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Desktop Linux is right here, desktops Linux has always been here! I don't understand why people complain about Apple neglecting developers when desktop Linux p

Desktop Linux is right here, desktops Linux has always been here! I don't understand why people complain about Apple neglecting developers when desktop Linux provides a superior experience aside from the rare times you need to compile an iOS/Mac specific application.

dingnuts 2y ago
I don't get it either, it takes twenty minutes to burn a USB stick and run the installer. It takes me longer to remove the bloatware and set up my preferred settings on a proprietary OS than it does to install Linux nowadays, and that's been true for a decade at least now. It's just not hard! It's not more work! And yet the meme about it being more trouble just. won't. die. You people are supposed to be technologists! Why won't you spend 20 minutes of one time setup to get a better experience? Not all hardware works? I don't see anybody complaining about having a limited set of hardware options when they buy Apple! Canonical maintains a list of fully compatible computers; just pick one, buy it, and you wind up with a computer just as easy to use as Mac OS but without the endless paper cuts of using a system that has no respect for you at all and thinks it knows better
- foldr 2y ago
  I use Apple laptops primarily for the hardware. But Linux has never really been a great experience on Mac laptops when it comes to battery life, reliable suspend/resume, etc. etc. I used to use Yellow Dog Linux on a G4 PowerBook way back in the day, but I haven’t had much luck with Linux on Mac hardware since then.
- bastardoperator 2y ago
  Most of us have .dotfiles, I can snap any macos installation into my preferred configuration in about 5-10 minutes unattended depending on internet speeds. I do most of my work in a terminal, as long as that works, I'm good on Linux, MacOS, and BSD's. They all have pros and cons.
  - rbanffy 2y ago
    I only wish Apple’s terminal supported Tektronix and ReGIS. And provided a sane implementation for sixels.
jebarker 2y ago
> desktop Linux provides a superior experience aside from the rare times you need to compile an iOS/Mac specific application or reliably use peripherals
- trey-jones 2y ago
  Wow, did you travel here from 2002? Edit: In case it's not clear from my initial, gut-driven snark: I definitely think if you use a reasonably popular distro (commercially backed or not) in 2025, you should never have any trouble connecting peripherals to it, with the possible exception of Bluetooth, which I hear also applies to macOS.
  - jebarker 2y ago
    Nope, I came directly from an MS Teams meeting where the desktop linux users had no audio.
    - 999900000999 2y ago
      I'm on Windows, and my work laptop has no audio via its headphone jack. I have no idea how this is supposed to even work, and since it's not my computer I don't mess around trying to install drivers. I just use my phone to call in for Teams. Things happen, let's not act like any OS is perfect.
      - jebarker 2y ago
        MacOS is definitely not perfect. I'm being snarky. But it has been my anecdotal experience as both a user and observing colleagues that MacOS is more reliable and stable for desktop use than Linux. This is unsurprising since it's easier to build a stable walled garden than an open ecosystem.
        999900000999 2y ago
        Macs are generally more reliable, but if you buy a year old ThinkPad Linux will be just as stable . The only issue Linux really has is when new chipsets come out you might need to wait 6 months or so for the drivers to be updated. But to be completely fair, on one of my laptops I had no webcam support for like six or seven months until Windows update decided to finally install it for me. If you need a significant amount of hard drive space, Macs are almost always exorbitantly expensive. I make music so I find myself dual booting between windows and Linux. I don't want to speed 3k+ on a MacBook just to get a 4TB SSD I can add to any Windows PC for 200$. Plus on Linux you can customize your personal experience to a much greater level. If you dislike X,Y,Z you can disable it or find an alternative. Both OSX and Windows are cramming so much monetization into the OS, there's a very real feeling that I'm just sharing my computer with a giant corporation rather than actually owning it.
behnamoh 2y ago
Desktop Linux is an oxymoron. i’ve tried it many times and every single time I went back to macOS.
- fsflover 2y ago
  Any particular reasons?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
medion 2y ago
I had an old i5 Mac mini laying about I wanted to use desktop Linux on the other day. The last time I tried, was about 20 years ago. I note nothing has changed since.
- rbanffy 2y ago
  I have one of those running the latest Fedora. It’s a great workstation.
paulddraper 2y ago
I use macOS because it's the only OS to reliably support Apple's Macbook M series. (Unless someone wants to correct me.)
- rbanffy 2y ago
  If you are paying for Apple hardware, it’s silly to use an OS that’ll make it only less reliable and compatible.
spudlyo 2y ago
I very recently tried again to adopt Linux on the desktop. I'm really sick of feeling like a frog in a pot of water. It's becoming harder and harder to bypass their literal gatekeeping of which applications I can run on my computer, and with every new version of macOS the temperature in the pot keeps rising. The main problem I have with living in a Gnome desktop environment, is with the keyboard. I'm not willing to abandon my use of Emacs control+meta sequences for cursor and editing movements everywhere in the GUI. On macOS, this works because the command (super/Win on Linux/Windows) key is used for common shortcuts and the control key is free for editing shortcuts. I spent a day or so hacking around with kanata[0], which is a kernel level keyboard remapping tool, that lets you define keyboard mapping layers in a similar way you might with QMK firmware. When I press the 'super/win/cmd' it activates a layer which maps certain sequences to their control equivalents, so I can create tabs, close windows, copy and paste (and many more) like my macOS muscle memory wants to do. Other super key sequences (like Super-L for lock desktop or Super-Tab for window cycling) are unchanged. Furthermore, when I hit the control or meta/alt/option key, it activates a layer where Emacs editing keys are emulated using the Gnome equivalents. For example, C-a and C-e are mapped to home/end, etc. The only problem is, this is not the behavior I want in terminals or in GNU/Emacs itself. So I installed a Gnome shell extension[1] that exports information about the active window state to a DBUS endpoint. That let me write a small python daemon (managed by a systemd user service) which wakes up whenever the active window changes. Based on this info, I send a message to the TCP server that kanata (also managed by a systemd user service) provides for remote control to switch to the appropriate layer. After doing this, and tweaking my Gnome setup for another day or so, I am just as comfortable on my Linux machine as I am on my Mac. My main applications are Emacs, Firefox, Mattermost, Slack, ChatGPT, Discord, Kitty, and Steam. My Linux box was previously my Windows gaming box (don't get me started about frog boiling on Windows) and I'm amazed that I can play all my favorite titles (Manor Lords, Hell Let Loose, Foundation) on Linux with Proton. [0]: https://github.com/jtroo/kanata https://github.com/jtroo/kanata [1]: https://github.com/hseliger/window-calls-extended https://github.com/hseliger/window-calls-extended

dingnuts 2y ago

I don't get it either, it takes twenty minutes to burn a USB stick and run the installer. It takes me longer to remove the bloatware and set up my preferred settings on a proprietary OS than it does to install Linux nowadays, and that's been true for a decade at least now. It's just not hard! It's not more work! And yet the meme about it being more trouble just. won't. die. You people are supposed to be technologists! Why won't you spend 20 minutes of one time setup to get a better experience? Not all hardware works? I don't see anybody complaining about having a limited set of hardware options when they buy Apple! Canonical maintains a list of fully compatible computers; just pick one, buy it, and you wind up with a computer just as easy to use as Mac OS but without the endless paper cuts of using a system that has no respect for you at all and thinks it knows better

foldr 2y ago
I use Apple laptops primarily for the hardware. But Linux has never really been a great experience on Mac laptops when it comes to battery life, reliable suspend/resume, etc. etc. I used to use Yellow Dog Linux on a G4 PowerBook way back in the day, but I haven’t had much luck with Linux on Mac hardware since then.
bastardoperator 2y ago
Most of us have .dotfiles, I can snap any macos installation into my preferred configuration in about 5-10 minutes unattended depending on internet speeds. I do most of my work in a terminal, as long as that works, I'm good on Linux, MacOS, and BSD's. They all have pros and cons.
- rbanffy 2y ago
  I only wish Apple’s terminal supported Tektronix and ReGIS. And provided a sane implementation for sixels.

jebarker 2y ago

> desktop Linux provides a superior experience aside from the rare times you need to compile an iOS/Mac specific application or reliably use peripherals

trey-jones 2y ago
Wow, did you travel here from 2002? Edit: In case it's not clear from my initial, gut-driven snark: I definitely think if you use a reasonably popular distro (commercially backed or not) in 2025, you should never have any trouble connecting peripherals to it, with the possible exception of Bluetooth, which I hear also applies to macOS.
- jebarker 2y ago
  Nope, I came directly from an MS Teams meeting where the desktop linux users had no audio.
  - 999900000999 2y ago
    I'm on Windows, and my work laptop has no audio via its headphone jack. I have no idea how this is supposed to even work, and since it's not my computer I don't mess around trying to install drivers. I just use my phone to call in for Teams. Things happen, let's not act like any OS is perfect.
    - jebarker 2y ago
      MacOS is definitely not perfect. I'm being snarky. But it has been my anecdotal experience as both a user and observing colleagues that MacOS is more reliable and stable for desktop use than Linux. This is unsurprising since it's easier to build a stable walled garden than an open ecosystem.
      - 999900000999 2y ago
        Macs are generally more reliable, but if you buy a year old ThinkPad Linux will be just as stable . The only issue Linux really has is when new chipsets come out you might need to wait 6 months or so for the drivers to be updated. But to be completely fair, on one of my laptops I had no webcam support for like six or seven months until Windows update decided to finally install it for me. If you need a significant amount of hard drive space, Macs are almost always exorbitantly expensive. I make music so I find myself dual booting between windows and Linux. I don't want to speed 3k+ on a MacBook just to get a 4TB SSD I can add to any Windows PC for 200$. Plus on Linux you can customize your personal experience to a much greater level. If you dislike X,Y,Z you can disable it or find an alternative. Both OSX and Windows are cramming so much monetization into the OS, there's a very real feeling that I'm just sharing my computer with a giant corporation rather than actually owning it.

behnamoh 2y ago

Desktop Linux is an oxymoron. i’ve tried it many times and every single time I went back to macOS.

fsflover 2y ago
Any particular reasons?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

medion 2y ago

I had an old i5 Mac mini laying about I wanted to use desktop Linux on the other day. The last time I tried, was about 20 years ago. I note nothing has changed since.

rbanffy 2y ago
I have one of those running the latest Fedora. It’s a great workstation.

paulddraper 2y ago

I use macOS because it's the only OS to reliably support Apple's Macbook M series. (Unless someone wants to correct me.)

rbanffy 2y ago
If you are paying for Apple hardware, it’s silly to use an OS that’ll make it only less reliable and compatible.

spudlyo 2y ago

I very recently tried again to adopt Linux on the desktop. I'm really sick of feeling like a frog in a pot of water. It's becoming harder and harder to bypass their literal gatekeeping of which applications I can run on my computer, and with every new version of macOS the temperature in the pot keeps rising. The main problem I have with living in a Gnome desktop environment, is with the keyboard. I'm not willing to abandon my use of Emacs control+meta sequences for cursor and editing movements everywhere in the GUI. On macOS, this works because the command (super/Win on Linux/Windows) key is used for common shortcuts and the control key is free for editing shortcuts. I spent a day or so hacking around with kanata[0], which is a kernel level keyboard remapping tool, that lets you define keyboard mapping layers in a similar way you might with QMK firmware. When I press the 'super/win/cmd' it activates a layer which maps certain sequences to their control equivalents, so I can create tabs, close windows, copy and paste (and many more) like my macOS muscle memory wants to do. Other super key sequences (like Super-L for lock desktop or Super-Tab for window cycling) are unchanged. Furthermore, when I hit the control or meta/alt/option key, it activates a layer where Emacs editing keys are emulated using the Gnome equivalents. For example, C-a and C-e are mapped to home/end, etc. The only problem is, this is not the behavior I want in terminals or in GNU/Emacs itself. So I installed a Gnome shell extension[1] that exports information about the active window state to a DBUS endpoint. That let me write a small python daemon (managed by a systemd user service) which wakes up whenever the active window changes. Based on this info, I send a message to the TCP server that kanata (also managed by a systemd user service) provides for remote control to switch to the appropriate layer. After doing this, and tweaking my Gnome setup for another day or so, I am just as comfortable on my Linux machine as I am on my Mac. My main applications are Emacs, Firefox, Mattermost, Slack, ChatGPT, Discord, Kitty, and Steam. My Linux box was previously my Windows gaming box (don't get me started about frog boiling on Windows) and I'm amazed that I can play all my favorite titles (Manor Lords, Hell Let Loose, Foundation) on Linux with Proton. [0]: https://github.com/jtroo/kanata https://github.com/jtroo/kanata [1]: https://github.com/hseliger/window-calls-extended https://github.com/hseliger/window-calls-extended