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Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

darlinghq.org

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Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#51

Post by microcolonel »

sjwright wrote: post #47
microcolonel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details > — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers I mean, first-party GNOME applications are as consistent as first-party Apple macOS applications; and third-party macOS applications are as highly customized as third-party applications one might run on GNOME. Not sure what you base y…

All those points are fine, but they're all yes-buts. — I mean, first-party GNOME applications are as consistent as Straight-up disagree. It all depends what your threshold of UI/UX consistency is. Unfortunately most open source enthusiasts have a low threshold. It is difficult to convey the importance of a thousand subtle details, each one impossibly trivial, but the sum total moves mountains. — I'd like an example,…

> That's really a marginal opinion. Maybe if you're an OpenGL developer. Apple provides an excellent framework (Metal) which works brilliantly. Yes it would be great if Apple delivered first-class support for Vulkan, but complaining about OpenGL is last decade's problem.

The Metal drivers are more stable, but the shader compilers generate slow code, just like the old Apple OpenGL drivers (the ones they wrote for the Intel GPUs). OpenGL issues are not "last decade's problem", I have on several occasions needed to write workarounds in WebGL shaders to prevent the NVIDIA drivers from crashing the whole windowing system (and every application with it) on macOS. On the same hardware, the drivers on Linux are faster, more stable, and more featureful and also include implementations of Vulkan.

> An example: If my aging father's Mac turns to shit, he can hold down R, boot up the computer from the recovery disk and restore from a Time Machine backup that he himself set up with no assistance required from anyone.

That's not a macOS feature though, that's an Apple PC firmware feature. I'll grant that AFAIK no vendor who ships a Linux distribution by default has a durable recovery partition, but there's nothing about macOS itself which makes that easier.

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#52

Post by setpatchaddress »

microcolonel wrote: post #41
sjwright wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with replacing MacOS is that its key value lies in aspects that the open source community have yet to succeed in, or are structurally unfit to succeed in.[0][1] — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers — Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit — Nomin…

> — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details > — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers I mean, first-party GNOME applications are as consistent as first-party Apple macOS applications; and third-party macOS applications are as highly customized as third-party applications one might run on GNOME. Not sure what you base y…

CoreAudio round trip latency can be under 5ms.

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#53

Post by kristianp »

beardedwizard wrote: post #23

I'm puzzled, wont most console apps already cross compile without much modification? Isn't this basis of brew/etc? The GUI piece seems like the key, but without it I'm failing to understand why this is significant.

If you look at [0], you'll see that non-GUI APIs need still need to be developed as a foundation for the project to continue. Implicit is that at some point in the future a GUI may be available. [0] Also states that Apples Toolchain can be run, which is promising.

Also, Darling desperately needs a re-implementation of Apple’s CoreCrypto [1].

[0] https://www.darlinghq.org/project-status/

[1] https://www.darlinghq.org/developer-zone/low-hanging-fruit/

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#54

Post by icxa »

msla wrote: post #44
sjwright wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with replacing MacOS is that its key value lies in aspects that the open source community have yet to succeed in, or are structurally unfit to succeed in.[0][1] — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers — Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit — Nomin…

> Nominally "perfect" hardware support With the decline of Apple hardware, this is less true, and modern Linux hardware support is, at worst, no worse than what other OSes provide, in my experience. > Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit I think the "Closed Box Philosophy" of Apple either defines or disproves this: Non-experts can't be tripped up by having to fix things... because nobody outside of…

> With the decline of Apple hardware, this is less true, and modern Linux hardware support is, at worst, no worse than what other OSes provide, in my experience.

I will still take a perceived regression in hardware from Apple over anything else on the market today. They are that far ahead. Still the best touchpad and connectivity support which are the two most important factors in my book. Also still the most aesthetically pleasing and known brand of laptop in the world. The latter point is not so important in my book, but I do believe it helps contribute to the resale value of the Mac, which again is class leading in terms of mass produced laptops.

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#56

Post by techntoke »

sjwright wrote: post #35
linguae wrote: post #17

What would be amazing is if Darling could join forces with the long-running GNUstep project in order to provide access to the Cocoa APIs. This would provide a means to run Cocoa apps on Linux, which will make Linux a more attractive operating system for prospective Mac converts and may also increase the popularity of GNUstep. Also, with many Mac users expressing anxieties about the future of the Mac given Apple's bus…

The problem with replacing MacOS is that its key value lies in aspects that the open source community have yet to succeed in, or are structurally unfit to succeed in.[0][1] — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers — Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit — Nomin…

> System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details

> Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers

There are consistent themes across both GTK+ and Qt. Pretty much all my apps share a similar theme and UI. There are Mac Apps as well that deviate from whatever "standardization" you're referring to.

> Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit

It is no longer 2004. A lot of Mac users are also more than capable of running a few shell commands when needed. There are tons of web UIs and graphical apps to manage a Linux OS, from hardware, users, configuration, etc. However, a properly configured Linux OS won't need a lot of interaction on the frontend.

> Nominally "perfect" hardware support

Linux has way better hardware support than Mac. I'm not sure what you're referring to here.

> Robust colorimetry

Agreed, this is one area that needs some improvement, but last I checked it is pretty well supported:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ICC_profiles

> Millisecond audio latency

Already exist:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Professional_audio

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#57

Post by techntoke »

icxa wrote: post #54
msla wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nominally "perfect" hardware support With the decline of Apple hardware, this is less true, and modern Linux hardware support is, at worst, no worse than what other OSes provide, in my experience. > Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit I think the "Closed Box Philosophy" of Apple either defines or disproves this: Non-experts can't be tripped up by having to fix things... because nobody outside of…

> With the decline of Apple hardware, this is less true, and modern Linux hardware support is, at worst, no worse than what other OSes provide, in my experience. I will still take a perceived regression in hardware from Apple over anything else on the market today. They are that far ahead. Still the best touchpad and connectivity support which are the two most important factors in my book. Also still the most aesthet…

This is entirely subjective. Aesthetically pleasing and "well known" may be factors for you in a purchase decision, but I personally prefer more open hardware and choice in my purchases so that I can fine tune each component and not be at least a year behind when it comes to modern hardware when making a purchase to get better performance than what Mac will offer for a fraction of the cost.

Also, if you care a lot about looks then I'd recommend checking out Razer, or aluminum chassis notebooks:

https://www.reinisfischer.com/top-20-aluminium-chassis-noteb...

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#58

Post by msbarnett »

techntoke wrote: post #56
sjwright wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with replacing MacOS is that its key value lies in aspects that the open source community have yet to succeed in, or are structurally unfit to succeed in.[0][1] — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers — Navigable by non-experts, even when things turn to shit — Nomin…

> System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details > Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers There are consistent themes across both GTK+ and Qt. Pretty much all my apps share a similar theme and UI. There are Mac Apps as well that deviate from whatever "standardization" you're referring to. > Navigable by non-experts, even when…

> There are consistent themes across both GTK+ and Qt.

And then you open an app that’s neither GTK+ nor Qt, and you’re back to square one.

Besides, there’s more to UI than “theme”. I have ^w mapped to delete word on OS X. One line in one config file. It works universally in every text box on the system.

I tried setting that up in Linux. Eventually got it working through some gnome setting or some such. In some apps. Firefox didn’t respect it and wanted its own setting iirc. Then it would forget it every few months and trying to delete a word while I was typing would unconditionally close the browser. Fucking ridiculous stuff like that abounded. Life’s too short.

> Pretty much all my apps share a similar theme and UI. There are Mac Apps as well that deviate from whatever "standardization" you're referring to.

A few (very few anymore, in my experience) might deviate in terms of widget styling. Essentially none ignore system wide keybindings, or fail to integrate with system wide services, etc. In terms of inconsistency it’s night and day vs what I’ve had to put up with from Linux desktops.

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#59

Post by sjwright »

microcolonel wrote: post #51
sjwright wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All those points are fine, but they're all yes-buts. — I mean, first-party GNOME applications are as consistent as Straight-up disagree. It all depends what your threshold of UI/UX consistency is. Unfortunately most open source enthusiasts have a low threshold. It is difficult to convey the importance of a thousand subtle details, each one impossibly trivial, but the sum total moves mountains. — I'd like an example,…

> That's really a marginal opinion. Maybe if you're an OpenGL developer. Apple provides an excellent framework (Metal) which works brilliantly. Yes it would be great if Apple delivered first-class support for Vulkan, but complaining about OpenGL is last decade's problem. The Metal drivers are more stable, but the shader compilers generate slow code, just like the old Apple OpenGL drivers (the ones they wrote for the…

> That's not a macOS feature though, that's an Apple PC firmware feature.

That you see a distinction here is telling. The end user doesn't see the distinction.

As for all of your complaints about the OpenGL drivers, that's an issue for developers, not end users. Yes, maybe there might be more 3D apps and faster 3D apps if the video driver situation was better, but also maybe not? Either way, this is all irrelevant because the fundamental argument here is the impetus for end users to remain on a platform. Just because you can possibly eek out an extra 20% performance in your Linux app on the same hardware isn't going to shift people.

-------------------

On a side note, could the people who are down-voting microcolonel please stop? This is a discussion of ideas, and his/her ideas are being expressed with valid form and structure.

Re: Darling – macOS Translation Layer for Linux

#60

Post by sjwright »

setpatchaddress wrote: post #52
microcolonel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> — System-wide UI consistency, especially in the fine details > — Singular UI/UX vision eliminates points of confusion and everything-is-a-compromise choices for third party developers I mean, first-party GNOME applications are as consistent as first-party Apple macOS applications; and third-party macOS applications are as highly customized as third-party applications one might run on GNOME. Not sure what you base y…

CoreAudio round trip latency can be under 5ms.

And maybe you can get something comparable on Linux. Maybe? Do I have to think about which distro I use? Do I have to think about which audio hardware I use? Do I have to think about which audio apps I use?

On Mac, you get that insane latency without having to put a moment's thought into any part of your architecture. I get that insane latency even if I never bothered to learn why latency matters.

"Just works" is more than ease of use. It's productivity. It shows respect to your mental load and mental priorities. And it is worth money to anyone whose time is valuable.

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