[HN Gopher] My next Mac might be the last
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       My next Mac might be the last
        
       Author : pier25
       Score  : 86 points
       Date   : 2022-10-24 19:39 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (morrick.me)
 (TXT) w3m dump (morrick.me)
        
       | drcongo wrote:
       | I feel like my current Mac (MBP M1 Pro) might be my last, because
       | it's so damn good that I can't imagine ever needing more.
        
       | chipotle_coyote wrote:
       | I'm eternally conflicted by personal stories like this, with part
       | of me going _do we have to do this again?_ and another part
       | responding with _surely you don't think Apple is above
       | criticism._
       | 
       | No. Of course I don't. Apple has made criticism-worthy decisions
       | for years and they still regularly make them. But at times it
       | seems like there's just a...reach. I'm using macOS Monterey right
       | now, and while I don't think the Big Sur UI refresh is a
       | substantial improvement over its predecessor Catalina and it made
       | a few aesthetic choices I'd charitably describe as dubious, it's
       | hardly a catastrophic regression. Yeah, people are nostalgic
       | about OS X Snow Leopard, but that's not a particularly good
       | indication of it being the pinnacle of design. People are also
       | nostalgic about Windows 3.1, AmigaOS, and CP/M. (Snow Leopard is
       | full of the old "metal" UI, glowy candy-colored buttons, and
       | drawers. It's adorable, but it's very 2000s.)
       | 
       | And, I mean, okay, Mac people are stereotypically (over)sensitive
       | to UX decisions, I get that. So when the author writes, "I'm not
       | saying I'm dumping the Mac and switching to Windows or Linux,"
       | well: no, he's clearly not, is he. He's just written a a fair
       | number of words with the clear subtext, _I am a Mac person who is
       | stereotypically oversensitive to UX decisions._ Apple will
       | undoubtedly make other weird choices next year with macOS Fresno
       | or Oxnard or whatever, but they will probably still on the whole
       | be choices Mac UX nerds will like more than the alternatives.
       | 
       | (Also, dumping the Mac and switching to Windows or Linux will
       | deprive people of the opportunity to write about how much they
       | hate the Mac, and you know, where would the fun be in that.)
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | derbOac wrote:
         | You're correctly pointing to some hypocritical subtext, but to
         | be fair to the author, they explain the reason for their
         | ambivalence: it's because there's such a contrast between
         | hardware and software.
         | 
         | This is nothing new really, but then that goes to the heart of
         | why people "love to hate the Mac". It's not that they love to
         | hate it, it's that the hardware is so great, but then you have
         | this kind of increasingly corporate consumer-hostile stuff that
         | gets thrown on top of it (in the past it was just plain bloated
         | inefficiency, like early iTunes).
         | 
         | So let's say you are in the author's position: what do you do?
         | Regardless of whether it's Linux or Windows, you're going to go
         | onto other hardware systems. Many of the options are pretty
         | nice and underrated in "Mac faithful" communities. But really,
         | they're _probably_ not quite what Apple offers, if not in
         | quality, than in selling points.
         | 
         | Recently this has been exacerbated because Apple is putting out
         | an ARM chip that's pretty powerful but also power-efficient.
         | Add nice trackpads, nice monitors, great battery life, and so
         | forth, and it's hard to leave even if you are frustrated with
         | the software. What other high-performing consumer ARM/RISC
         | power efficient laptop are you going to find?
         | 
         | A lot of people (I'm in this boat now) would love to see the
         | ability to buy Apple hardware and slap Linux on it seamlessly,
         | but it's not quite there yet. Asahi Linux is incredibly
         | impressive in how fast its grown but it's not actually ready
         | for primetime: last time I looked at the status notes, you were
         | at risk of literally blowing up your speakers by doing much
         | with them.
         | 
         | So then the ambivalence goes around and around.
        
       | yawnxyz wrote:
       | I decided my last Macbook Pro 15 was my last Macbook, then bought
       | a top of the range DELL running Windows 10, and the fit and
       | finish of both the device and the OS is just not there.
       | 
       | Using the touchpad was a chore as it's not as responsive; ads pop
       | up all over the Start menu; the monitor is blurry; and even
       | setting up things like Bluetooth devices were hit and miss.
       | 
       | Ended up getting another Macbook, for better or worse
        
       | wizardman wrote:
       | While we're getting things off our chest I wanted to share
       | something.
       | 
       | I'm still using the original iPhone SE (you know, the small phone
       | with bezels). The design of Safari for iOS used to be perfect.
       | The + sign to open a new tab was right in the middle. Switching
       | to incognito was 1 tap away. The open tabs were stacked open
       | behind another.
       | 
       | Apple redesigned Safari in iOS 15 to accommodate it for the
       | bigger all-screen iPhones. The address bar was moved to the
       | bottom for better reachability. The + sign was moved away not to
       | be so close to that horizontal line that replaced the home
       | button. Incognito was hidden away. The stack of open tabs become
       | a grid.
       | 
       | Even though the redesign made sense for the bigger bezel-less
       | phones it was a regression for phones like the iPhone SE. I would
       | have loved if they introduced the changes only to newer models
       | but I can also understand that maintaining 2 different UIs
       | would've been more work.
        
       | SevenNation wrote:
       | > But what about security? Are you sure you want to stay on an
       | older version of Mac OS? -- Thankfully I'm tech-savvy enough to
       | know what I'm doing. The two Macs I use most are still on High
       | Sierra and Mojave, and haven't received security updates in quite
       | a while. I haven't had any security-related problem whatsoever.
       | ...
       | 
       | Lots to unpack here. First, the author is stating a personal
       | preference and won't be swayed. Fair enough.
       | 
       | But the idea that the author would know they "haven't had any
       | security-related problems whatsoever" is debatable at best. The
       | attack surface is enormous.
       | 
       | Even security experts admit they have trouble securing a consumer
       | computer. And it doesn't sound like the author spends much time
       | dealing with the topic in depth.
        
         | jollyllama wrote:
         | How often do ordinary people actually get owned by zero days
         | like you're describing? The majority have got to be malicious
         | links, opening dangerous attachments, etc. Or, back in the day,
         | a misconfigured firewall; I'd still absolutely recommend a
         | strict firewall on the router.
        
           | hot_gril wrote:
           | I agree, you can probably stay on an old release and be ok,
           | but that doesn't mean it's worth the risk.
        
         | kitsunesoba wrote:
         | Yeah, I won't say that I've enjoyed the restrictions that've
         | come with the various security-associated measures added over
         | the years, but I leave them turned on anyway because all it
         | takes is one zero-day on some site you visit that manages to
         | worm its way through your blocking extensions.
         | 
         | I've been using computers for 25+ years and have been
         | technically capable for the better part of that, but that
         | doesn't mean I'm any less vulnerable. I'm not going to be
         | intentionally clicking on fishy links or anything but we all
         | make mistakes, which makes it more a matter of when than if.
        
         | Apocryphon wrote:
         | macOS is much more prevalent than it used to be, but the attack
         | surface is hardly "enormous" considering the prominence of
         | security vulnerabilities on Windows.
         | 
         | Would be more interesting to actually cite examples of high-
         | risk exploits that have been discovered since High Sierra and
         | Mojave.
        
         | RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
         | The OP points about security updates seem like a good example
         | of Dunning-Kruger
        
       | DoctorD68 wrote:
       | I've been feeling this creeping since roughly the PPC->Intel
       | transition. There was a point where I was turning off more new OS
       | X features than using them. The inescapable fact is that if you
       | do not want to fully jump into the Apple ecosystem, macOS treats
       | you like a second class citizen. I sync my iPhone via lightning
       | cable, use Retroactive to install iTunes (it's better than
       | Apple's "Music" app if you're managing your own library), get my
       | apps via homebrew casks, store my documents locally, and every
       | new release of macOS makes these sort of things a little bit
       | harder.
       | 
       | As far as security posture goes, I'm not too concerned. Little
       | Snitch + Pihole are pretty amazing and I have the skills to stay
       | secure. But it is depressing watching from the Catalina shore as
       | each year another macOS release takes more autonomy from the
       | user.
        
         | dkonofalski wrote:
         | I'm genuinely curious why you're doing this. What advantages do
         | you get from turning off these features, installing old apps,
         | and storing everything locally? I sync via my own server but
         | still leave the iCloud backups for Documents on and there's no
         | a single reason that I can see to install iTunes that's not
         | already done better by other media players without the addition
         | of Apple Music (which I use heavily in addition to keeping my
         | own music library in Plex).
         | 
         | I feel like making those kinds of concessions means that MacOS
         | doesn't treat you as a second-class citizen but that you've
         | deliberately chosen to make yourself a second-class citizen. In
         | what ways do Linux or Windows (or even older MacOS) treat you
         | like a first-class citizen that the new MacOS doesn't anymore?
        
           | DoctorD68 wrote:
           | I've started a draft to your comment 3 times now and it
           | always becomes a "not your cloud, not your data" rant :) But
           | better writers than me have, and continue to, bang that drum
           | so I will not right now.
           | 
           | I could write 100 blog posts about this but let me give you
           | one good example: Years ago when many people still synced
           | their iPhones via cable, you could sync all the major "iLife"
           | apps -- photos, music, contacts, calendar etc. When Apple
           | released Notes.app, it was around the time the iCloud push
           | got really big and more people started using that. To this
           | day, you cannot sync Notes.app via cable. It would be a
           | trivial thing to implement, but it prevents cloud adoption
           | and is so clearly in the "wontfix" category that the only
           | conclusion is that it's intentionally left out. Want your
           | Mac's notes on your iPhone? Get in the iCloud, citizen, and
           | maybe we'll let you.
           | 
           | Bottom line is that if you go back and look at Steve Jobs'
           | 2001 digital hub strategy, the futuristic view was one where
           | the Mac was the ground truth for your data and your apps. You
           | were in charge. You owned the machine, it did what you
           | wanted, and you bought neat peripherals that interfaced with
           | it like mp3 players and cameras.
           | 
           | But today the "digital hub" is the cloud, and the Mac is just
           | another peripheral. Today by default Macs and iPhones need to
           | be "activated" via internet connection to reinstall the OS,
           | and any peripherals you buy (looking at you, fucking HP/Epson
           | shit) will likely force you to create a cloud account which
           | means they own it, not you.
           | 
           | <insert cloud rant here>
           | 
           | Side note: Windows is a worse offender, you need look no
           | further than Windows 11 and its removal of the local account
           | except via extremely technical/hacky means. This is an
           | intentionally malicious push to their ecosystem, and one I
           | hope Apple does not follow (but essentially has on iOS and I
           | won't be surprised if/when macOS follows suit).
           | 
           | PPS. One of the next big pushes here will be passkeys. If
           | they can tightly couple your online services to their devices
           | for authn then the ease and freedom to migrate systems is
           | reduced further, and "knowing" your credentials for an online
           | service means nothing. The cloud provider decides if you get
           | to access it or not.
        
           | DoctorD68 wrote:
           | Oh! I thought of another peak frustration, iOS this time.
           | Years ago when you toggled off WiFi and Bluetooth via the
           | swipe-down control center it disabled the radios at the
           | hardware level. I like this because wifi and bluetooth have
           | become de-facto tracking technologies now.
           | 
           | Now it only "disconnects" for 24 hours. This is because Apple
           | wants your Bluetooth and Wifi on for aiding in maps and the
           | FindMy network etc. It is intentionally misleading and they
           | won't even add a Settings toggle for something like "Control
           | center radio toggles turn off the hardware". You have to go
           | into Settings and then into each WiFi and BT and toggle the
           | radio off there.
        
       | daviddever23box wrote:
       | Sitting on top of old macOS releases != reasonable security
       | posture.
        
       | tptacek wrote:
       | To my lights, we're in a bit of a golden age with the Mac
       | platform; the newest revision of the M1 Macbooks are some of the
       | best they've ever made. I'm not in love with much of the new OS
       | stuff, but I don't need to be; I'm mostly not the audience for
       | it, and I don't need my OS to have whizzy new stuff just for the
       | sake of it.
       | 
       | I have a hard time getting myself wound up over the UI design of
       | the System Preferences app.
        
         | enneff wrote:
         | TBH the only thing pushing me away from macOS is that there's a
         | bunch of stuff running on there by default that I don't
         | understand, and I don't really trust Apple's direction wrt
         | respecting user privacy.
         | 
         | When I've been using Linux in other contexts lately it's been
         | awesome being able to fully understand exactly what each
         | process is and why it's running (and to be able to remove it if
         | I want to). On my macOS (and windows) boxes I end up trusting
         | Apple and Microsoft a lot more than I would actively choose to.
        
         | EricE wrote:
         | Agreed. While I loathe the current system preferences app, look
         | at what Microsoft started with Windows 8 with the Settings app.
         | Almost a decade later and there is still stuff strewn between
         | Settings and the original Control Panel. At least Apple ripped
         | the band aid off and for better or worse there is only one for
         | them to focus on, and no "legacy" piece loitering around giving
         | them an excuse to not keep improving the new system
         | preferences.
         | 
         | Also I was amused at his notch hostility - I shared the same
         | view; until I used a new Mac with the notch and discovered that
         | I don't notice it. At all. I thought I would hate it, and I
         | can't remember a single time it surfaced other than it coming
         | up as a topic and then I notice it.
         | 
         | I'm trying to think of any of the recent changes they made and
         | none of them are fatal enough to prevent me from working with
         | macOS as I have for decades now, and can think of none. He
         | doesn't like stage manager? Big deal. Spaces is still there and
         | window management still works the way it always has without it
         | - that one was really telling. It's not like they forced it to
         | be the only way to manage windows.
        
       | non-nil wrote:
       | I'm nursing a Mojave install that I intend to keep around for a
       | long time, even though there are newer devices and operating
       | systems in my houshold for everyday online stuff.
       | 
       | In terms of the Mac experience, it was quickly downhill from
       | Mojave in my opinion (though I'm more fond of Snow Leopard or
       | possibly Mavericks aesthetically), plus the 32 bit cutoff which
       | kills important backwards compatibility for me.
       | 
       | I already leverage some of the really nifty Mac features like
       | Target Disk Mode, cloning and booting from external drives
       | etcetera, to enable some hardware agnostic behavior, and will
       | eventually move to virtualization, probably through Proxmox.
       | 
       | Not having upgrades introduce breaking changes (Notes.app, I'm
       | looking at you!) is such a relief.
        
       | mark_l_watson wrote:
       | I am in my 70s, but still do some work as an architect/software
       | developer so I am going to hang on to my Mac computers for a
       | while.
       | 
       | When I finally get past my "sell by date" and completely stop
       | working, I really like the Chromebook since the UI is nice enough
       | and the Linux containers work well enough for light weight coding
       | for fun projects. I would hang on to my iPhone and Apple Watch.
       | Maybe keep an iPad instead of a Chromebook if not having Linux
       | containers is OK.
       | 
       | I virtually never turn on any of my Mac computers anymore if I am
       | not in work mode. Even with valid criticisms of recent UI
       | changes, macOS is great for getting work done.
        
       | streblo wrote:
       | It's unfortunate that some of what made MacOS great for
       | developers is now being phased out in favor of features that are
       | lifted out of iOS. Apple has made developer-hostile moves over
       | the years that seem out of line with it's old 'think different'
       | ethos. I hope Apple takes this customer segment seriously and
       | reverses course here, but I'm not super hopeful.
       | 
       | The real problem is that there isn't a reasonable alternative.
       | Windows is out of the question for me due to not being a POSIX-
       | based OS. WSL isn't integrated deeply enough and is still a pain
       | in the ass to use coming from MacOS. I experimented with using a
       | mostly stock Xubuntu setup for a bit and also found the user
       | experience to be really subpar. Call me old, but I have no
       | interest in dealing with the amount of configuration and tweaking
       | necessary to be productive in a Linux environment.
       | 
       | Ultimately, I'm just going to stick it out with MacOS.
        
         | antics9 wrote:
         | Try Fedora. My iMac from 2011 is still running strong on that.
         | Same on my XPS 13. Haven't needed to do any special
         | configuration yet.
        
         | justsomehnguy wrote:
         | > is now being phased out in favor of features that are lifted
         | out of iOS
         | 
         | I have a sudden flashback of 2012
        
           | [deleted]
        
         | Mikeb85 wrote:
         | > I experimented with using a mostly stock Xubuntu setup for a
         | bit and also found the user experience to be really subpar.
         | Call me old, but I have no interest in dealing with the amount
         | of configuration and tweaking necessary to be productive in a
         | Linux environment.
         | 
         | Forget what everyone says. Just use Ubuntu (like, regular
         | Ubuntu, not some stupid derivative) with everything default.
         | It's what you're looking for. It takes zero configuration, is
         | super easy to use and is a nice environment.
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | I'm confused. How is Stage Manager a "developer-hostile move"?
        
         | forrestthewoods wrote:
         | Why is POSIX a strict requirement?
         | 
         | > Call me old, but I have no interest in dealing with the
         | amount of configuration and tweaking necessary to be productive
         | in a Linux environment.
         | 
         | Exactly why I prefer Windows development to macOS and Linux!
        
         | megaman821 wrote:
         | MacOS is a great platform but I find all their apps terrible.
         | Luckily there is a very active development community and I
         | don't have to use any of them.                 * Finder -> Path
         | Finder       * Spotlight -> Alfred       * Stage
         | Manager/Snapping -> Moom       * Safari -> Chrome/Firefox
         | * Mail/Calendar/Contacts -> Outlook       * Photos -> Google
         | Photos       * Maps -> Google Maps       * Weather -> Weather
         | Channel       * System Sound -> SoundSource       * System
         | Screen Shots -> Clean Shot X       * System Menu Bar ->
         | Bartender       * Terminal -> iTerm2       * Preview (I
         | actually use this one)
        
           | kitsunesoba wrote:
           | I've never been able to get a good grip on what people find
           | bad about Finder. Once View > Show Path Bar and View > Show
           | Status Bar have been selected and current folder searching
           | has been enabled in Preferences I don't find it any worse
           | than Windows Explorer, GNOME Files, or any of the numerous
           | derivations of GNOME Files (Nemo, Thunar, etc).
        
             | megaman821 wrote:
             | In my case I just wanted a button on the Finder toolbar
             | that opens up the current folder in the default terminal.
        
               | jmbwell wrote:
               | I have [right-click/control-click] > Services > New
               | Terminal at Folder
               | 
               | Is that standard now, or did I add it long ago and
               | forget?
        
               | megaman821 wrote:
               | That is standard now. It wasn't when a started using Path
               | Finder. I still find it slower than just having the
               | button in the toolbar.
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | kitsunesoba wrote:
               | There's at least one Finder extension that can add such a
               | button.
               | 
               | https://github.com/Ji4n1ng/OpenInTerminal
        
               | Ancapistani wrote:
               | I have something that serves a similar purpose - a shell
               | script that calls out to AppleScript to get the path of
               | the most recently used Finder window and returns it as a
               | string:                   #!/usr/bin/env bash
               | ####################         # Description: Get the path
               | of the most recently used Finder window         # Author:
               | Ancapistani         # Version: 1.0.0
               | ####################                  osascript -e 'tell
               | application "Finder"'\                   -e "if (${1-1}
               | <= (count Finder windows)) then"\                   -e
               | "get POSIX path of (target of window ${1-1} as alias)"\
               | -e 'else' \                   -e 'get POSIX path of
               | (desktop as alias)'\                   -e 'end if' \
               | -e 'end tell';
               | 
               | I have this saved as `fpwd` in my shell.
        
             | bcherry wrote:
             | wow i had no idea these things could be done. i've just
             | suffered in silence for years. thanks for the tips!
        
           | w1nst0nsm1th wrote:
           | If you don't have :
           | 
           | * Keyboard Maestro (automation) * BetterTouch Tools (trackpad
           | + mouse + shit tons of improvement of Destop Experience) *
           | Curio (The best of The bests note taking App by the worst
           | greedy dev in the world) * PopClip. * Fantastical (calandar
           | app)
           | 
           | You still miss a lot of the potential brought by mac desktop
           | develloper API and might as well be better off with a
           | chromebook ou a Ubuntu Mate on an old lenovo thinkpad from
           | ebay.
        
         | nomel wrote:
         | > Apple has made developer-hostile moves over the years that
         | seem out of line with it's old 'think different' ethos.
         | 
         | Could you give some examples?
        
         | kitsunesoba wrote:
         | Windows also has some unfortunate papercuts like font rendering
         | that's still optimized for super low rez displays all these
         | years later, with bad hinting and kerning. Seriously, this
         | drives me nuts. It's better when DPI scaling is above 1.0 but
         | it's still not as good as that of macOS or any Linux desktop
         | environment.
         | 
         | Also, if you want an application-centric desktop management
         | style, macOS is the only game in town. Practically everything
         | else follows Win9X conventions in that regard, even the iPadOS-
         | reminiscent GNOME. While global menubars can be enabled in KDE
         | and added to XFCE, they're only functional in some apps because
         | a lot of apps (those built with GTK, mostly) have eschewed
         | menubars entirely in favor of that infernal hamburger button.
        
         | MisterTea wrote:
         | > Windows is out of the question for me due to not being a
         | POSIX-based OS.
         | 
         | Cygwin.
         | 
         | > I experimented with using a mostly stock Xubuntu setup for a
         | bit and also found the user experience to be really subpar.
         | 
         | Did you try any other DE such as Cinnamon, mate, KDE or one of
         | the many others?
         | 
         | Though I feel my recommendations will fall on deaf ears as I
         | have the feeling you're one of those devs that doesn't want to
         | put in the effort to learn a new platform and thus will ignore
         | any and all advice and go back to whatever abusive platform
         | they are familiar with. I get it, time is precious and you just
         | want to get work done. But you cant complain about alternatives
         | when you aren't willing to put in the effort to learn how to
         | use them and help make them better. This isn't an insult mind
         | you, just an observation.
        
       | bsnnkv wrote:
       | I jumped ship from macOS to Windows back in 2020 and honestly it
       | has been great. Most of the time I essentially use Windows as a
       | DE for Linux under WSL2.
       | 
       | Especially since the windows-rs[1] crate was published, for me it
       | is just so much more infinitely customizable for my needs than
       | macOS ever was.
       | 
       | Once you get the hang of the Win32 API (pretty easy with the
       | excellent developer documentation), the sky is really the
       | limit.[2]
       | 
       | [1]: https://github.com/microsoft/windows-rs
       | 
       | [2]: With the exception of the Virtual Desktops API. I'm still
       | salty about this, see more here:
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33169588
        
       | DwnVoteHoneyPot wrote:
       | Seems like he's just arguing about cosmetics.
       | 
       | System Settings is now vertical instead of rows. Big deal - how
       | much time does he spend in System Settings? In command line I
       | prefer "ls -la" over "ls". Vertical is faster to read.
       | 
       | An article says Stage Manager can be turned off. I'm using
       | AltTab.app to customize my multi-tasking.
        
         | bdougherty wrote:
         | It's not about System Settings being vertical now. Just look at
         | any of the panels and tell me how the new version is an
         | improvement on the old? The panels in System Preferences were
         | meticulously designed and the new ones are just a list of
         | checkboxes.
        
         | Aaargh20318 wrote:
         | > An article says Stage Manager can be turned off.
         | 
         | AFAIK it's off by default and you have to explicitly enable it.
        
       | fxtentacle wrote:
       | I'm quite jealous of the nice hardware that Macs have. If Apple
       | would commit to first class Linux support, I'd immediately buy a
       | set for my family.
       | 
       | But instead of delighting customers, Apple is now chasing the
       | mystical "services revenue". In my opinion, that's just a more
       | pleasant way of saying "everything will be infested with DRM so
       | that we can sell you the same movie multiple times". We can
       | already see the start of it with Apple Music which is raising
       | prices now that customers are appropriately entrapped and have
       | lost their old (purchased) iTunes mp3 collection.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | jemmyw wrote:
       | > My next Mac might be the last
       | 
       | What's the point of writing this? If it was "My current Mac will
       | be my last" then that's interesting. But stating that you're
       | actually going to buy another one and maybe one after that. Of
       | course it might be your last, you might die in a car crash on the
       | way home from the store.
       | 
       | My next car might be my last. There's a bunch of things I don't
       | like about my current car so I'll make an uninformed guess that
       | the next one will have the same problems + some other ones and
       | I'll be sick of cars after that.
        
       | hbn wrote:
       | So far none of the recent changes to macOS have been any kind of
       | deal-breaker to me. But there has been a lot of changes that are
       | just... odd.
       | 
       | Catalyst apps suck and don't feel right. For some reason Messages
       | just loses typing focus at weird times. I'm sure it's nice for
       | Apple to share codebases but for the end user it feels like a
       | weird mobile app that had some desktop functionality tacked on at
       | the last second.
       | 
       | And the little control center they added to the right of the menu
       | bar is just weird cause it's doubled-up implementations of menu
       | items I already have. Volume control is already there. Media
       | controls are already there. Wifi toggle is already there.
       | Bluetooth switcher is already there. Why does this thing exist?
       | So it can have bigger controls that look designed for a touch
       | screen even though Macs don't have touchscreens (which I'm
       | personally fine with)
       | 
       | Thankfully they backtracked on the dumb Safari tab changes where
       | they tried to make the web page and browser chrome bleed together
       | which was just confusing.
        
       | tristor wrote:
       | I've been using Macs exclusively since 2010, and I basically feel
       | the same way. The hardware is still fantastic. I still plan to
       | replace my 2015 MBP with an M2 Max MBP when they become
       | available. But I am intensely frustrated by unnecessary and
       | inferior UI changes that would frankly never have passed muster
       | when Steve Jobs was alive. I know it's trite to say, but I
       | honestly think the current Apple UX team doesn't have the same
       | philosophy and understanding of the Apple UX teams of yore.
       | 
       | I say this as someone that has pretty much entirely shifted my
       | tech to Apple over the last 5 years. I don't see me going
       | elsewhere at the moment, but I do see a shift towards turning Mac
       | devices into walled gardens that don't give the user actual
       | control similar to iOS devices. I'm fine with that for my phone,
       | not for my laptop, end of story.
        
       | turtlebits wrote:
       | I don't love everything about MacOS, but the IMO the Apple
       | ecosystem is worlds ahead of everything else when it comes to
       | amount of time spent using it vs maintenance/tweaking/updating.
       | 
       | As I've gotten older, I have 0 tolerance for spending time
       | fiddling with hardware or OS issues. (I've reinstalled/tweaked
       | Windows so many times just to keep it running well, let alone
       | sitting through install wizards or messing with drivers).
       | 
       | I don't need to shop around for the most reliable hardware, I
       | trust Apple that it will be fast enough, ergonomics will be
       | better than most, and most importantly - will just work.
        
       | hot_gril wrote:
       | Isn't this the same old story since 2008? First they ruined
       | iMovie, but they fixed it later. Then they made mistakes in Lion
       | which were later fixed. What exactly are the permanent problems
       | with macOS, other than maybe iTunes becoming gimped?
        
       | throw7 wrote:
       | This guy sounds like how I felt during the gnome 2 -> gnome 3
       | shift. Thank goodness I could just stick with mate.
        
       | least wrote:
       | I've used Windows, Linux, and MacOS as my primary operating
       | system for long stretches of time and I make an effort to stay
       | current on all their developments. I personally find MacOS to be
       | the right set of compromises for what I primarily do on my
       | computer (for now), but that familiarity also means I am much
       | more aware _currently_ of all the things that piss me off about
       | MacOS. A lot of the criticisms that the author has written here
       | are valid. I probably have a larger set of grievances about the
       | OS than he does.
       | 
       | Anyone that deeply uses any operating system is going to find
       | many things that delight them and many things that are deeply
       | frustrating to the point where you think you might want to
       | switch... only to find that the grass is not in fact greener on
       | the other side, you're simply given a different set of delights
       | and frustrations.
       | 
       | I just don't really know what someone like this expects to do.
       | Just use Mojave into perpetuity? That won't work for all that
       | long. Switch to Windows or Linux? He might luck out and find that
       | they serve his needs better, but more than likely he'll just find
       | them frustrating to use too. I think one ultimately has to accept
       | that whatever they choose to use (or eschew computers entirely)
       | that they'll be dealing with a lot of frustrations. There is no
       | panacea.
        
       | rhaway84773 wrote:
       | In a strange way, part of Apple's downfall with multi-tasking IMO
       | is because they basically got it right the first time.
       | 
       | The early versions of Expose were brilliant. One version which
       | displayed all windows that were open, and another version which
       | displayed windows for the current app. You could trigger it via
       | the Keyboard, Hot Corners, or trackpad or mouse gestures (I'm not
       | sure about the mouse gestures though).
       | 
       | Further, the windows largely maintained their spatial
       | configuration as well as their relative sizes.
       | 
       | This was pretty much perfect and I've not seen any other
       | implementation that does this better (Gnome is actually getting
       | there by doing a good job of recreating Expose but adding
       | Workspaces to it).
       | 
       | The problem for Apple was that they need to keep changing
       | prominent visual elements to indicate progress, even if the
       | elements get functionally worse. This led to first losing the
       | spatial configuration and relative sizing. Then it morphed into
       | Mission Control which tried to overload a highly successful Mac
       | OS X feature, Expose, to promote workspaces and then full screen
       | apps. And once Mission Control got long in the tooth it had to
       | change for marketing reasons, so we get Stage Manager.
       | 
       | I suspect if Stage Manager or Mission Control would have come
       | first, Max OS X would likely have evolved towards something like
       | the original Expose instead and everyone would have been happier
       | for it.
        
       | tpmx wrote:
       | What will Riccardo use instead?
       | 
       | Windows? That's a joke. It's a fine platform for gaming and
       | probably still the most performant platform for web browsing (I
       | personally value that highly), but not really built for
       | development (except for development of games, I guess).
       | 
       | Desktop Linux/Gnome: Excellent for actual development work, but
       | not great elsewhere.
        
         | ok_dad wrote:
         | I absolutely detest using Windows, I refuse to work for a
         | company that would have me use Windows, but even a rabid Linux
         | fanboy like myself knows that Windows is suited perfectly fine
         | for a lot of development work, like all that enterprise crap I
         | try to stay away from, but Windows still has a valid use for
         | developing some things.
        
         | brokencode wrote:
         | I develop on Windows every day and have no issues with it. It
         | works great if you primarily use an IDE like Visual Studio
         | Code, and especially if you are working with .NET or
         | Typescript.
        
         | Apocryphon wrote:
         | BSD - ravynOS
        
         | ascrazy wrote:
         | With WSL2, Windows is just as good development platform as
         | Linux but with great access to good looking/working consumer
         | software. Way better than macos.
        
           | Woeps wrote:
           | I'm almost with you on this one.
           | 
           | Virtualization and containers are still very very finicky on
           | wsl.
           | 
           | But it's 95% of the way there. And I don't mind using it.
           | 
           | On the flip side, all these electron apps make it so lots of
           | stuff just works on Linux as well.
        
         | RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
         | > Windows? That's a joke. It's a fine platform for gaming and
         | web browsing, but not for development.
         | 
         | With WSL, I actually find Windows a better backend development
         | platform than Mac.
        
           | xorl wrote:
           | I live in WSL for all my Dev work outside of Mac based apps.
           | WSL allows me not to dual boot, still use "work" required
           | applications w/out having a lot of issues and completing
           | everything I need in one ecosystem.
        
           | specialp wrote:
           | Agreed strongly. I would rather develop on Linux as my
           | development environment will not be destroyed on updates, and
           | my applications run on Linux based systems. The only thing
           | that saves MacOS from being completely unworkable is that
           | there are so many devs on Macs, so workarounds/fixes to the
           | breakage done to *nix subsystems are plentiful.
        
           | sublinear wrote:
           | I agree. Ubuntu and VSCode has been the typical dev
           | environment on most company-issued Windows machines for years
           | now.
        
         | 0_____0 wrote:
         | What does development mean to you? Working on stuff that lives
         | in the cloud? I think you may be taking a very limited view of
         | what people need from their work machines.
        
           | wildrhythms wrote:
           | A UNIX OS that lets me begrudgingly run certain Adobe
           | products from time to time.
        
           | tpmx wrote:
           | It means mostly backend development. There is a whole lot of
           | reading, a whole lot of real-time audio/video communication
           | (via all possible communication platforms), a whole lot of
           | web browsing, a whole lot of editing, containerization, lots
           | of command line work utilizing my Unix/Linux knowledge from
           | the past 20 years etc.
        
         | thefz wrote:
         | I've been developing on Windows since .NET 3.5 and man, you can
         | definitely do that. And .NET is a joy to use, too.
        
         | schwartzworld wrote:
         | Sounds like dual booting Linux and Windows is a good solution
         | if you want to develop and play games.
         | 
         | Desktop Linux is pretty serviceable for any tasks that aren't
         | gaming. It may require learning different tools if you are used
         | to Microsoft/adobe products, but the alternatives do exist. If
         | you're doing command line work, it's better on Linux than osx
         | anyway.
        
           | beebeepka wrote:
           | I'd say desktop Linux is great. To me, it's been better than
           | windows and mac for a while.
           | 
           | Gaming is not great but pretty good. Certainly better than
           | what's possible on a Mac. Updates do break my StarCraft 2
           | once or twice an year but pretty much everything else I care
           | about works.
           | 
           | If anyone @ Valve is reading this: get back to fixing VR on
           | Linux. My Index is almost useless these days. Fix your
           | vrcomposer
        
           | tpmx wrote:
           | I just have a separate machine for Windows. That's not the
           | concern.
        
           | dleslie wrote:
           | Steam's Proton means just about every Windows game of note
           | works well on Linux, now. And yes, it works with non-Steam
           | games; you don't even need to use the Steam Launcher, and can
           | use an alternative (like Heroic Launcher) instead.
        
             | Karunamon wrote:
             | Let us not oversell Proton. While the compatibility story
             | now is better than it ever has been, only about 26% of the
             | top 100 games on Steam work without substantial tinkering
             | or other problems. And most of that is going to be due to
             | multiplayer games and developer/publisher anti-cheat
             | obstinance.
             | 
             | Statistically speaking, the games the average person would
             | most likely want to play likely still do not run, or do not
             | run without problems or tinkering required.
        
               | dleslie wrote:
               | Where are you getting that 26% from? PCGamesN reported,
               | last year, that around 70% of the top 100 were supported.
               | It's a different story for SteamDeck, which has further
               | constraints due to its unconventional screen size; but
               | even then, ProtonDB claims at least 48% of the top 100
               | are playable on the Deck[1]. In my experience, just about
               | any game that didn't work well on my Deck does work well
               | after I switch it to Proton Experimental.
               | 
               | 0: https://www.pcgamesn.com/steam-deck/top-100-games-
               | proton-com...
               | 
               | 1: https://www.protondb.com/
        
               | Karunamon wrote:
               | From the ProtonDB dashboard. Top 100, ProtonDB click play
               | ratings system. 26% of those games are tier 1 or tier 2
               | (no way to give a direct link here).
               | 
               | You could go by the old the medal system, which looks
               | promising at first glance, but "gold" basically means
               | "playable". Platinum is the real metric there, and can be
               | understood to mean "plays as well as it does on its
               | native platform". There are game issues in gold rated
               | titles that would lead to mass complaints and refunds if
               | they existed on the native platform. That is kind of my
               | point. "Playable" is way too low of a bar.
        
         | llanowarelves wrote:
         | Windows is a terrible development environment: it prioritizes
         | stable APIs and backwards compatibility, unlike OS X and Linux.
        
           | tpmx wrote:
           | Almost noone cares outside of the legacy corporate world -
           | the selling of software via binaries is a niche thing these
           | days.
        
       | woah wrote:
       | Somebody should make a compendium of the thousands of blog posts
       | from programmers threatening to leave Mac because of graphic
       | design reasons over the past 20 years.
        
       | tambourine_man wrote:
       | I mostly agree with the author. Having been a Mac user for almost
       | 40 years, the recent disaster in usability and aesthetics is
       | disheartening.
       | 
       | The thing is, Windows is still a lot worse and not getting any
       | better.
       | 
       | Linux... I'm actually afraid I'd devote my life to endless
       | configuration and frustration while having to deal with a Windows
       | VM with GPU passthrough and whatnot. Or constant dual boot. Or a
       | KVM. Who knows.
       | 
       | So Mac it is for now. Please stop breaking our favorite OS,
       | Apple.
        
       | coding123 wrote:
       | I sometimes feel like Apple is catering to me: A convert of the
       | last 3/4 years. Used Windows forever, dabbled in Linux for a
       | while, saw everyone at conferences presenting from a Mac, so why
       | the heck not. It's the 2018+ crowd that seems to be adopting at
       | rates high enough that it's making the 2018- crowd feel their OS
       | is getting ripped up.
        
         | bdougherty wrote:
         | It _is_ getting ripped up, but all the new people on the
         | platform are unaware of how much better it was before. I don 't
         | think anybody has issues changing things to make them better
         | for newcomers as long as Apple doesn't throw out all of their
         | design principles to do it (which is what they have been
         | doing).
        
       | mfarris wrote:
       | I regularly use a 10.4 Tiger machine for music and graphic
       | projects and it is a breath of fresh air compared to where MacOS
       | is today. My daily drivers are Mavericks/Mojave/Mojave but
       | recently got an M1 iMac with Monterey. Nothing about
       | Mojave-->Monterey feels like an improvement.
       | 
       | Aside from high-DPI, I'd be pressed to think of a single Mac
       | interface convention or element that is better today than 2005.
       | Many are a lot worse.
        
         | Tagbert wrote:
         | Tabs as a first-class UI element used in many apps is a big
         | improvement. They are a big part of how I use Finder for
         | instance.
        
       | taylodl wrote:
       | The guy hates macOS so much he's buying another Mac? Seems
       | strange to me. If macOS is so awful then why not leave it today?
       | Why wait another five or more years?
       | 
       | As far as Apple's strategy is concerned it makes sense to me.
       | There's an order of magnitude more iPadOS and iOS users than
       | there are macOS users. Why not make it easier for them to migrate
       | to the platform? Who knows? Maybe one day Apple will realize that
       | what's needed is an Macbook that you can bend the screen back
       | flat and use like an iPad? The more the UI's are unified the more
       | likely it is we'll see such a machine.
        
         | hot_gril wrote:
         | > The guy hates macOS so much he's buying another Mac? Seems
         | strange to me. If macOS is so awful then why not leave it
         | today? Why wait another five or more years?
         | 
         | I think the answer is that he's not really leaving.
        
       | sylens wrote:
       | Article correctly calls out how they are ripping out perfectly
       | good parts of macOS like System Preferences to replace them with
       | an iOS-ified version. Instead of delivering features power users
       | might want (proper window snapping/tiling!), the press release
       | announcing Ventura talks up the new Weather app (from iOS) and
       | Stage Manager, a horrible solution on both macOS and iPadOS.
        
         | trollied wrote:
         | They are slowly changing iPadOS and macOS to bring them closer
         | & closer together. I have a feeling that they are going to be
         | one & the same in 3 or so versions.
        
           | pornel wrote:
           | Except the macOS bug of being able to run 3rd party
           | applications that don't pay 30% cut to Apple.
        
             | RockRobotRock wrote:
             | And being able to run a browser that isn't based on WebKit
             | :)
        
         | dkonofalski wrote:
         | But what the article doesn't really do _at all_ is clarify why
         | doing this replacement is a bad thing. For the _vast majority_
         | of MacOS users, this will be a good thing because most of them
         | are using iOS /iPadOS as their first point of content. Making
         | things seamless across all these devices might be, at most, a
         | slight inconvenience for power users but it will be an
         | improvement for literally everyone else.
         | 
         | Hacker News is obviously a different demographic but no tech
         | company is going to cater to power users. There's not enough of
         | us for anyone to take what we say meaningfully.
        
           | ohCh6zos wrote:
           | I have been an Apple user since 1990, and I think you are
           | absolutely right. In my mind iPad OS and iOS are so bad I
           | don't want my Mac taking any inspiration from them, but I bet
           | the average user wants something familiar to those two
           | platforms.
        
             | dkonofalski wrote:
             | The ideal situation, for me, would be some kind of
             | progressive disclosure or a way to toggle "Advanced"
             | versions of these panels and sections but I totally get why
             | Apple wouldn't want to do that. It's double the work for
             | such a small crowd.
        
           | timw4mail wrote:
           | As an old Mac user I loathe iOS.
        
         | shikshake wrote:
         | There are plenty of great third party tools that do power user
         | features (including window snapping/tiling). Apple is better at
         | defining a workflow and toolset for casual users and forcing
         | them to adapt to the Apple way. Power users would naturally
         | push back if Apple did a similar thing for them. So I think
         | it's better that they leave any advanced features to outside
         | developers.
        
         | tinus_hn wrote:
         | Alternatively things like 'proper window snapping/tiling' are
         | pet issues of a vocal minority and 99% of Apples users don't
         | care about them.
        
         | FredPret wrote:
         | I'm new to MacOS but there's a $4 app that enables window
         | snapping. I know it's annoying to pay for that but it's still
         | worth it in the big picture
        
           | CharlesW wrote:
           | In addition to the other free apps people have mentioned, the
           | indispensable Raycast does windows management too.
           | https://www.raycast.com/
        
           | ace2358 wrote:
           | Open source version of the app:
           | 
           | https://rectangleapp.com/
        
           | toqy wrote:
           | There's also free ones, such as https://rectangleapp.com/
           | 
           | It does have a paid upgrade, but i've not found it necessary
        
           | viktorcode wrote:
           | There are free apps too.
        
       | ttfkam wrote:
       | MacOS Ventura review on Ars Technica
       | https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/10/macos-13-ventura-the...
        
       | wellthisisgreat wrote:
       | What is the upside of Stage Manager?
       | 
       | I love me some new features, but I turned this on, and it's some
       | weird motion-sickness inducing always-on cmd+tab monstrosity.
       | 
       | Is it supposed to learn about my usage habits and adapt?
        
       | fdgsdfogijq wrote:
       | In the last six months I have purchased:
       | 
       | 16 inch M1 Max ~4k
       | 
       | Apple Watch Ultra ~800
       | 
       | Air pods pro 2 ~250
       | 
       | 13 inch M1 16 GB ~2000
       | 
       | = 7000 dollars.
       | 
       | A huge spend and I don't regret one single purchase. Each
       | subsequent product interfaces extremely well with the ecosystem.
       | I no longer carry my phone with me 80% of the time. I bring my
       | watch and usually have a laptop if needed.
        
         | constantcrying wrote:
        
         | jollyllama wrote:
         | Interesting. Does the watch have a cellular connection? I
         | thought it piggybacked off of an iphone.
        
           | fdgsdfogijq wrote:
           | Yeah the cellular connection is 10 bucks a month. But I can
           | talk on the phone/receive texts like its a phone.
        
           | FredPret wrote:
           | Not OP but yes, if you buy the pricier model, it has its own
           | data plan.
        
         | FredPret wrote:
         | I won an iPad years ago. It was so much smoother than my
         | Samsung. Fast forward to today, and I'm in a similar situation
         | as you.
         | 
         | I keep throwing money at Apple and they almost never
         | disappoint.
        
         | etrautmann wrote:
         | Do you text with friends, family, or colleagues, and if so, is
         | it from the laptop? I find my communication hampered without
         | the phone, but like the idea of leaving it away from me more
         | often.
        
           | fdgsdfogijq wrote:
           | The texting is actually pretty good from the watch, can use
           | Siri or type into the watch keyboard. Same with phone calls,
           | I use the air pods to connect and its like talking on a
           | regular phone.
           | 
           | Apple pay works very well. Get emails, slack messages, etc.
           | Can easily reply to slack messages from the watch. Cant see
           | conversations but
           | 
           | Basically everything works that I need.
           | 
           | Alot of apps dont work, but thats the point. I dont need
           | those apps all the time.
        
           | tannedNerd wrote:
           | Yeah iMessage has a pretty great tie in with iPhones to the
           | point that they don't even have to be on the same network to
           | send an sms from your laptop via your phone.
        
             | FredPret wrote:
             | Just remember to deregister your number if you ever move
             | off of Apple, or else every text from any iPhone to you
             | will disappear into the void
        
               | dkonofalski wrote:
               | This used to be true but is not true anymore.
        
               | ideamotor wrote:
               | Link?
        
       | kylehotchkiss wrote:
       | I actually like the new system settings. Feels much better
       | organized than the previous version, and has space for adding new
       | settings. I even noticed apple using the new space to show things
       | like user groups, and rouge login items (I seriously found a
       | Corel draw login item in there that I immediately discarded).
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | Agreed, System Settings really needed an update and is better
         | for it. There's a bit of weirdness at the moment since
         | apps/utilities make now-incorrect assumptions about where
         | permissions are, but that'll be a memory soon.
         | 
         | Stage Manager was opt-in for me and doesn't solve a problem
         | that I have, but I think it's a great sign that Apple continues
         | to try new things.
        
         | prh8 wrote:
         | It's much better, it's pretty hilarious that was the example
         | used for the article.
        
       | jmbwell wrote:
       | Oof. Just last night I reset one of my personal systems to its
       | original Yosemite. It couldn't access the app store or many
       | modern web sites because of obsolete SSL. I manually upgraded to
       | Sierra. It barely worked with iCloud and keychain. Getting it up
       | to Mojave felt so much better.
       | 
       | I hate that 32-bit got left behind, and I bemoan apparent
       | "planned obsolescence" as much as anyone. But the fact is that
       | these latest OSes are coming with genuine improvements in
       | security posture. The point that the UI changes are sometimes
       | unwelcome is well-taken, and I can see how the changes in
       | security technologies change the experience for the user in
       | sometimes awkward or baffling ways. Totally get it. But when it
       | comes to stuff like this, I'm afraid the only way through it is
       | forward.
        
       | nipponese wrote:
       | > But what about security? Are you sure you want to stay on an
       | older version of Mac OS? -- Thankfully I'm tech-savvy enough to
       | know what I'm doing. The two Macs I use most are still on High
       | Sierra and Mojave, and haven't received security updates in quite
       | a while.
       | 
       | Good luck with that.
        
       | cglong wrote:
       | As someone who said "My next iPhone might be my last", just go
       | ahead and leave the platform now. I ended up being irritated with
       | so many things about that iPhone, looking longingly at the other
       | side. You can always switch back later if things improve :)
        
         | FigurativeVoid wrote:
         | Just curious, what did you end up switching to?
        
           | cglong wrote:
           | I ended up getting a Pixel 4 and love it! Newer Pixels are
           | too big for me though, so my next purchase will most likely
           | be an Asus Zenfone.
        
       | yumraj wrote:
       | Sometimes I wonder if such blogs are written just because the
       | author needs/wants to publish a blog at some frequency for
       | whatever reason.
       | 
       | I fail to take a blog that talks about how their "next" Mac
       | "might" be the last, seriously.
       | 
       | I would have paid some attention if the blog was about how their
       | current Mac "might" be the last, and definitely more if their
       | current Mac would "most definitely be" the last.
       | 
       | I guess I should work on my _next_ blog: My next space travel
       | might be the last ..
        
       | mcbuilder wrote:
       | For me I have to look at the battery life to performance
       | tradeoff, and Apple hardware seems to win that game against Intel
       | and AMD. I hope that a more open perhaps RISC-V SoC thing appears
       | and a company like Framework could put it into modules or I could
       | hack it into my Frakenpads, but until then it's Apple Silicon. OS
       | wise Asahi has you covered for a hobbyist grade Linux experience.
       | Probably get something ARM or x86 if using an open source
       | operating system is important.
        
       | sosodev wrote:
       | Why buy a Mac if you're just going to immediately downgrade?
       | Maybe I'm wrong but I can't imagine that outdated versions of
       | MacOS will remain for productive for very long.
       | 
       | I also find it odd that many Mac users in this thread claim that
       | Linux requires too much tweaking. I've been daily driving Linux
       | for years and I feel like I spend more time fiddling trying to
       | get stuff to work correctly on my Mac work laptop. Perhaps it's
       | just a matter of perspective?
        
       | northisup wrote:
        
       | tomcam wrote:
       | > To me, Stage Manager is as useful and practical an addition to
       | Mac OS as putting a USB numeric keypad inside the packaging of a
       | new MacBook Pro.
       | 
       | Not trying to be silly here. Probably need my brain calibrated
       | here,
       | 
       | I would love the inclusion of a keypad and would find it
       | incredibly useful, especially for accessibility reasons. So I
       | find the idea delightful, which I suspect is not the way it
       | supposed to strike me. I am assuming one is supposed to find that
       | idea exotically stupid and niche?
        
         | dkonofalski wrote:
         | I think he's trying to say, albeit poorly in my estimation,
         | that adding a USB keypad in the box defeats the purpose of
         | having a portable machine? I'm only assuming that because
         | they're suggesting that Stage Manager is impractical and not
         | useful for them and USB keypads seem impractical for a laptop
         | and would be unused by the majority of people using Macbooks(?)
         | Pro.
        
           | tomcam wrote:
           | That interpretation makes a lot of sense
        
       | jdlyga wrote:
       | I couldn't even suggest a good alternative:
       | 
       | Windows: Windows 11 is a mixed bag with some better design and
       | some worse. Currently, it's a bit of a step backwards. Windows 10
       | is pretty ok though.
       | 
       | Ubuntu: I wouldn't say Ubuntu is in a better place now with Gnome
       | than it was 5 years ago. It works well, but it doesn't have the
       | cool factor that Unity did and is missing a lot of its features.
       | Ubuntu Unity exists, but it's a little buggy and not as polished
       | as back in the 16.04 days. You could always go KDE Plasma (or
       | MATE if you're old school).
       | 
       | There's the rabbit hole of other Linux distributions, my favorite
       | alternative being Arch. But depends on your tolerance for
       | tweaking.
        
         | tapoxi wrote:
         | Fedora deserves a mention as a solid desktop alternative to
         | Ubuntu. It ships very up-to-date packages but doesn't require
         | as much tweaking as, say, Arch. The default 'spin' is GNOME but
         | they provide excellent support for Plasma, Cinnamon, etc.
         | 
         | I also think dnf is a more powerful and easier package manager
         | than apt.
        
         | didibus wrote:
         | I think KDE Plasma is great, highly recommend it.
        
           | tmtvl wrote:
           | I like KDE, not the biggest fan of Kwin, but I've replaced it
           | with awesome and it's a really nice experience.
        
         | zekrioca wrote:
         | You forgot to mention Ubuntu's worse part which is snap :)
        
         | wvenable wrote:
         | I was going to say something similar. The same sort of
         | complaints this author has about Mac OS could be made about
         | Windows 11. Linux desktop environments are worse because they
         | go through the same cycle of changes in half the time.
         | 
         | What we really want is design stability. We do want
         | improvements but we don't want wholesale conceptual changes in
         | our desktop environments every few years.
        
         | hot_gril wrote:
         | I'm a SWE, I've been a DBA and a sysadmin, and I've been using
         | Linux on servers for a long time, but on the desktop I'm just a
         | user who doesn't care to understand the inner workings of the
         | stuff that's supposed to just work for me. This KDE, GNOME,
         | XFCE, Cinnamon, X vs Wayland, Unity, MATE, Plasma, whatever GUI
         | stuff is way too confusing and not worth my time. Just sticking
         | to the default in Ubuntu doesn't help much when even that keeps
         | changing a ton, which is unbelievable. Why do they get users
         | accustomed to something only to swap it out?
        
         | dleslie wrote:
         | Debian + MATE/Plasma is a great option, IMHO; great hardware
         | support, no snap, and a fabulous desktop experience.
        
         | psychstudio wrote:
         | Honestly, Xubuntu and then forget about it for the next decade.
         | I get it, xfce doesn't have the "cool" factor but it just works
         | and keeps on doing so.
        
         | 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
         | I switched from Windows to Fedora Linux on all of my machines
         | about 2+ years ago and it's been great! I will never go back. I
         | do keep a totally empty Windows install for one game that I
         | can't play though (Escape from Tarkov).
        
         | antifa wrote:
         | I think garuda-mate is a good arch variant for this purpose.
        
         | acomjean wrote:
         | I moved from mac to linux at work. Its been fine.
         | 
         | Pop!_OS. Its Ubuntu at its core, but somehow is better.
         | 
         | It took me a bit to get over not having MS Office, but honestly
         | as a development box, it works much better.
        
         | alluro2 wrote:
         | I got tired of Mac, weird and forced UI choices, inflexibility,
         | so much RAM use, and feeling like it slowed down 50% over a
         | course of 2-3 years despite having a fixed set of software on
         | it
         | 
         | Tried Windows 11, and despite really wanting to like it, it
         | left an impression of utterly unbelievable level of unpolished
         | and unfinished mess, with basic features missing (primarily
         | taskbar related) and still, after all these years, just being a
         | skin over ever-present (and still there) Win95-era dialogs. I
         | understand Windows 8 keeping the old Control Panel and having a
         | weird and weak replacement with a new skin for it in parallel,
         | but come on, we've had Win 10 for years and Win 11 still hasn't
         | moved a bit from that same crap?
         | 
         | Switched to Manjaro (Arch-based distro), and KDE Plasma, spent
         | a couple of days tinkering and customizing and have never been
         | happier with my quick, light, rock-solid, completely
         | customizable and fancy environment, that served me impeccably
         | for 1.5 years until I was too tempted with MBP 14. It is a
         | great device hardware-wise, but Mac OS has been a definite leap
         | back, and I would pay hundreds of dollars to be able to put my
         | Linux on MBP with everything working.
        
       | enneff wrote:
       | Am I the only one here who finds the title and central message of
       | this post totally ridiculous? Like "I don't like what Apple are
       | doing so I'm only going to give them a few more thousand bucks,
       | but then in a few more years I'm probably gonna switch to another
       | OS!!!"
        
         | chipotle_coyote wrote:
         | You are not. :)
        
       | digitthedog wrote:
       | More or less saying "the UI has gone bad", but not in the
       | functional sense. It's gone bad in the sense of UI principals and
       | aesthetics, but not usability. Not a single complaint about
       | usability.
       | 
       | Not just click-bait, it's trolling.
        
       | briantkelley wrote:
       | I totally agree with the author's summary:
       | 
       | > That trepidation and sinking feeling of "What are they going to
       | break this time?" every time the WWDC's date approaches, has been
       | wearing me down in the past few years. What one should feel,
       | instead, is: "Apple got this. I'm in good hands. I see no reason
       | not to upgrade straight away." And I haven't felt this in a long
       | time.
       | 
       | I haven't looked forward to a release since Snow Leopard, and
       | High Sierra was the only usable version after that. Mojave and
       | onward have been just dreadful. Mac software hasn't been fun,
       | exciting, or good in a long time, sadly.
        
         | dkonofalski wrote:
         | I might agree with the summary if there was any examples given
         | of what they're referring to. If there was even a small list of
         | things that Apple broke every WWDC that anyone besides extreme
         | power users cared about, the point might actually be made. As
         | it stands, it's a lot of "feelings" and not enough substance.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-10-24 23:02 UTC)