And here: Why many developers are not switching to mac.
1. Abysmal window manager, not replacable. Pixel waste, clumsy (long list here)
2. Mandatory Click-to-Focus and Click-Raise. Showstopper.
3. No home/end keys on apple laptops and other wierd layout choices.
4. Nasty BSD gang-rape under the hood. Yes, OSX has it's own "windows registry".
5. Idiotic shareware culture that makes you pay for the smallest things. $10 for a sane Macbook trackpad driver that should be in the OS in first place.
To clarify what is being said here (a lot of people seem confused by this)...
A lot of these seem to be the difference between the Mac "This is ours, you can use it" philosophy, and the BSD/Linux "This is ours, WE can use it" philosophy.
There are things about macs that, while they are probably obvious to mac users, are completely non-intuitive to everyone else. Devs don't want to spend time learning the quirks of a window manager, we don't care; we care about....DEVELOPING! When you've got something, like aqua, that just seems to continually get in your way, it sucks.
A personal example:
A few years ago, my parents had just moved into a new house. It was a really cool house, and they were really excited about it. I thought it would be fun to create a spoof of that show that used to be on MTV called "Cribs" (Athletes and singers walk through their houses and show them off with some slow motion/fast motion transitions and some hip hop music). A friend of mine helped by filming me walk around their house and host our fake cribs show.
When it came time to offload the video onto my PC, we ran into trouble, I didn't have the right firewire port for the cable we had (it was his camera). "No Problem", I thought, "I'll just plug it into my friend's laptop (a mac), copy the video to his machine, then SCP it to mine." Hooray, "Unix-Under-The-Hood!".
We imported the movie to "iMovie" (i think that is what it was), but I could NOT figure out how to save the video file. There was no "save" or "export". Nothing. I could "save to quicktime" or "save to the internet" or "save to $foo mac app", but no "Save to /home/scott/video.mpg".
I finally had to "export to quicktime", then do a find. |grep *.mpg to find the thing.
THAT is the sort of "getting in my way" that seems to be not only acceptable at Apple, but standard and required.
Another example is iPods. Ever try and take a song OFF of your ipod? Yes, you can do it, but Apple tries to get in your way as much as they can.
you say tomato i say tomato. the things you've listed aren't deal breakers for me. i've developed for a number of years now on all three systems and so far mac laptops take the cake easy. that's just me situation, though.
also, -1 for use preformatted text that ruins this whole discussion for everyone (without a wide browser window).
also, -1 for use preformatted text that ruins this whole discussion for everyone (without a wide browser window).
Sorry for that one. I found that the quickest way to format a list in a half-bearable way and didn't notice the width (big screen). Maybe PG can be bothered to add some kind of list markup one day...
2. Try typing in an obscured terminal window without raising it.
7. Yes, kind of. But saving in the wrong place because you can't quickly perform an operation on an obscured window and be sure focus is restored to the one you had before. (Or can you? I recall intermittent behaviour and am quite sure that at least keyboard focus is lost)
8. Last time I checked the laptops all had one button.
I know I'm just feeding the troll here but if you re-read the thread carefully you might notice that I am not the one posturing. In fact, maybe show it to someone else and let them judge. Thanks for playing, this conversation has ended.
More like '5 reasons why Mac is no longer impractical for developers'. I think the only absolute benefit it offers (which is driving some people to it but curiously isn't mentioned) is being able to develop iPhone/iPod apps.
Not hating on the Mac, or anything - competition is a good thing. I just didn't care for the evangelista tone.
The majority of this article seems to be the standard " OS X is Great!" talking points.
In my opinion, the real reason that developers switch to OS X is so that they can develop software for apple products (or in the case of web development, develop websites that are OS X friendly).
IMO, The real reason "most" developers switched to mac has more to do with hosting websites on Linux/UNIX than anything else. A true UNIX command prompt is a powerful tool for dealing with large numbers of other UNIX computers and computer files.
SSH + vi and suddenly your not just using your system but any computer your connecting to. The classic windows advantage of all those legacy systems stopped being relevant when many developers went back to notepad to update whatever new language they happened to be using today.
PS: The article mentioned Terminal, but it forgot a lot of the other out of the box UNIX tools like SSH / diff.
On the topic of ssh/dealing with other computers, doesn't PuTTY do that pretty well on windows? Though I may be misunderstanding the advantage you're pointing out.
Putty is just a ssh client. Terminal is a shell that has access to ssh so you can access your own files or redirect ports easily through a remote ssh session(you can do this with putty but you must go through some hoops, ie. loopback device and setting up some ports in the putty config), etc.... I love the tabbed terminals that terminal provides. I can ssh into a work computer and have my local shell in another tab. Very seamless.
Not at all. I think a lot would rather concentrate on building stuff, than trying to get their wifi to work in linux, or managing the latest updates that have broken gcc for some reason.
For most, I think OS X is linux but without the maintenance.
Not true, Apple breaks core features in minor security releases all the time. Most recently, they broke the system Perl. I don't use OS X for anything important anymore (only for watching videos on my TV), but back when I did use a Mac for work, things randomly broke for no reason all the time. (That doesn't even include the nightmare that is ports / fink / whatever, required to get modern versions of UNIX programs.) I use Debian unstable now, and it is a lot more reliable than OS X, for me anyway.
Also, the whole getting wifi to work thing is mostly solved now. All the wireless cards are Intel, and Intel pours a lot of money into making them work really well with Linux. So you pop in your Ubuntu or Moblin CD, install, and right click the little icon, just like on any other OS.
Basically, OS X sucks, Linux sucks, and Windows sucks. So there is no real reason to get super-excited about any of them -- they are all basically the same, with Linux marginally better in a few cases.
Incorrect. Security Update 2009-001 replaced a Perl component which some users had (inappropriately) upgraded themselves, causing breakage for those users. The "system Perl" worked fine as long as you hadn't touched it, though.
: The inappropriate part was touching the Perl install in /System. You don't do that.
Then you should have placed the updated copy in your home directory, or in /usr/local, rather than replacing the one in /System. This is really no different than if you'd updated the Perl install in /usr on a Linux system, and the package manager later replaced that with an updated copy - in both cases, the vendor's supposed to be the only one touching those files.
Try Debian stable, and let me know if it ever breaks. (Debian unstable definitely does break, but not very often, and it's usually easy to fix. It works for me.)
I agree with this. All three operating systems have their flaws, so it basically boils down to preference and ease of development. If you are developing a Windows application, you should develop in Windows; for Apple applications, use OS X; Linux applications, use Linux. One advantage of Apple platforms, which the article mentions, is that that they allow running of all 3 operating systems.
None of the "advantages" sounded so hot to me except the desktop effects, which I haven't bothered to enable in Ubuntu anyway. I use a Mac regularly, and the interface hasn't stopped irritating me. I hate the stoplight window controls, and I hate using Command instead of Control. I love Apple's hardware design, but the software feels... obtuse. And apathetic. Like it has a hard time paying attention to me and doesn't feel like being helpful anyway. (I bought my Mac for four reasons: to try iPhone development, to run Adobe Lightroom, because I love my iPhone, and because I wanted to see what the fuss was all about.)
I'm positively drooling for Apple to release a tablet PC, though. Gimme gimme gimme please.... The multitouch stuff on the iMacs looks extremely cool, and you just know Apple will nail the tablet.
Because they're all terrible. They're all just small laptops with touch-sensitive screens and a few touch-screen software features. I've been itching for a tablet PC since at least 2003, but I've never bought one because I want one that doesn't suck. (Wait, I did buy a Nokia n800... sigh.) Apple's tablet won't suck, because Apple will 1) put a lot of work into creating a UI that works well with the form factor, and 2) have the guts to cut hardware features if that's what it takes to create a decent product.
Funny, I sound like an Apple fanboy, even though I came here to express my irritation with OSX. Right now, if somebody gave me an iMac, my first impulse would be to install Linux on it, but you just have to look at the non-Apple phones released since the iPhone launched to see that Apple is on a completely different plane when it comes to smaller devices. I can't wait to see what they do with tablets, though perhaps it would hurt their prestige to release a novel product for a small market... they wouldn't be able to keep the hype within reasonable bounds, and expectations wouldn't be met.
The iPhone works, because it's small enough to hold with one hand, while you type with the other.
I can't see anything much bigger working TBH. At some stage, you need a keyboard to type on, and to hold the screen at a good angle. And then it's not portable so you may as well have a netbook/laptop.
I typically move my 15" ThinkPad around by grabbing about (checking...) four inches of the corner with one hand. I admit it's a strain to hold it up and type with the other hand, but a tablet would be lighter and more compact. The ThinkPad is heavy and has a long lever arm.
There are lots of daily uses where it would be ideal to have a decent-sized screen and no keyboard. Web surfing in bed (or lying on the couch,) playing simple games in bed, using recipes in the kitchen, videos and news on the road (like an iPhone without the iStrain.) Put a notch in the back so you can hang it on a wall, and it's even more versatile (and even better in the kitchen.) Plus it would be a nice compromise for traveling when the iPhone isn't enough -- have a bluetooth keyboard in your hotel room for blogging and email, carry a nice thin tablet during the day.
Actually, that last scenario pretty much sums it up. It's a small laptop with no hinge, with the keyboard reduced to an optional accessory that you can leave in your briefcase, or in your hotel room, or on your bedside table, or wherever, except when you actually want to bother with it.
Of course, most tablets fail by integrating the keyboard, keeping the hinge, and not providing a decent touch-screen interface. Really decent tablet interfaces have been limited to special-purpose applications for medical entry, warehouse inventory, GPS, or what-not.
The kitchen is the only use case I can see working. A netbook/laptop is far more usable in bed than a tablet would be.
>> "have a bluetooth keyboard in your hotel room for blogging and email"
The bottom bit of a laptop isn't just there for the keyboard, it's there to hold the display at a nice viewing angle. So you'd need some extra device for that as well.
I'd rather hold the screen with my hand. I hate the way my laptop jiggles around every time I shift my weight when I'm sitting on the couch. Plus, when I'm reading in bed I like to turn from my back to one side to the other side. A laptop kind of pins you into one position. Not really, of course, but it makes you want to stay perfectly still even when you start to get uncomfortable.
Agreed. I tried, did not like. At least it is a viable solution.
My only big reason is because mac is a *nix under the hood. So I get all the nice scripting benefits and never have to deal with the windows shell scripting for dev purposes.
The hardware issue is a BIG fucking deal. I just got a mac mini at work for testing. ONLY ONE VIDEO PORT! So no dual screen. My PC? Oh no dual output? no problem a hundred bucks will solve that problem. To make it worse I can't upgrade my mini with a new card, gota get a new mini. (sorry just got = right before their new model was released)
So yea mac is a pain still. I want a nice motherboard like a PC has, and a nice case like a PC has, and as powerful/weak as a mac mini, for the mac mini price. If I need a new card Ill buy one. But that's not available, gota get me the $2000 power mac.
Now we are seeing the clueless wannbe, 3rd-time around "Why Developers are Switching to Mac" articles. I think this is analogous to your mother joining Facebook and "When taxi drivers are giving stock tips, it's time to sell."
These are actually reasons why casual, non-developer users are switching to Macs, not developers or designers.
The author describes how OSX is more open-source friendly, describing also how it comes bundled with developer tools, but I find it incredibly hard to believe that an actual developer will have a hard time finding a better tool online. The apps that come with the OS aren't exactly the best, and just about everyone who's planning to get some work done will find other tools wherever with better libraries and more support.
The author also goes on and on about the UI. The simple taskbar in Windows and Linux is enough for me. Is it really necessary to have to view a thumbnail-esque to change to the window? Alt-Tab is enough.
Security? Please! I'll say again: the developers I know are not stupid. Anyone in their right mind and with some knowledge of computers should know that clicking on an odd-looking ad, or downloading a strange attachment, or accessing a crazy porn site aren't sane things. A combination of Firefox and AdBlock/NoScript can make any OS safe for most people. Unless you have kids who have thumb drives and like to use your computer, contracting a virus that way shouldn't be a concern, either.
The hardware-specific optimization is another problem. iPhone development is booming right now, but what about the rest?
I'm willing to accept "the apple", but presenting bogus arguments isn't convincing.
> The author also goes on and on about the UI. The simple taskbar in Windows and Linux is enough for me. Is it really necessary to have to view a thumbnail-esque to change to the window? Alt-Tab is enough.
I would argue that -this- is the reason why Mac is converting casual non-developer users. "Normal people" are complicated and the way they perceive files, windows, and apps interacting on a computer is varied and bizarre. Alt-tab is simply not enough for normal people to connect with a computer the way they expect it to work.
Leopard has come really far in making visualization tools that are fast, easy to understand, and useful. With one keystroke, I can interact with my open windows in 5 different, task-focused ways. With two keystrokes, I gain access to even more.
If you develop web based applications, Mac OS X has many limitations, strangely enough.
Mac OS X is UNIX alright, but to pull most of libraries from MacPorts is the only sane way to manage dependencies.
If you run Tiger (and see no reasons to upgrade) - then you are stuck with old Java release for ever. There is no way to upgrade Java other than buying Leopard, and then you are still at Apple's mercy for future upgrades.
A simple task like doing 'sudo emacs' requires some custom shell scripting, since emacs that came with the operating system is old and useless.
My initial excitement about Mac hardware is also dented after battery and graphic card both failed only after a year on my MacBook Pro.
A web developer would be much more happy on Linux if he/she could live without eye candy.
"Mac OS X is UNIX alright, but to pull most of libraries from MacPorts is the only sane way to manage dependencies."
The only time this is the case is ImageMagik. Everything else is easily manageable by hand unless you insist of mixing it with the normal mac stuff. MacPorts is hardly necessary.
It's unfortunate too, because Apple has one of the best non-package solutions for managing software installs in their .bundle and .app and .framework scheme. It's exquisitely simple and elegant, but everyone seems hesitant to adopt it because, well, because the UNIX way is to use a byzantine and barely functional package system and not incur manifest parsing penalties when apps are loaded.
same thing happened to me. imagemagick has an image viewer app that requires x11.
worse, i did indeed already have x11 installed, but imagemagick didn't like it for some reason, and failed to install. so i pulled down one of the binary distributions instead.
If I have to fiddle with macports, install my own emacs and live with the Java Apple wants me to have, I would rather just buy a cheap core 2 duo notebook or a netbook and put Linux on it. The only reason to buy a Mac is if you need iTunes, Adobe stuff and Office and don't want to run Linux.
Or if you are developing for Mac (in which case it would be rather dumb to use anything else)
It makes more sense to put an exact duplicate of your server platform (FreeBSD, Linux, Solaris) in a VM on the Mac and develop on the machine headless. Same applies to developing on Linux.
For the same reasons it would be nicer to ssh into a real, not virtual, unix server machine from Mac OS X. It's a real unix underneath with a proper terminal built in. I'm temporarily doing similar at work on a Windows machine and Putty just doesn't cut it. I could look into cygwin or whatever but sod that, Ubuntu will be replacing it shortly.
I'm not sure why a 'unified interface' is such a selling point. Does Windows not offer it? To be honest, I'm constantly finding that things on my Mac don't have a unified interface and that Apple keeps changing what they're looking to build.
Both platforms (Mac and Win) tend to violate consistency on a case-by-case basis. Adium, one of the apps highlighted in the article as awesome (which it is), does not conform to the rest of the system's interface. Specifically, it uses white tabs rather than the new not-quite-metal look of 10.5. Likewise, iTunes has different scrollbars, Camino and OmniWeb don't use the new button-look for controls and use the old-style flat color images, sometimes input boxes have rounded corners and sometimes they don't, sometimes you can tab to select menus and sometimes you can't, find boxes are in every form imaginable. . .
Consistency is great, but practicality beats purity. Both Apple and Microsoft have kept things decently consistent and violate their designs. Heck, with web pages throwing all sorts of interfaces at users, even the non-techies are getting used to understanding how different interfaces work.
OS X is great, but I don't see it as being amazingly more consistent than other platforms.
I think this is an extremely poor article, particularly as this largely seems like just a random selection of vague talking points while giving anything concrete. I'm slightly frustrated that people think that this sort of article is worthy of being upvoted when it has little more substance than "Apple! Yay!".
I think the real reasons developers, compared to all other users, are beginning to use Macs is down to 3 reasons:
* Unix tools, software and terminal. Unix, and Unix software, is the bread and butter for a lot of developers, and getting them to work on Windows is pain and even then is regarded as a second-class citizen. People have been crying out for a truly good Unix workstation for years, but Apple are the first ones to gain enough traction to matter and truly create a good out-of-the-box user experience for it.
* Universality. Mac OS X runs notoriously poorly under virtualization, so buying a Mac is the only simple choice if you wish to develop for all current platforms, something that is increasingly common, and run all the software available.
* Fashion, particularly in areas where programming has overlapped design such as web development. People follow each other and their trends, and Mac OS X and the Macbook Pro has become a fashion among a certain type of developer.
Yes, I have read the article. Yes, they are mentioned in the article... alongside another dozen Macintosh features which have little or no bearing on the reasons that developers specifically buy Macintosh machines compared to ordinary users. Unless, of course, you honestly think developers are buying Macs because of Quartz or Core Animation as much as they are Unix support, because they aren't savvy enough to know how to avoid spyware, or because they're looking for obviously much-needed help at the Genius Bar. A stopped clock is right twice a day.
I picked up a 13" Macbook (unibody) at the end of last year because I was looking to do some iPhone/iPod Touch development. I'd always wanted to give OS X a go because of the underlying system and I've become a big fan of the OS.
I'd have to say that the biggest thing holding me back from doing extensive development on the OS, though, is the lack of "Home" and "End" buttons (it's the small things, I guess). I know there's Command+Left/Right but it's just such a weird keystroke and if I want to select a line it's not End, Shift+Home. I have to press Command+Right, Shift+Command+Left and it just feels like a lot of unnecessary keystrokes.
I also don't like the fact there's no built-in solution for mouse acceleration. I want it turned off but from what I've read in my searches there's no way to do it without running a separate program to do it for you.
Text editing on the keyboard also drove me crazy for a while. You do get used to it. My lingering complaints: the insane placement of Cmd for Cut/Copy/Paste (talk about a Vulcan Nerve Pinch!) and the mental shift required when switching back and forth between the GUI and the shell. (Mainly that's remembering to switch to/from Control/Cmd).
I love using Command-C to cut and paste throughout the OS including the terminal, rather than having to switch to Control-Shift-C for certain things as you do under Gnome, where forgetting means canceling something.
Every single new Mac user has a "critical missing feature" that turns out not to be so missing after all once they actually read the docs about the literally thousands of keyboard shortcuts that they can call upon.
I've come to like my iBook G4 more since I've been running Debian on it. The advantage, which no fanboy can dispute is this, free upgrades. I got sick of this or that not working under 10.3 (no Java updates, for example) and so I thought "I'm just not shelling out $100+ for a new OS."
I do appreciate that OSX is now an official UNIX, more power to 'em.
This isn't a Warez approval site so stealing it is not an option. Therefore your choices to install Leopard for free are: Find someone willing to fund your purchase of Leopard.
What about brand appeal. Macs are also a status symbol. A way to make a statement about yourself, telling others that you are 'in' that exclusive club, you are cool and happening.
I really think that this is an overstated effect for computers. For the iPhone and iPod maybe that's true. But for the laptops? I dunno.
I know OSX is the #1 reason I prefer a mac at home. Being able to play like a native member of the Posix world while still having one of my favorite GUI APIs available is a big deal in my book.
Oddly enough on the lekking[1] front; I've gotten more comments in the last few months when I pull my smallish (8.9in.) netbook out and use it, than I've seen anyone get for using a Mac in the past couple of years.
Whether they'll admit it or not, that comment is probably the #1 issue holding back more hackers from switching to a Mac. Hackers :: Linux as Hipsters :: ObscureIndieRock. Switching to a Mac is like admitting you listen to Nickleback.
I'd guess price and compatibility with already-purchased or Windows-only software is the #1 reason, but you have a good point. Years ago my friend Nick used to use an old Dell with stickers and tape and missing keys. He ran Slackware and wrote magical code. I hate to think of it as a question of "status" but I do unconsciously and unintentionally appraise people as hacker/non-hacker at coffee shops, airports and such based on their laptops. From lowest to highest: Dell with Windows, corporate asset tag and Outlook on the screen; next, Sony Vaio playing Disney cartoon full-screen; then a Mac; and at the rare top, something like Nick's old computer with stickers and tape and syntax-highlighted terminal editor on the screen. I'm sorry, now I feel bad about judging people like that. And Nick now uses a nice black MacBook.
I read this and was underwhelmed.I'm not a Mac hater (I used one for over a decade), but nothing on the list seemed all that compelling. The Unix base and virtualization are the most compelling reasons, but the only reason virtualizing Macs on generic x86 boxes is problematic is OS X's license.
Macs are nice machines. But if you have some other reason for using Windows (cost, compatibility, prior experience), I don't see a compelling case for switching.
I didn't read the list in detail, but was there realy anything on that list(except the hardware and the mac only apps) that i don't have in KDE4? Im seriously asking and im not really bashing apple this time(i sort of have a history with that).
nice article. I have to admit, that after Apple and Intel "teamed" up I actually spent a thought on buying one, but my wallet was clearly against it since I'm a full time CS student. perhaps sometime in the future I'll buy a mac or I'll give OSx86 (http://www.osx86project.org/) a try.
I buy Macs because they work fine and I can afford them and I spent far too many years of my life dicking around with Linux on the desktop when it clearly belongs in the datacenter.
I don't use Windows because it isn't Unix, not even if you use Cygwin and squint and tilt your head sideways.
No it's not. My 13-yo son uses a Linux-based phone, my wife uses a Mac and my mother uses Ubuntu. It's fair to say neither of them uses the terminal for anything (wife did sudo shutdown her Macbook when it refused to do it from the Apple menu), but Unix is not about terminals - it's an operating system ideal.
"Y Combinator is (we hope) visited mostly by hackers. The proportions of OSes are: Windows 66.4%, Macintosh 18.8%, Linux 11.4%, and FreeBSD 1.5%. The Mac number is a big change from what it would have been five years ago."
I'd love to see current numbers so we can spot the trend
Agreed... those numbers were from March 2005. PG, can we have an update, please?
Also, I was at the first Startup School at Harvard in 2005 (?). One of the speakers (PG?) noted the very high proportion of Macs in the room. Looking around I guessed about 80%. That is consistent with something PG said in that Mac essay - "If you want to know what ordinary people will be doing with computers in ten years, just walk around the CS department at a good university. Whatever they're doing, you'll be doing." I'm seeing more of my friends and coworkers using Mac, even DBAs who use MS SQL Server a lot.
This is anecdotal, of course, but I've rarely used Mac in my lifetime. Windows always satisfied my needs, however now that PC gaming has essentially become pointlessly costly to me (Microsoft lost me with the whole DX10 only games, now they're readying to release D3D11, likely with its own swathe of D3D11 only games), because I can no longer buy a top of the line card and run it into the ground, because of Microsofts foolish bid to force people into Vista.
Unfortunately I ended up with Vista on one of my computers, the system is so cumbersome it's repugnant to me. XP had it's faults, however they're all passable and the lack of elegance in the system was forgiven by its durability and compatibility between locals (School, Work, Home).
Unfortunately for Microsoft, my next desktop is going to be an iMac. I'm fully aware there's going to be a learning curve when switching OS, however using Vista is frequently painful compared to XP. So for me, their's no longer a perceived barrier to entry to Mac, plus my wife is pushing for our next desktop to be a Mac... so I likely no longer have a choice but Mac. Same thing happened with the Xbox, when she found out the Elite was black and matched our TV she wouldn't let me get the cheaper one.
To borrow from The Big Lebowski, "You're not wrong, Walter, you're just an asshole".
(You may have a point, but you've presented it in a trollish manner without explanation, justification, deviation, hesitation or repetition and it doesn't add to the discussion)
Although I haven't read any of the 56 responses here, I'm probably safe in assuming:
1) No new insight into this earth-shattering issue will arise, even from the mighty minds on HN.
2) Even if 1) were wrong, it wouldn't change anyone's mind anyways.
1. Abysmal window manager, not replacable. Pixel waste, clumsy (long list here)
2. Mandatory Click-to-Focus and Click-Raise. Showstopper.
3. No home/end keys on apple laptops and other wierd layout choices.
4. Nasty BSD gang-rape under the hood. Yes, OSX has it's own "windows registry".
5. Idiotic shareware culture that makes you pay for the smallest things. $10 for a sane Macbook trackpad driver that should be in the OS in first place.
6. Inconsistent keyboard shortcuts, meta-key nonsense, Apple+Q.
7. Menus only on context-sensitive titlebar, sub-problem of #2
8. Single mouse button idiocy.
9. Finder.
10. Equivalent PC hardware can be had for 60% of the apple price