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I'm working for a startup right now, using a Lenovo ThinkPad running Linux. Most developers who've worked here use Apple products running OSX. Leaving aside t

I'm working for a startup right now, using a Lenovo ThinkPad running Linux. Most developers who've worked here use Apple products running OSX. Leaving aside the virtues of Linux vs. OSX as a development environment, I'd use this as a litmus test. If your request for a Linux box is refused, run for the hills. It's as bad a sign as being forced to wear a suit and tie. Re. OSX vs. Linux: my opinion, having spent years using Windows, Linux (various flavours), OSX and a little FreeBSD: OSX is better than Windows for software development, but that's as far as it goes. It's still a locked-down proprietary imponator that you'd do well to avoid.

piva00 11y ago
I have an issue with reasoning about what system you're gonna use to be productive based on ideology-based values. I've used Windows, Linux and OS X to develop, mostly of the environment I'm responsible for is Linux (and some Mac dev machines our team uses). In my opinion I'm really most productive in OS X, I don't have to be aware of weird glitches when using distro Y in hardware Z nor do I need to configure anything to work in my Macs, they just works and that's what I really want from a workstation. I don't feel locked-down, I have a lot of UNIX tools to leverage myself while having support from a very sane and invisible UI experience. Really, the time when Mavericks came and fucked up ntpd and our machines started to have weird glitches with HTTPS and other time-based authentications I got really angry. But then I remembered when I had to fiddle with Xorg or run a laptop without sound for months under CentOS or Mint or any other of the dozen of distros I've tried to use. I love to tinker with computers, that's why I chose this career, but when you get older you begin to really praise when work-stuff "just works", you let the tinkering to stuff which you want to play with. So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of. Yet this is exactly where ideology matters. If Apple as a corporation decides to make OSX worse than it is, later on, you will have no choice but to follow, if you stay on Mac hardware. Linux is the only option that gives you freedom to choose your tools, your distribution that fits you best, and change if needed.
  - PebblesHD 11y ago
    > Linux is the only option that gives you the freedom to... And exactly how is Apple or the use of a Macbook restricting your toolset in every way. OSX is UNIX compliant and will run damn near any tool a generix Linux distro can, with the added bonus that it wont take a thousand years to configure and maintain. Add to that the ability for enterprise to use a policy server and even domain logons with limited hassle and it forms quite a reasonable platform for development. Linux is a perfectly usable development OS, but OSX and Windows are just as capable given the same amount of configuration.
    - dman 11y ago
      I have to disagree about this. As a development environment both Windows and OSX are noticeably more broken out of the box as compared to Linux / FreeBSD. Neither comes with a package manager and you have to go through a song and dance to get a compiler / debugger / profiler toolchain setup on either platform. You cant dump out the list of installed packages from your prior machine and use it as a recipe to get your new machine setup. On a linux box, I can provision a new machine and have it behave exactly as I want in under 10 minutes. Getting nfs setup with good transfer speeds was an exercise in frustration on Yosemite (Ultimately I gave up, even on an ethernet connection I cannot coax my macbook pro to do > 2 Mbps nfs transfers). On Windows I had to buy an enterprise version for NFS share support.
      - duncan_bayne 11y ago
        While working on one contract, I sat next to two devs who spent at least a day trying to get Ruby 2.0 (back when it was new) and associated libraries compiling and running properly on OSX. I don't know how long they spent, they were still at it when I left that evening. All my Linux (Mint) setup is in a bunch of scripts that live in Git. I can have a fully configured dev machine running in under an hour, starting from a fresh OS installation.
        stephenr 11y ago
        How long did those scripts take you to write? With similar scripts an OS X machine could also be configured.
- duncan_bayne 11y ago
  "I have an issue with reasoning about what system you're gonna use to be productive based on ideology-based values." I have had literally years of experience trying to standardise OSX across a range of pairing workstations, and the experience was sufficiently bad to: a) put me off OSX entirely as a 'serious' OS b) motivate me to develop a Vagrant-based dev system that could be shared across OSX hosts, and used via SSH w/ X forwarding I demonstrated the solution to a local Ruby on Rails meetup, where it was fairly well received despite the vast majority of the audience being Apple users and, in many cases, advocates. I wasn't trying to make an ideological argument there. Leaving the ideology aside: been there, done that, never again. "So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of." In terms of ideology, look at say kernel extensions. These days, you have to have permission from Apple to sign kernel extensions such that you can install them on your own machine. Not only does this mean that OSX is broken as a machine for serious work (i.e. stuff beyond running your latest Rails project), it's a clear example of how important ideology actually is. Ideology is important. Sooner or later, it makes or breaks your project in ways you'd never expect. (The same is true of teams, companies and entire countries).
cpncrunch 11y ago
I guess it depends what kind of development you're doing. If you need to use XCode and/or test on Safari then OSX is required. You can also reliably run Windows and Linux VMs on Apple hardware, but not vice-versa. Also, Macbook Pros are incredibly well built hardware, compared to the typical Thinkpad. I'd recommend that the OP try using a Macbook Pro if he/she hasn't used them before. You might be pleasantly surprised. I think it might be better to be a little bit open-minded when considering a job, rather than rejecting them if they don't let you use linux. Ask them what their reasons are for using Apple hardware.
- VeriPine 11y ago
  well you only get one. So you be open minded means if I don't like it I am still stuck with it.
- ekianjo 11y ago
  > Also, Macbook Pros are incredibly well built hardware, compared to the typical Thinkpad. They are built to be monoliths that cannot be opened and tweaked with. I'm not sure how you can say it's well built hardware if one cannot interact with it at all. On a Thinkpad, I can upgrade the memory, add a SSD on top of my base hard drive, remove and replace the LCD screen, completely replace the keyboard... and of course change the battery - and everything just works. That's incredibly well built -modular- hardware, without any stop needed at your local Lenovo shop to change anything.
  - PebblesHD 11y ago
    > Cannot be opened or tweaked with Unlike a many-year-old thinkpad, Macbooks generally dont have problems requiring you to open them and fiddle. As with alot of Ultrabook style machines, everything's soldered down meaning you get a thinner, lighter product, even the new thinkpads. Granted upgradinng RAM is a bit tricky now, but 8GB base isnt too bad. EDIT: pre-empting the reply, I use both a T61 and a Macbook and they're both useful in their own ways.
    - ekianjo 11y ago

piva00 11y ago

I have an issue with reasoning about what system you're gonna use to be productive based on ideology-based values. I've used Windows, Linux and OS X to develop, mostly of the environment I'm responsible for is Linux (and some Mac dev machines our team uses). In my opinion I'm really most productive in OS X, I don't have to be aware of weird glitches when using distro Y in hardware Z nor do I need to configure anything to work in my Macs, they just works and that's what I really want from a workstation. I don't feel locked-down, I have a lot of UNIX tools to leverage myself while having support from a very sane and invisible UI experience. Really, the time when Mavericks came and fucked up ntpd and our machines started to have weird glitches with HTTPS and other time-based authentications I got really angry. But then I remembered when I had to fiddle with Xorg or run a laptop without sound for months under CentOS or Mint or any other of the dozen of distros I've tried to use. I love to tinker with computers, that's why I chose this career, but when you get older you begin to really praise when work-stuff "just works", you let the tinkering to stuff which you want to play with. So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of.

ekianjo 11y ago
> So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of. Yet this is exactly where ideology matters. If Apple as a corporation decides to make OSX worse than it is, later on, you will have no choice but to follow, if you stay on Mac hardware. Linux is the only option that gives you freedom to choose your tools, your distribution that fits you best, and change if needed.
- PebblesHD 11y ago
  > Linux is the only option that gives you the freedom to... And exactly how is Apple or the use of a Macbook restricting your toolset in every way. OSX is UNIX compliant and will run damn near any tool a generix Linux distro can, with the added bonus that it wont take a thousand years to configure and maintain. Add to that the ability for enterprise to use a policy server and even domain logons with limited hassle and it forms quite a reasonable platform for development. Linux is a perfectly usable development OS, but OSX and Windows are just as capable given the same amount of configuration.
  - dman 11y ago
    I have to disagree about this. As a development environment both Windows and OSX are noticeably more broken out of the box as compared to Linux / FreeBSD. Neither comes with a package manager and you have to go through a song and dance to get a compiler / debugger / profiler toolchain setup on either platform. You cant dump out the list of installed packages from your prior machine and use it as a recipe to get your new machine setup. On a linux box, I can provision a new machine and have it behave exactly as I want in under 10 minutes. Getting nfs setup with good transfer speeds was an exercise in frustration on Yosemite (Ultimately I gave up, even on an ethernet connection I cannot coax my macbook pro to do > 2 Mbps nfs transfers). On Windows I had to buy an enterprise version for NFS share support.
    - duncan_bayne 11y ago
      While working on one contract, I sat next to two devs who spent at least a day trying to get Ruby 2.0 (back when it was new) and associated libraries compiling and running properly on OSX. I don't know how long they spent, they were still at it when I left that evening. All my Linux (Mint) setup is in a bunch of scripts that live in Git. I can have a fully configured dev machine running in under an hour, starting from a fresh OS installation.
      - stephenr 11y ago
        How long did those scripts take you to write? With similar scripts an OS X machine could also be configured.
duncan_bayne 11y ago
"I have an issue with reasoning about what system you're gonna use to be productive based on ideology-based values." I have had literally years of experience trying to standardise OSX across a range of pairing workstations, and the experience was sufficiently bad to: a) put me off OSX entirely as a 'serious' OS b) motivate me to develop a Vagrant-based dev system that could be shared across OSX hosts, and used via SSH w/ X forwarding I demonstrated the solution to a local Ruby on Rails meetup, where it was fairly well received despite the vast majority of the audience being Apple users and, in many cases, advocates. I wasn't trying to make an ideological argument there. Leaving the ideology aside: been there, done that, never again. "So yeah, I know there are some good arguments to use Linux vs OS X but ideology is not one I'm really fond of." In terms of ideology, look at say kernel extensions. These days, you have to have permission from Apple to sign kernel extensions such that you can install them on your own machine. Not only does this mean that OSX is broken as a machine for serious work (i.e. stuff beyond running your latest Rails project), it's a clear example of how important ideology actually is. Ideology is important. Sooner or later, it makes or breaks your project in ways you'd never expect. (The same is true of teams, companies and entire countries).

cpncrunch 11y ago

I guess it depends what kind of development you're doing. If you need to use XCode and/or test on Safari then OSX is required. You can also reliably run Windows and Linux VMs on Apple hardware, but not vice-versa. Also, Macbook Pros are incredibly well built hardware, compared to the typical Thinkpad. I'd recommend that the OP try using a Macbook Pro if he/she hasn't used them before. You might be pleasantly surprised. I think it might be better to be a little bit open-minded when considering a job, rather than rejecting them if they don't let you use linux. Ask them what their reasons are for using Apple hardware.

VeriPine 11y ago
well you only get one. So you be open minded means if I don't like it I am still stuck with it.
ekianjo 11y ago
> Also, Macbook Pros are incredibly well built hardware, compared to the typical Thinkpad. They are built to be monoliths that cannot be opened and tweaked with. I'm not sure how you can say it's well built hardware if one cannot interact with it at all. On a Thinkpad, I can upgrade the memory, add a SSD on top of my base hard drive, remove and replace the LCD screen, completely replace the keyboard... and of course change the battery - and everything just works. That's incredibly well built -modular- hardware, without any stop needed at your local Lenovo shop to change anything.
- PebblesHD 11y ago
  > Cannot be opened or tweaked with Unlike a many-year-old thinkpad, Macbooks generally dont have problems requiring you to open them and fiddle. As with alot of Ultrabook style machines, everything's soldered down meaning you get a thinner, lighter product, even the new thinkpads. Granted upgradinng RAM is a bit tricky now, but 8GB base isnt too bad. EDIT: pre-empting the reply, I use both a T61 and a Macbook and they're both useful in their own ways.
  - ekianjo 11y ago