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Better user experience? Not for certain kinds of work. If you're in the terminal a lot, for example. The OS X Aqua terminal really blows, and its X11 terminal

Better user experience? Not for certain kinds of work. If you're in the terminal a lot, for example. The OS X Aqua terminal really blows, and its X11 terminal isn't much better. I never have any problems with terminal settings under Linux, but every time I try to SSH under OS X some stupid thing happens like the Backspace key doesn't work. X11 is balls slow under OS X, too. Under Linux I can install any software I need in 15 seconds, whereas under OS X, if I need some library or something, I end up searching the 'net and finding some random guy who distributes such-and-such a package for OS X, and it always has a wonky install process (which invariably makes it impossible to uninstall). So yeah, Linux saves me a LOT of time.

lincolnq 18y ago
I should point out that I do use OS X for games, web browsing, and casual programming tasks. It's a good OS, but I can't live with it when I'm really trying to be productive.
- byrneseyeview 18y ago
  I do use OS X for games, web browsing, and casual programming tasks. It's been a while since I looked into games on Linux, but if this is correct, things are worse than I could have imagined.
irrelative 18y ago
I completely agree. I've been using ubuntu for a few years now, but use OS X at work. A lot of coworkers are pretty hardcore developers but still insist on using OS X. Anyone who tells you that Macs "just work" and that linux takes too long to setup (or hardware isn't supported, etc) haven't used linux, and specifically ubuntu, in the last couple of years. It does what OS X should be doing -- easy to get started, but doesn't go out of its way to shield you from advanced features. Quick side rant -- OS X does in fact "just work" if you're doing basic to intermediate things (checking email, digital photos, etc). As soon as you want to do something slightly advanced, it isn't the beautiful experience anymore at all -- a coworker of mine got so frustrated trying to setup PGP in mail.app that he switched to using Thunderbird. Planning on doing any serious C development? There's no ldd command for OS X. Want to really tweak your terminal (see parent)? Good luck. If you're serious about development and want something that'll scale with your skill level, use linux.

lincolnq 18y ago

I should point out that I do use OS X for games, web browsing, and casual programming tasks. It's a good OS, but I can't live with it when I'm really trying to be productive.

byrneseyeview 18y ago
I do use OS X for games, web browsing, and casual programming tasks. It's been a while since I looked into games on Linux, but if this is correct, things are worse than I could have imagined.

irrelative 18y ago

I completely agree. I've been using ubuntu for a few years now, but use OS X at work. A lot of coworkers are pretty hardcore developers but still insist on using OS X. Anyone who tells you that Macs "just work" and that linux takes too long to setup (or hardware isn't supported, etc) haven't used linux, and specifically ubuntu, in the last couple of years. It does what OS X should be doing -- easy to get started, but doesn't go out of its way to shield you from advanced features. Quick side rant -- OS X does in fact "just work" if you're doing basic to intermediate things (checking email, digital photos, etc). As soon as you want to do something slightly advanced, it isn't the beautiful experience anymore at all -- a coworker of mine got so frustrated trying to setup PGP in mail.app that he switched to using Thunderbird. Planning on doing any serious C development? There's no ldd command for OS X. Want to really tweak your terminal (see parent)? Good luck. If you're serious about development and want something that'll scale with your skill level, use linux.