7 ms·

>I thought I would use it for playing with LLMs, but local dev on a Mac is not fun and I still don't have it fully set up. Sounds more like a you problem, prob

>I thought I would use it for playing with LLMs, but local dev on a Mac is not fun and I still don't have it fully set up. Sounds more like a you problem, probably due to unfamiliarity. There are endless options for local dev on a Mac, and a huge share of devs using one.

Syntaf 1y ago
Agreed, as a software engineer of ~8 years now Mac is actually my _preferred_ environment -- I find it an extremely productive OS for development whether I'm working on full stack or Unity game dev in my free time.
- deaddodo 1y ago
  I don't agree with OP's sentiment that macOS is a bad dev environment, but surely I prefer Linux+KDE as an overall dev environment. I find that all the tools I need are there but that I'm fighting the UI/UX enough to make it a hassle relative to KDE.
  - robenkleene 1y ago
    > I don't agree with OP's sentiment that macOS is a bad dev environment, but surely I prefer Linux+KDE as an overall dev environment. I find that all the tools I need are there but that I'm fighting the UI/UX enough to make it a hassle relative to KDE. This sounds like you think macOS is a good dev environment, but that you personally don't like the UI/UX (always safer to make UI/UX judgements subjective ["I don't like"] rather than objective ["it's bad"], since it's so difficult to evaluate objectively, e.g., compared to saying something like Docker doesn't run natively on macOS, which is just an objective fact).
    - deaddodo 1y ago
      I literally started off my comment saying that it's not bad. That means it's neutral-good, by definition. I can easily develop on both, I prefer developing on Linux. Thus, it is "more good" (IMO), if you prefer.
      - robenkleene 1y ago
        Sorry, you're 100% right, I misread your comment.
SomeUserName432 1y ago
I've been on a mac for ~4 years now. It was a bit of a struggle to get used to it, coming from windows. The only thing I really miss now is alt-tab working as expected. (It's a massive pain to move between two windows of the same program)
- wiseowise 1y ago
  CMD + ~.
- sator-arepo 1y ago
  You know about Cmd+Backtick, do you?
- superjose 1y ago
  https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/ https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/
  - staindk 1y ago
    I don't think I could survive on MacOS without AltTab.
  - SomeUserName432 1y ago
    It has some weird behavior when it comes to reverse order, when you cmd+tab+shift then the shift key is suddenly the deciding button, not tab. End up with the focus just speeding off to the left without really intending to, since it ignores tab and now focuses on shift.
- WXLCKNO 1y ago
  You know you can use CMD+backtick (CMD+`) to cycle between windows of the same app? Add shift to go in reverse. Or otherwise you can enable the app exposé feature to swipe down with three fingers and it will show you only windows of the same app.
  - lostlogin 1y ago
heavyset_go 1y ago
I've used Macs for 20 years starting on the day 32-bit Intel Macs were released, and agree with the GP. Linux and Plasma spoiled me, going back to macOS and its windowing system feels like a step backward, especially for development, where using multiple windows is a must. Task switching is.. not good? I don't get window previews I can switch through when I hover over the dock, but I do on Linux. Yes, I know about Yabai and the other things that modify the existing window manager. The problem is the window manager itself. Outside of the windowing system, running native Linux if you're deploying to Linux beats using an amalgamation of old BSD utils + stuff from Homebrew and hoping it works between platforms, or using VMs. The dev tools that are native to Linux are also nice. When it comes to multiple monitors, I want a dock on each monitor. I can do that in Plasma, but I can't in macOS, unless I use some weird 3rd party software apparently.
- Sharlin 1y ago
  > Task switching is.. not good? I don't get window previews I can switch through when I hover over the dock, but I do on Linux. That just sounds like being accustomed to one way of switching tasks, honestly. If I want previews, I use Expose (three-finger swipe up/down or ctrl-up/down). But mostly I just use cmd-tab and haven't really needed to see previews there. Because macOS switches between applications, not windows, often there isn't single window to preview, and I'm not sure showing all the windows would work well either. For Expose it works well because the it can use the entire screen to show previews.
  - afandian 1y ago
    The app switching behaviour is really infuriating. Selecting a window and having all the app’s windows come to the fore, obscuring the window from another app is still annoying, 20 years on. And then when you full-screen a window, switch to another app for a moment, and then you can’t find it without delving into the ‘window‘ menu. First world problems. But daily annoyances.
    - duskwuff 1y ago
      > Selecting a window and having all the app’s windows come to the fore ... would only happen if the application you switch to is enforcing it for some reason. Ordinarily you can interleave windows all you want. Switching to an application by clicking on it in the Dock or Cmd+Tabbing to it will bring all its windows to the front, though.
godelski 1y ago
> Sounds more like a you problem I'm sorry, I just really hate this Apple Fanboy rhetoric. It's frequent and infuriating. Don't get me wrong, I hate it when the linux people do it too, but they tend to tell you how to get shit done while being mean. The biggest problem with Linux is poor interfaces[0] but the biggest problem with Apple is handcuffs. And honestly, I do not find Apple interfaces intuitive. Linux interfaces and structure, I get, even if the barrier to entry is a big higher, there's lots of documentation. Apple less so. But also with Apple there's just things that are needlessly complex, buried under multiple different locations, and inconsistent. But I said the biggest problem is handcuffs. So let me give a very dumb example. How do you merge identical contacts? Here's the official answer[1] Either: 1) Card > Look for Duplicates 2) Select the duplicate cards, then Card > Merge Selected Cards. Well guess what? #2 isn't an option! I believe this option only appears if you have two contacts that are in the same address book. Otherwise you have the option "Link Selected Cards". Something that isn't clear since the card doesn't tell you what account it is coming from and clicking "Find duplicates" won't offer this suggestion to you. There's dozens of issues like this where you can be right that I'm "holding it wrong", but that just means the interface isn't intuitive. You can try this one out. You can try this out. Go to your contacts, select "All Contacts" and then by clicking any random one try to figure out which address book that contact is from. It will not tell you unless you have linked contacts. And that's the idiocracy of Apple. Everything works smoothly[2] when you've always been on Apple and only use Apple but is painful to even figure out what the problem even is if you have one. The docs are horrendous. The options in the menu bar change and inconsistently disappear or gray out, leading to "where the fuck is that button?". So yeah, maybe a lot of this is due to unfamiliarity, but it's not like they are making it easy. With Apple, it is "Do things the Apple way, or not at all". But with Linux it is "sure whatever you say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯". If my Android phone is not displaying/silencing calls people go "weird, have you tried adjusting X settings?" But if my iPhone is not displaying/silencing calls an Apple person goes "well my watch tells me when someone is calling" and they do not understand how infuriating such an answer is. Yet, it is the norm. I really do want to love Apple. They make beautiful machines. But it is really hard to love something that is constantly punching you in the face. Linux will laugh when you fall on your face, but it doesn't actively try to take a swing or put up roadblocks. There's a big difference. [0] But there's been a big push the last few years to fix this and things have come a long way. It definitely helps that Microsoft and Apple are deteriorating, so thanks for lowering the bar :) [1] https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/merge-contact-cards-adrbk1456/mac https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/merge-contact-cards... [2] Except it actually doesn't
neya 1y ago
Wow, this account's recent comment history is just full-on blasting with pro-apple opinions and attacking anyone who posts even a tinge of negativity about Apple or its recent product(s). I find it amusing we'd become so defensive about for-profit companies and their products..
rtpg 1y ago
Stuff like the containerisation story on Macs is so miserable. The fact that so many devs use Docker and on Mac and pay the orders of magnitude file costs (or do a bunch of other shenanigans) really makes for an unfun experience. Really wish someone could have figured out something a bit better in that space in particular. Docker compose is a "least worst" option for setting up a project with devs when many are uncomfortable with other solutions, but it really takes the oxygen out of anything that might "work"
windexh8er 1y ago
> Sounds more like a you problem... I don't. I'm constantly shifting between my Linux desktop and a Mac for work. I also picked up a personal MBP with as much RAM as Apple allowed (still far overpriced and limited options) about a year and a half ago. While I don't regret it, it's still not my first choice. If there's "endless options for local dev on a Mac" then I don't know how to describe the flexibility that a decent laptop running Linux gives you, comparatively. Honestly I think the Mac only excels in one area still today and that is: the breath of their paid for software library. The polish of Mac used to be the draw, but OS X has degraded over the years as Apple shifts to unify IOS and OS X. And don't get me started on the garbage that iCloud is that Apple continues to force feed harder and harder having, clearly, taken cues from the Windows team in Redmond. I'm really hopeful we start to see more ARM options in non-Mac laptop formats soon. Because, while trivial, it is nice to be able to run small models for a variety of reasons. It is interesting though that I see a "huge share of devs" using a Mac to write code targeting Linux environments when they could actually simplify their development environment by ditching Mac. To each their own.

Syntaf 1y ago

Agreed, as a software engineer of ~8 years now Mac is actually my _preferred_ environment -- I find it an extremely productive OS for development whether I'm working on full stack or Unity game dev in my free time.

deaddodo 1y ago
I don't agree with OP's sentiment that macOS is a bad dev environment, but surely I prefer Linux+KDE as an overall dev environment. I find that all the tools I need are there but that I'm fighting the UI/UX enough to make it a hassle relative to KDE.
- robenkleene 1y ago
  > I don't agree with OP's sentiment that macOS is a bad dev environment, but surely I prefer Linux+KDE as an overall dev environment. I find that all the tools I need are there but that I'm fighting the UI/UX enough to make it a hassle relative to KDE. This sounds like you think macOS is a good dev environment, but that you personally don't like the UI/UX (always safer to make UI/UX judgements subjective ["I don't like"] rather than objective ["it's bad"], since it's so difficult to evaluate objectively, e.g., compared to saying something like Docker doesn't run natively on macOS, which is just an objective fact).
  - deaddodo 1y ago
    I literally started off my comment saying that it's not bad. That means it's neutral-good, by definition. I can easily develop on both, I prefer developing on Linux. Thus, it is "more good" (IMO), if you prefer.
    - robenkleene 1y ago
      Sorry, you're 100% right, I misread your comment.

SomeUserName432 1y ago

I've been on a mac for ~4 years now. It was a bit of a struggle to get used to it, coming from windows. The only thing I really miss now is alt-tab working as expected. (It's a massive pain to move between two windows of the same program)

wiseowise 1y ago
CMD + ~.
sator-arepo 1y ago
You know about Cmd+Backtick, do you?
superjose 1y ago
https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/ https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/
- staindk 1y ago
  I don't think I could survive on MacOS without AltTab.
- SomeUserName432 1y ago
  It has some weird behavior when it comes to reverse order, when you cmd+tab+shift then the shift key is suddenly the deciding button, not tab. End up with the focus just speeding off to the left without really intending to, since it ignores tab and now focuses on shift.
WXLCKNO 1y ago
You know you can use CMD+backtick (CMD+`) to cycle between windows of the same app? Add shift to go in reverse. Or otherwise you can enable the app exposé feature to swipe down with three fingers and it will show you only windows of the same app.
- lostlogin 1y ago

heavyset_go 1y ago

I've used Macs for 20 years starting on the day 32-bit Intel Macs were released, and agree with the GP. Linux and Plasma spoiled me, going back to macOS and its windowing system feels like a step backward, especially for development, where using multiple windows is a must. Task switching is.. not good? I don't get window previews I can switch through when I hover over the dock, but I do on Linux. Yes, I know about Yabai and the other things that modify the existing window manager. The problem is the window manager itself. Outside of the windowing system, running native Linux if you're deploying to Linux beats using an amalgamation of old BSD utils + stuff from Homebrew and hoping it works between platforms, or using VMs. The dev tools that are native to Linux are also nice. When it comes to multiple monitors, I want a dock on each monitor. I can do that in Plasma, but I can't in macOS, unless I use some weird 3rd party software apparently.

Sharlin 1y ago
> Task switching is.. not good? I don't get window previews I can switch through when I hover over the dock, but I do on Linux. That just sounds like being accustomed to one way of switching tasks, honestly. If I want previews, I use Expose (three-finger swipe up/down or ctrl-up/down). But mostly I just use cmd-tab and haven't really needed to see previews there. Because macOS switches between applications, not windows, often there isn't single window to preview, and I'm not sure showing all the windows would work well either. For Expose it works well because the it can use the entire screen to show previews.
- afandian 1y ago
  The app switching behaviour is really infuriating. Selecting a window and having all the app’s windows come to the fore, obscuring the window from another app is still annoying, 20 years on. And then when you full-screen a window, switch to another app for a moment, and then you can’t find it without delving into the ‘window‘ menu. First world problems. But daily annoyances.
  - duskwuff 1y ago
    > Selecting a window and having all the app’s windows come to the fore ... would only happen if the application you switch to is enforcing it for some reason. Ordinarily you can interleave windows all you want. Switching to an application by clicking on it in the Dock or Cmd+Tabbing to it will bring all its windows to the front, though.

godelski 1y ago

> Sounds more like a you problem I'm sorry, I just really hate this Apple Fanboy rhetoric. It's frequent and infuriating. Don't get me wrong, I hate it when the linux people do it too, but they tend to tell you how to get shit done while being mean. The biggest problem with Linux is poor interfaces[0] but the biggest problem with Apple is handcuffs. And honestly, I do not find Apple interfaces intuitive. Linux interfaces and structure, I get, even if the barrier to entry is a big higher, there's lots of documentation. Apple less so. But also with Apple there's just things that are needlessly complex, buried under multiple different locations, and inconsistent. But I said the biggest problem is handcuffs. So let me give a very dumb example. How do you merge identical contacts? Here's the official answer[1] Either: 1) Card > Look for Duplicates 2) Select the duplicate cards, then Card > Merge Selected Cards. Well guess what? #2 isn't an option! I believe this option only appears if you have two contacts that are in the same address book. Otherwise you have the option "Link Selected Cards". Something that isn't clear since the card doesn't tell you what account it is coming from and clicking "Find duplicates" won't offer this suggestion to you. There's dozens of issues like this where you can be right that I'm "holding it wrong", but that just means the interface isn't intuitive. You can try this one out. You can try this out. Go to your contacts, select "All Contacts" and then by clicking any random one try to figure out which address book that contact is from. It will not tell you unless you have linked contacts. And that's the idiocracy of Apple. Everything works smoothly[2] when you've always been on Apple and only use Apple but is painful to even figure out what the problem even is if you have one. The docs are horrendous. The options in the menu bar change and inconsistently disappear or gray out, leading to "where the fuck is that button?". So yeah, maybe a lot of this is due to unfamiliarity, but it's not like they are making it easy. With Apple, it is "Do things the Apple way, or not at all". But with Linux it is "sure whatever you say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯". If my Android phone is not displaying/silencing calls people go "weird, have you tried adjusting X settings?" But if my iPhone is not displaying/silencing calls an Apple person goes "well my watch tells me when someone is calling" and they do not understand how infuriating such an answer is. Yet, it is the norm. I really do want to love Apple. They make beautiful machines. But it is really hard to love something that is constantly punching you in the face. Linux will laugh when you fall on your face, but it doesn't actively try to take a swing or put up roadblocks. There's a big difference. [0] But there's been a big push the last few years to fix this and things have come a long way. It definitely helps that Microsoft and Apple are deteriorating, so thanks for lowering the bar :) [1] https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/merge-contact-cards-adrbk1456/mac https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/merge-contact-cards... [2] Except it actually doesn't

neya 1y ago

Wow, this account's recent comment history is just full-on blasting with pro-apple opinions and attacking anyone who posts even a tinge of negativity about Apple or its recent product(s). I find it amusing we'd become so defensive about for-profit companies and their products..

rtpg 1y ago

Stuff like the containerisation story on Macs is so miserable. The fact that so many devs use Docker and on Mac and pay the orders of magnitude file costs (or do a bunch of other shenanigans) really makes for an unfun experience. Really wish someone could have figured out something a bit better in that space in particular. Docker compose is a "least worst" option for setting up a project with devs when many are uncomfortable with other solutions, but it really takes the oxygen out of anything that might "work"

windexh8er 1y ago

> Sounds more like a you problem... I don't. I'm constantly shifting between my Linux desktop and a Mac for work. I also picked up a personal MBP with as much RAM as Apple allowed (still far overpriced and limited options) about a year and a half ago. While I don't regret it, it's still not my first choice. If there's "endless options for local dev on a Mac" then I don't know how to describe the flexibility that a decent laptop running Linux gives you, comparatively. Honestly I think the Mac only excels in one area still today and that is: the breath of their paid for software library. The polish of Mac used to be the draw, but OS X has degraded over the years as Apple shifts to unify IOS and OS X. And don't get me started on the garbage that iCloud is that Apple continues to force feed harder and harder having, clearly, taken cues from the Windows team in Redmond. I'm really hopeful we start to see more ARM options in non-Mac laptop formats soon. Because, while trivial, it is nice to be able to run small models for a variety of reasons. It is interesting though that I see a "huge share of devs" using a Mac to write code targeting Linux environments when they could actually simplify their development environment by ditching Mac. To each their own.