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Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

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Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#131
post #82

Preview is probably the most underrated app of all time, with “quick look” as a contender for most under-appreciated feature. Just hitting spacebar to see virtually any file, and the ability to open in preview and read or even markup and make small changes, is so nice. Whenever I use a non-Mac system I really miss those two features.

> Preview is probably the most underrated app of all time I’ve lost count of the times I’ve seen macOS users saying they can’t leave it in part because of Preview. But IDK if any have listed any features not present in both GNOME’s Evince and KDE’s Okular (not that I’ve ever needed or used any of the three).

How are those for editing PDFs? I haven't tried those specific tools, but in the past when I tried it was surprisingly difficult to figure out how to do things like merge 2 PDFs or rearrange the pages on non-Macs

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Homebrew is like running Debian unstable, the world underneath you is currently changing. Mac OS itself doesn’t really have this problem since applications can bundle the exact version of their required frameworks, a bit like Ubuntu Snaps.

This doesn't really answer the question does it? It's been a while since I used apt, but if I remember correctly you'd have the same problem the parent described, right? ------------------- And regarding the 'name@version' criticism: If you want to stick to a version, how can you do it without specifying it?

For example Ubuntu X.Y LTS always use a pinner version of Apache 2.xxx and it will remain that version throughout that LTS release, such as 18.04. what they do for you is apply security patches and bump Apache 2.xxx.Y where Y is the security release applied patch. Apache stays at 2.xxx for the duration of that LTS and is considered the Stable version. Want something newer like Apache 3.x install from a PPA or an all-in-one bundled Snap package...

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#133
post #125
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People state consistent shortcut mapping is an advantage of using Mac but after 2 years of being required to use a Macbook Pro I'm not really sure about that - often they are more complicated IMO. I still miss built in Linux and Windows key mappings. For example Windows + Left to move the window on the left side of screen for side by side apps on the same screen. Great for remote demo's and coding sessions. Ctrl + Sh…

On a mac I can't live without "Magnet" [1]. It lets you do organize your windows in half/thirds of screens with simple keystrokes. That should be part of the OS. [1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/magnet/id441258766?mt=12

Ah the next stop would be outrage by Magnet folks, writing a blogpost on how Apple stole their app features and sent them out of business.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#134
post #44

>apt-get was a revolution when it was released in 1998 and it is still the best way to manage software today. brew is a mediocre replacement. While apt still isn't the best package manager (my heart belongs to pacman, no matter what the haters say), I completely agree that brew is a failed imitation. I wanted to use MacOS for the longest time, because I've been told that it's a real "Unix system". Brew has distilled…

What makes Homebrew a failure? I don’t generally have issues with it for my needs.

I find Docker to replace the parts that suck about using brew. E.g. I would never install something like Postgres using brew again. Small command line tools sure, but anything with complex dependencies and where you might need multiple versions it’s just better to use containers.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#135
post #32

> If you want to achieve some specific action you need to read four or five manpages, search online, and figure out how you are going to put the pieces together. That made me appreciate Karabiner and BTT much more. This is still accurate to this day and what they don't tell you. Hence why you always need to search for 'xorg/wayland error' this, 'dbus initialization error' that or a random core dump occurred on a free…

>ther than messing around or spending days playing around with my setup or window manager. I don't get why this narravitve still exists today. Linux works out of the box on many distros perfectly fine. Keybindings are a very special use case, and if you need that customizability and its better on a Mac, then get a Mac. Doesn't mean that Macs are "more productive" If you want to argue actual semantics in terms of valu…

>If you like Mac, then stay on Mac, and stop publishing articles on how good Macs are and how Linux is neat, but your time is so valuable that you can't spend learning a few commaind line tools.

"Stop writing good things about things I hate and bad things about things I like!"

> don't get why this narravitve still exists today. Linux works out of the box on many distros perfectly fine.

Yeah. And then you connect two monitors with different scaling factor. Turns out X11 can't handle this and Wayland is still broken.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#136
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People state consistent shortcut mapping is an advantage of using Mac but after 2 years of being required to use a Macbook Pro I'm not really sure about that - often they are more complicated IMO. I still miss built in Linux and Windows key mappings. For example Windows + Left to move the window on the left side of screen for side by side apps on the same screen. Great for remote demo's and coding sessions. Ctrl + Sh…

I used a macbook for 2 years and the key binding is definitely less consistent than windows or linux. If nothing something as important as word navigation and word selection (ctrl+arrows and ctrl+shift+ arrows on linux and windows), is located in different modifiers (can't remember which), something along the lines of: move with command+arrow and select with option+shift+arrows. Drives me crazy every time, given that…

Option + arrows: move by word

Option + Shift + arrows: select by word

Cmd + arrows: move to the end of the line

Cmd + Shift + arrows: select to the end of the line

Additionally you can still use the decades old Ctrl+A/Ctrl+E shortcuts almost everywhere (some custom text input reimplementations ignore this).

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#137

Preview is probably the most underrated app of all time, with “quick look” as a contender for most under-appreciated feature. Just hitting spacebar to see virtually any file, and the ability to open in preview and read or even markup and make small changes, is so nice. Whenever I use a non-Mac system I really miss those two features.

Wait what? You can make small changes in preview?!

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GNOME has this feature

It does and it mostly works but it doesn’t seem to be as fast as on macOS.

Sure, until you mention Finder is browsing an SMB share folder ...

Once upon a time I used a Macbook, never again :D

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#139
post #115

Preview is probably the most underrated app of all time, with “quick look” as a contender for most under-appreciated feature. Just hitting spacebar to see virtually any file, and the ability to open in preview and read or even markup and make small changes, is so nice. Whenever I use a non-Mac system I really miss those two features.

QuickLook on Windows Store is actually pretty good. Same usage with spacebar. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/quicklook/9nv4bs3l1h4s?act...

Great find. It is actual FOSS [1][2]

[1] https://pooi.moe/QuickLook/ [2] https://github.com/QL-Win/QuickLook

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#140
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the solution to homebrews handling of major versions is to not use homebrew, I think it indicates there are issues. I think it should work like almost Linux distros where the major version is fixed for a release lifecycle, and any other installations require modification. So say brew install postgresql should always install 12, and if you want something else you have to add the version modifier.

This is a side point but the docker suggestion is far cleaner if you work on multiple apps as you can easily configure and run multiple versions with Dockerfiles and compose files to be exactly right for each app, with only the plugins the specific app needs, data stored in a custom location for each app, and the ability to turn off postgres for an app. System postgres installs and upgrades are a needles pain for dev…

Not just different apps but having multiple working environments for the same app - very useful when you wreck the db on a feature branch and need to jump to another to fix a bug etc.
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