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Running Linux on My MacBook

djhworld.github.io

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Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#121

Post by bitcharmer »

jki275 wrote: post #120
bitcharmer wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Java has been broadly used in HPC and low-latency trading software for years now. That's not only because much more attractive time-to-market but also because in many cases Java is on par with c/cpp when it comes to performance. Sometimes even better. I'm under the impression that you are not interested in educating yourself on the topic, however if I'm mistaken, have a look at some reasons why Java can be as fast or…

I've used Java in the enterprise plenty. Not a fan. And no, it's really never faster than properly written C/C++. And no, the actual HFT stuff is written in C++.

> And no, the actual HFT stuff is written in C++

This is how I know you have no idea what you're talking about.

Source: been working on low-latency HFT Java apps for shops like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, UBS and others for 10+ years.

Not going to reply any more. Not worth it.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#122

Post by gowld »

jafjaf wrote: post #54
growse wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Works well". I have a 2019 mbp16. It does not "work well". For me, the graphics driver crashes me out of my login session pretty much daily, the network stack occasionally shits itself (reboot) and various internal processes (the... window server?) like to use >50% CPU for no reason at all. Looking around, I'm not the only one who has issues.

AFAIK the macOS activity manager doesn’t show task usage as you’d expect. It displays resource usage based on total current usage rather than maximum capacity.

Citation needed. That doesn't match my experience at all. When Activity Monitor shows high CPU in the process list, it corresponds to high CPU in the CPU monitor.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#123

Post by mijoharas »

djhworld wrote: post #4

Author here. Post is a bit rambling but I just wanted to document somewhere the things I encountered along the way with links to resources, to save someone having to trawl the web for it next time.

Hey, nice post!

I'm the guy from the sway github issue mentioning that the chrome autoscaling had been fixed, so maybe you need a more up to date chrome, or maybe there was some kind of regression. (I had some other bug with sway to do with the tray, so haven't been using it).

One other suggestion for an alfred/spotlight alternative is dmenu (or bemenu for a wayland compatible one if you go for sway), there's also rofi as an option which does the same thing iirc.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#124

Post by gowld »

Normille wrote: post #58

The trouble with almost every article that I read of this kind is that the author is either a writer or a coder. So their demands on Linux are relatively minor; a terminal, an IDE, something to mangle text with. I could probably make the full-time switch to Linux, if that was the bulk of what I did too. And I do a fair bit of writing and coding. But the majority what I do on my [OSX] computers is Art & Design related…

Interjecting shocking crude language makes it hard to read and understand what you are writing.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#125

Post by amaccuish »

amaccuish wrote: post #94

For Firefox rendering being slow, I forced the Ubuntu Firefox to use Wayland the other day (my login session was already wayland but Ubuntu doesn't default to making firefox using it), and the difference is night and day. Everything is so much faster and super smooth.

FYI I popped this in my .pam_environment (I was having issues when just editing the .desktop file in that thunderbird stopped being able to open links in firefox)

MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND DEFAULT=1

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#126

Post by abrowne »

I was nearly Mac exclusive for years before switching to Linux. Similarly to the author I mostly use a browser, VS Code and a few small utilities, although mine are mostly simple Qt GUI apps.

My thumbs are well trained to use the keys to the sides of the space bar as the main modifier. My solution to the Command/Control issue is to swap the key positions with xkd so that it's always [Win][Alt][Ctrl][Space][Ctrl][Compose]. (Since Macs and PCs swap Alt and Win/Cmd, you need different xkb options for each type of keyboard.)

As for terminals, if you set VTE-based terminals (such as GNOME Terminal) to use Ctrl+C for copy, it will automatically set Ctrl+Shift+C to send SIGINT. Since I don't use many terminal apps that use modifiers, this works for me, and I set paste to Ctrl+V as well.

I mostly use Alacritty now, so I've set it up to do the same thing for Ctrl+Shift+C. Come to think of it, I still need to do so for VS Code's terminal, for the few times I use it.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#127

Post by bearbin »

gowld wrote: post #117

> The main reason for the switch was one killer app; the i3 window manager. Keyboard shortcuts, tiled windows, lightning fast to use - it feels like a piece of software designed for people who tinker and use computers a lot. If that's the main reason, how about yabai on Mac? https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai > The primary function of yabai is tiling window management; automatically modifying your window layout usi…

I'm forced to use a Mac for work, and I use yabai. It's far superior to the default mac experience, which seems to be designed to actively hide windows and make your life more difficult, but it's still a pain to use. It's obviously a hack and that makes itself known in daily usage - dialog boxes are tiled just like regular windows, or alternatively hidden behind the tiled windows where they're inaccessible; suspending and resuming randomly messes up the position of my windows; and the stupid mac detached-titlebar is almost unusable when you drag your mouse over another program and the focus gets yanked away.

Customisation and configuration are also plainly inferior to i3/sway, plus there's the complicated installation process and necessity to disable apple's walled garden features to get full functionality.

At home I have i3/sway, which is a nice polished user experience; there's no comparison really.

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#128

Post by cpursley »

xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #51
j7ake wrote: post #14

Converting a machine that works well out of the box into a machine that requires custom scripts and constant tinkering to handle simple tasks seems like a waste of time.

Honestly, I run Linux on a 2015 MacBook Pro. It works much better than it did "out of the box". I get better battery life, because I can turn off things I don't need. I don't have to restart the audio service before every Zoom call. I don't have to reboot to get external monitors to work again. My Yubikey doesn't drain the battery in a few hours. My system boots to the login screen in the time it takes for the Apple…

How did you get the Webcam to work?

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#129

Post by war1025 »

abrowne wrote: post #126

I was nearly Mac exclusive for years before switching to Linux. Similarly to the author I mostly use a browser, VS Code and a few small utilities, although mine are mostly simple Qt GUI apps. My thumbs are well trained to use the keys to the sides of the space bar as the main modifier. My solution to the Command/Control issue is to swap the key positions with xkd so that it's always [Win][Alt][Ctrl][Space][Ctrl][Comp…

> if you set VTE-based terminals (such as GNOME Terminal) to use Ctrl+C for copy, it will automatically set Ctrl+Shift+C to send SIGINT.

I just looked in the preferences for Gnome Terminal and didn't see this option. I think I'm used to the current setup enough that I wouldn't switch anyway, but how do you configure this?

Re: Running Linux on My MacBook

#130

Post by muststopmyths »

peteretep wrote: post #5

Thank you for writing this! Whenever I see people using Linux as their main laptop OS, I'm struck by remembering the amount of tinkering needed circa 1999 which was the last time I did it. Having read this -- the custom scripts, the "suspend still doesn't work properly" -- it feels like that's still the case.

Last year I had to use a Dell 7540 (may have the exact model number wrong, but it was one of their enterprise "workstation" laptops) with Ubuntu for work. I was also skeptical for the same reason as you, not having used Linux as a daily driver for a long time.

FWIW these laptops were rock solid and ran Linux just fine. Sleep also seemed to work as well(I'd have tried hibernation if I knew how. That's my preferred mode on Windows to save unnecessary power consumption).

I was quite impressed and while my personal daily needs are fully Windows-based, I would not hesitate to recommend those laptops to anyone who wants to get away from Windows.

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