in some instances it can be hard to figure out exactly how). If your macOS does something that is weird or buggy (e.g.: before the update to big sur I had the annoying issue that my system would go into DND mode after every restart, which is really not good if you don't want to miss notifications), then you're out of luck and there's nothing you can do. [1]: https://www.hammerspoon.org/ https://www.hammerspoon.org/
- rbanffy 6y ago
  > I would however complain that the default terminal on macOS is really not very good and I always install iTerm2... Apple’s terminal is one of the very few that passes the VT torture test and has support for double width and height attributes. Sadly, it doesn’t do overlines and doesn’t italicise my terminal font.
uncledave 6y ago
I think “Linux supported” is a vague promise that should not be relied on. I had a T495s which is supported officially on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. And it was quite frankly broken. Closing the lid didn’t work, it drank batteries faster than windows by a mile and plugging in external displays caused the X server to crash. This is unfortunately every experience I’ve had with Linux on native hardware to some capacity in the last 24 years of using it other than dumb headless servers. So I use windows as the native OS and virtualise anything else.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
domano 6y ago
He used a XPS Dev Edition Laptop... Those are officially sold with Ubuntu
shp0ngle 6y ago
I still remember when I bought a laptop officially preloaded with Ubuntu. And the minute I did software update there, everything broke. (Because it was using some binary graphic driver that broke with newer kernel.) I could not even use the computer after that, only the console. I needed to reinstall old ubuntu in order to get my data. Never again
- freebuju 6y ago
  Blame the vendor who shipped you proprietary graphics drivers.
  - rovr138 6y ago
    So now it’s not finding and using an officially supported laptop running Linux, but using a officially supported that runs Linux and doesn’t break. Well, if that’s the argument, I want to see this device that’s guaranteed to not break.
  - shp0ngle 6y ago
    I half blame them, but also Linux that explicitly doesn’t care about binary compatibility of graphic drivers, unlike Windows.
robenkleene 6y ago
I’m curious what you mean by this: > For instance, it's easier to automate tasks with shell scripts in Linux than to attempt the same with osascript. macOS is a Unix, so you can obviously automate it via shell scripts. `osascript` is just an additional option?
ddevault 6y ago
Anyone who is a "extreme power user" is doomed to fail on any new platform. You should approach a new platform planning to learn and embrace what you find there, and become a new power user. Trying to port over the most "extreme power user" workflows you're used to on one system is inevitably going to fail. This was doomed from the start.
matwood 6y ago
> For instance, it's easier to automate tasks with shell scripts in Linux than to attempt the same with osascript. Are you talking about automating UI tasks in linux? Nearly all of my linux shell scripts work fine on macOS and vice versa unless they are using something OS specific. While not perfect, with macOS I get a large majority of what makes Unix nice while also avoiding the UI annoyances. Using macOS also tends to give more software options over unix/linux alone, like PS, LR, the Affinity toolset, etc...
vbezhenar 6y ago
My anecdote. Few weeks ago I bought Dell Latitude 3410. It's an extremely cheap (and underpowered) 13" laptop. I upgraded RAM and installed M.2 SSD. It came with Ubuntu 18.04 pre-installed (which contained a dozen of dell-specific packages). I installed Fedora 33 and checked everything I could check. Every bit of hardware worked correctly out of the box, so I'm pretty happy so far. And despite being underpowered, it's very fast and snappy, definitely faster than my old Macbook in day-to-day usage. I paid $600 for laptop and $150 for RAM and SSD upgrades. Comparable Macbook Air would cost $2000 for me. It does have terrible TN screen, cheap touchpad and bad keyboard layout. That's good enough for me, as I prefer external everything in day-to-day use.
linuxdesktopfo 6y ago
> If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example) I bought a Lenovo specifically since they mentioned all their laptops will support Linux in the future. Note that historically Lenovo didn't really "support" Linux. Remember the Windows tax and how most Thinkpads came with Windows and most still do? Thinkpads supported Linux in spite of Lenovo / IBM. Anyhoo, my new Lenovo had to wait a few months until the trackpad worked! Turns out Lenovo only meant that business laptops (or some other sub-category) will support Linux out of the box. Silly me.
wander_homer 6y ago
When I bought my Thinkpad (one year after its release and with lots of recommendations) it took more than a year before it worked reliably without any kernel panics and weird lockups. External monitor support when docked was broken for even longer. Now I fear the day this notebook stops working and I might have to go through similar trouble again.

by jeswin 6y ago

Veen 6y ago

> But if you've spent a few years on Linux, you'd be able to do many things faster on Linux than on macOS This may be true, but the article explicitly targets people moving from Mac to Linux, not people with years of Linux experience. I’m interested why you don’t like Finder. It does the job for me. What do you think it’s missing?

m12k 6y ago
I can't speak for GP, but I'd pay for Path Finder even if all it did was give me cmd-x to cut, and enter key to mean open instead of rename. It does a ton more, but those two are the killer features for me (Tabs used to be one too, but Finder finally got those a while ago).
- Veen 6y ago
  I definitely agree with you on the lack of cmd-x for cut. However, you can do cmd-c to copy, and then cmd-option-v to move files rather than copy them. Enter to rename and cmd-o to open was hard to adapt to when I moved from Windows, but it's second nature now.
  - krrrh 6y ago
    Using the distinction of paste as copy vs paste as move, instead of overloading the cut metaphor is a better choice semantically. When you cut text or images from a document with ctrl/cmd-x the content is deleted immediately. It’s weird and inconsistent that in windows the files get greyed out and if you don’t paste them they... eventually look normal again when you put something else in the clipboard? Modifying the paste with option on mac is also consistenT with option switching between move and copy while dragging files.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
stormbeta 6y ago
Speaking personally: * No ability to show thumbnails in folder icons * No ability to use single click + hover to highlight * Relative sizing feels way off - everything in Finder always seems to be simultaneously way too spaced out while also being way too small. * Never seems to remember view preferences properly, and often defaults to confusing arrangements. * Doesn't like to stay connected to network drives, despite any number of tricks I've tried. * The usual cut/paste/delete operations being needlessly complicated to perform I do prefer macOS overall, partly because I'm tired of having to constantly tweak and fix Linux whenever I try to use it as a desktop system, and because of things like iTerm2 and BetterTouchTool. But I really hate trying to do any kind of real file management with Finder, and most third-party apps I've tried just seem to replicate everything I dislike about Finder.
- rbreaves 6y ago
  I fixed the cut/paste/delete stuff here. https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto

csomar 6y ago

Power user according to the OP seems to be having a bunch of shortcut keys.

phendrenad2 6y ago

I never understood how someone can make a good-faith effort to document their Linux experiences and for people to label it "complaining".

aniforprez 6y ago
Welcome to the Linux community where every year is the "year of the Linux desktop"
- nix23 6y ago
  Well it is/was already, it runs google-chrome as a Runtime-Environment.
rjzzleep 6y ago
He specifically targeted the "complain about linux drivers" part in his comment didn't he? He didn't dismantle the entire post, just comment on a specific part he disagreed with. I don't fully agree with it, especially since things such suspend, the fingerprint scanner and the LTE modem were still a mystery to be solved with the x1c6/7. But if anything, your attitude that's effectively shutting down any criticism is the problem.

carlesfe 6y ago

I clarified now in the article that the "Linux Laptop" is a Dell XPS 13" Developer Edition, which is marketed indeed as a Linux laptop, and the Ubuntu is marketed as "Ubuntu Dell".

jeswin 6y ago
> Screen tearing with the intel driver. Come on. This was solved on xorg and now with Wayland it's back. Since you mentioned Dell XPS, I'm thinking they'd have sold it to you with Ubuntu 20.04. But why did you choose Wayland - which IIRC is not the default in 20.04? These are the trickiest pieces of the distro, and will take years to stabilize. Especially considering that Linux aims to work across the entire set of PCs in existence.
- carlesfe 6y ago
  It is a 2018 Dell XPS. It had a previous version preinstalled, which used Wayland. I explicitly remember having to edit the settings to run with Xorg because otherwise screen sharing in Google Meet would not work. I upgraded to 20.04 at some point. During the six months I tried both environments. I ended up with Xorg just because it works.
- nix23 6y ago
  Unbelievable how the Linux community makes excuses (on the desktop) instead of fixing shitty software...it's always the same....
jmkni 6y ago
Dell don't sell any machines with Linux on them in the UK anymore (as far as I can tell).

2muchcoffeeman 6y ago

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). So I Googled “laptops supported by Linux”. There is no official site. Ubuntu has a page. But it’s not on the first page of results. I only know about it because I’m familiar with it. Supporters keeps arguing people should jump through hoops. I’m on Linux right now, but people have better things to do. Either provide a list so people know exactly what to buy, or all complaints are valid. Apple sells you the whole package: take it or leave it. Windows supports everything and has their logo everywhere.

zucker42 6y ago
Again, that's like googling "laptops supported by MacOS" and expecting to find a list of Hackintosh compatible hardware. Dell and Lenovo both sell laptops pre-installed with Linux, and there are also boutique shops like System76 and TUXEDO. And I DDGed "Linux Laptops" and got all these suggestions. Of course, Linux doesn't quite have the mass market consumer experience you get with MacOS or Windows, but it's not exactly hard to find laptops pre-installed with Linux.
- hurril 6y ago
  No it is absolutely not. That googling will find a list of hardware supported by Hackintosh and it will find Apple. Two very good responses. Laptops supported by Linux provides neither.
  - seniorivn 6y ago
    if ddg got desired results and your google didn't, it's an issue with google and how it serves you
  - rjzzleep 6y ago
    I'm all for bashing Desktop Linux but this statement is just ridiculous. Searching for exactly that search term gives me the following result: >Best Linux Laptops > > Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (8th Generation) Last year, >Lenovo shocked the Linux community by announcing Linux >laptops. ... > Tuxedo Pulse 14 Gen 1. ... > System76 Serval WS. ... > Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition 2020. ... > Purism Librem 14. ... > System76 Galago Pro. ... > Lenovo ThinkPad P53 Mobile Workstation. ... > DELL Inspiron 15 3000. > >More items... https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Laptops+supported+by+Linux https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Laptops+s...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

galkk 6y ago

I own Thinkpad X1 extreme, that I bought with my own money, and chose as working laptop Thinkpad Carbon. Both are not working well with linux. 1. Carbon, due to it's intel chip, can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter. 2. I need to authorize dock (Lenovo's thunderbolt dock) after every reboot. 3. The screen tearing sucks. 4. I need to have pulse audio volume control window opened all the time, otherwise the laptop loses my external sound card after first call via browser, and I need to turn it off/on. On my own laptop, where I installed Ubuntu, I can boot only into 5.8.0.43 kernel (the one which I initially installed). All others, that I've got via apt-get update stuck with blinking cursor at last step of boot, and it's well known problem. The longer I'm trying to love linux for work os, the more I realize that only tool that I truly want from linux is i3. For the rest I'm happily using WSL2 on my home, and don't have choice with work. So on next hardware refresh date I think I'll choose Mac. The supplied by job laptop config is also more performant than carbon. So, hope, I'll be able to use my monitors in native res, and not put 2K into 1920x1020 mode

hansel_der 6y ago
> can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter. VGA ftw > screen tearing sucks it sure does. look into your os config for a compositor or drop the following into /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-intel.conf : Section "Device" Identifier "Intel Graphics" Driver "intel" Option "AccelMethod" "sna" Option "TearFree" "true" EndSection
- tinus_hn 6y ago
  Why does it have a ‘tearfree’ ‘false’ option?
  - bicolao 6y ago
    From the man page > Thus enabling TearFree requires more memory and is slower (reduced throughput) and introduces a small amount of output latency, but it should not impact input latency
- 6y ago

karateka 6y ago

> Finder is unbelievably bad compared to Nautilus Whats so bad about finder?

lostlogin 6y ago
The ones that have bugged me today: It randomly forgets view preferences. There is something weird about SMB shares where they appear mounted but actually aren’t. It doesn’t have scroll bars in its default state. MacOS is my favourite by a mile, but there are some major warts, though the finder isn’t my major gripe.
- fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
  The scrollbar thing is system-wide, not Finder-specific: it’s definitely a somewhat annoying default.
- nmlt 6y ago
  Well, concerning SMB shares I had the same problem in Nautilus a few days ago.
one2three4 6y ago
UI. Add a shortcut to a folder. Go there. Now try to go to parent folder... Open a folder with images. How on earth do you switch to visible thumbnails? And more like that. These things should be intuitive and easy to do.
- fiddlerwoaroof 6y ago
  Unless I’m completely misunderstanding you, showing Thumbnails has an obvious button on the toolbar. Go to parent is harder, but I think for the sequence you describe there’s a back button on the toolbar that will do what you want. Otherwise, you can use the breadcrumb bar at the bottom (can’t remember if this is a default setting or not) or open the Go menu and learn that Command-Up is the shortcut for “parent directory”. (A little later you discover this is symmetrical: Command-Up goes “up” out of the folder you’re looking at, Command-Down goes “down” into the selected item.)

Tainnor 6y ago

I'll be the devil's advocate even though I agree with you partially and I personally prefer Linux, both for practical and philosophical reasons. However, I use a Linux laptop privately and macOS for work, so I think by now I understand both systems a little bit. For automating tasks on macOS you can look at something like hammerspoon which is really cool (though I mostly use it to modify some of the macOS keybindings which I find ridiculous) [1]. Finder is crap, I agree. But then again, I'm mostly in the terminal, so I don't care much. I would however complain that the default terminal on macOS is really not very good and I always install iTerm2... most Linux distros seem to have a better terminal pre-installed. Package manager is better on Linux for system packages, applications, etc. (in fact, such a thing doesn't really exist on macOS, save for maybe homebrew cask, but that has problems). However, dev packages are tricky on Linux, too. Generally, for dev packages I might want to have a) a very specific (and often the latest) version of something, and b) often multiple versions installed separately. Additionally, on most Linux distros you can't install without root. On a Linux machine, I mostly have to install such tools in addition to my package managed libraries and apps, on macOS I can typically just "brew install rbenv" or so (though homebrew has its own share of problems). In general I would say that macOS makes it slightly easier to do things sort-of reasonably well for default flows but can break down quickly once you want something more custom. With Linux, while it has become a lot (!) better in the last 15 years or so, I still occasionally need to debug some audio problem or so. The upside is that problems on Linux are generally solvable (although, in some instances it can be hard to figure out exactly how). If your macOS does something that is weird or buggy (e.g.: before the update to big sur I had the annoying issue that my system would go into DND mode after every restart, which is really not good if you don't want to miss notifications), then you're out of luck and there's nothing you can do. [1]: https://www.hammerspoon.org/ https://www.hammerspoon.org/

rbanffy 6y ago
> I would however complain that the default terminal on macOS is really not very good and I always install iTerm2... Apple’s terminal is one of the very few that passes the VT torture test and has support for double width and height attributes. Sadly, it doesn’t do overlines and doesn’t italicise my terminal font.

uncledave 6y ago

I think “Linux supported” is a vague promise that should not be relied on. I had a T495s which is supported officially on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS. And it was quite frankly broken. Closing the lid didn’t work, it drank batteries faster than windows by a mile and plugging in external displays caused the X server to crash. This is unfortunately every experience I’ve had with Linux on native hardware to some capacity in the last 24 years of using it other than dumb headless servers. So I use windows as the native OS and virtualise anything else.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

domano 6y ago

He used a XPS Dev Edition Laptop... Those are officially sold with Ubuntu

shp0ngle 6y ago

I still remember when I bought a laptop officially preloaded with Ubuntu. And the minute I did software update there, everything broke. (Because it was using some binary graphic driver that broke with newer kernel.) I could not even use the computer after that, only the console. I needed to reinstall old ubuntu in order to get my data. Never again

freebuju 6y ago
Blame the vendor who shipped you proprietary graphics drivers.
- rovr138 6y ago
  So now it’s not finding and using an officially supported laptop running Linux, but using a officially supported that runs Linux and doesn’t break. Well, if that’s the argument, I want to see this device that’s guaranteed to not break.
- shp0ngle 6y ago
  I half blame them, but also Linux that explicitly doesn’t care about binary compatibility of graphic drivers, unlike Windows.

robenkleene 6y ago

I’m curious what you mean by this: > For instance, it's easier to automate tasks with shell scripts in Linux than to attempt the same with osascript. macOS is a Unix, so you can obviously automate it via shell scripts. `osascript` is just an additional option?

ddevault 6y ago

Anyone who is a "extreme power user" is doomed to fail on any new platform. You should approach a new platform planning to learn and embrace what you find there, and become a new power user. Trying to port over the most "extreme power user" workflows you're used to on one system is inevitably going to fail. This was doomed from the start.

matwood 6y ago

> For instance, it's easier to automate tasks with shell scripts in Linux than to attempt the same with osascript. Are you talking about automating UI tasks in linux? Nearly all of my linux shell scripts work fine on macOS and vice versa unless they are using something OS specific. While not perfect, with macOS I get a large majority of what makes Unix nice while also avoiding the UI annoyances. Using macOS also tends to give more software options over unix/linux alone, like PS, LR, the Affinity toolset, etc...

vbezhenar 6y ago

My anecdote. Few weeks ago I bought Dell Latitude 3410. It's an extremely cheap (and underpowered) 13" laptop. I upgraded RAM and installed M.2 SSD. It came with Ubuntu 18.04 pre-installed (which contained a dozen of dell-specific packages). I installed Fedora 33 and checked everything I could check. Every bit of hardware worked correctly out of the box, so I'm pretty happy so far. And despite being underpowered, it's very fast and snappy, definitely faster than my old Macbook in day-to-day usage. I paid $600 for laptop and $150 for RAM and SSD upgrades. Comparable Macbook Air would cost $2000 for me. It does have terrible TN screen, cheap touchpad and bad keyboard layout. That's good enough for me, as I prefer external everything in day-to-day use.

linuxdesktopfo 6y ago

> If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example) I bought a Lenovo specifically since they mentioned all their laptops will support Linux in the future. Note that historically Lenovo didn't really "support" Linux. Remember the Windows tax and how most Thinkpads came with Windows and most still do? Thinkpads supported Linux in spite of Lenovo / IBM. Anyhoo, my new Lenovo had to wait a few months until the trackpad worked! Turns out Lenovo only meant that business laptops (or some other sub-category) will support Linux out of the box. Silly me.

wander_homer 6y ago

When I bought my Thinkpad (one year after its release and with lots of recommendations) it took more than a year before it worked reliably without any kernel panics and weird lockups. External monitor support when docked was broken for even longer. Now I fear the day this notebook stops working and I might have to go through similar trouble again.