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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

#401

Post by [deleted] »

m12k wrote: post #175
Veen wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if you've spent a few years on Linux, you'd be able to do many things faster on Linux than on macOS This may be true, but the article explicitly targets people moving from Mac to Linux, not people with years of Linux experience. I’m interested why you don’t like Finder. It does the job for me. What do you think it’s missing?

I can't speak for GP, but I'd pay for Path Finder even if all it did was give me cmd-x to cut, and enter key to mean open instead of rename. It does a ton more, but those two are the killer features for me (Tabs used to be one too, but Finder finally got those a while ago).

[deleted]

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

#402

Post by carlesfe »

aritmo wrote: post #318

I could not find information about the Linux distro he used. He says at some point "Wayland", which cancels Ubuntu. Which distro did he install?

I used Ubuntu Dell 18.?? then 20.04, the official ISOs from Dell, since the laptop is a 2018 XPS "Developer Edition"

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

#403

Post by stormbeta »

Veen wrote: post #147
jeswin wrote: post #142

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). Just like it wouldn't be fair to complain about macOS on a Hackintosh - sound didn't work well and had to patch the DSDT. > but there are rough edges for the power user. > I am an extreme power user, ... > In the end, I was able to replicate most of my macOS power tools setup via input hooks and sh…

> But if you've spent a few years on Linux, you'd be able to do many things faster on Linux than on macOS This may be true, but the article explicitly targets people moving from Mac to Linux, not people with years of Linux experience. I’m interested why you don’t like Finder. It does the job for me. What do you think it’s missing?

Speaking personally:

* No ability to show thumbnails in folder icons

* No ability to use single click + hover to highlight

* Relative sizing feels way off - everything in Finder always seems to be simultaneously way too spaced out while also being way too small.

* Never seems to remember view preferences properly, and often defaults to confusing arrangements.

* Doesn't like to stay connected to network drives, despite any number of tricks I've tried.

* The usual cut/paste/delete operations being needlessly complicated to perform

I do prefer macOS overall, partly because I'm tired of having to constantly tweak and fix Linux whenever I try to use it as a desktop system, and because of things like iTerm2 and BetterTouchTool.

But I really hate trying to do any kind of real file management with Finder, and most third-party apps I've tried just seem to replicate everything I dislike about Finder.

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

#404

Post by carlesfe »

gbil wrote: post #300

While I agree with many things, since when Gnome = Linux? But maybe that is part of the problem

Just after the intro:

I feel like I need to clarify that this is an article aimed at Mac users who are considering a migration to Linux in hope of a more polished system. As usual, personal experiences and requirements are subjective. I know that Ubuntu ≠ Gnome ≠ Linux. I also know that I'm not entitled to anything, everybody is welcome to send patches. Just let me say that if you try to cherry-pick any single issue, you're missing the forest for the trees.

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

#405

Post by theelous3 »

> I feel like I need to clarify that this is an article aimed at Mac users who are considering a migration to Linux in hope of a more polished system

I... don't really know what to say here. Seems like a fundamental misunderstanding. On a mac, polished is pre-polished - polished from the box to a nice one shape fits all sphere.

For linux, you machine it out of stock to your personal dimensions, and hand polish to the finish of your choice.

Comparing the two misses the point of both.

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

#406

Post by wruza »

riedel wrote: post #139
jug wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Used it for a while, but it really annoys with random “let’s get updates in chinese” popup from time to time. This is that last mile that non-macs always get wrong, gosh.

Edit: to add some value to the rant, there is also MiniBin, which sits in a tray area and allows you to open/purge your recycle bin without reaching a desktop icon.

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

#407

Post by cdogl »

mraza007 wrote: post #27

I switched to Linux when learning nodejs and web development in general. Setting up nodejs and using commandline was pain so I decided to completely switch to Ubuntu and never looked back and I consider that one of the best decisions I ever made. Now after getting tempted to try Arch Linux and I finally gave it a try and its been great so far and especially the Arch Wiki has been the best resource for all my linux kn…

Indeed. Arch's disadvantages are obvious, but the educational contribution of the Arch community to all its users has been immense. Almost everyone technical that I know personally has really levelled up through it at some stage. I think Arch's detractors often miss its role in getting more people truly on board with Linux and OSS.

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

#408

Post by joana035 »

popeathlete wrote: post #389
minimaul wrote: post #368

From someone who tends to try this switch about once a year (because the lack of TLC the Mac was getting in the last 5 or so years was getting very very worrying - M1 feels like Apple actually care about the Mac again), I agree with a lot of these pain points. My biggest personal issues end up being (and these are super subjective!): - Preview on macOS is great and no other OS has anything remotely equivalent. First…

No offense, but this largely reads to me like "I don't wanna use Linux because I wanna use Mac". If you want to move to a different system, you can't expect to get the same thing. Really, the only complaints I can agree with now are 2 and 3, the rest is just invalid. You've got kdeconnect gsconnect nextcloud keepassxc many, many configurable mail clients, especially the beatiful, integrated kmail and their whole PIM…

Not even 3.

I don't remember seeing tearing on my Linux for a heck of a long time.

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

#409

Post by papaf »

throwanem wrote: post #361
Zardoz84 wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd tolerate it if I had no better option. Did you try to install a native Linux distribution. The experience is always better that running on a VM.

The machine also has to run Lightroom.

You are probably better off with the Mac, but I can recommend one option that many people ignore but that works for well me.

Modern Linux virtualization (KVM/Qemu) is powerful and is getting easier to setup with programs such as Virtual Machine Manager and Boxes. I run several Windows VMs without problems and they have usable performance.

I have used Windows VMs for Word and Skype for Business using KVM.

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

#410

Post by celrod »

jchw wrote: post #354

One thing that Windows and macOS users will never understand about Linux, because they’ve never truly experienced it, is just how viscerally different the Linux experience is depending on your hardware. You don’t really need to go with a vendor like System76, and going with a fan favorite like Lenovo does not guarantee a good experience, but seriously, Linux on a machine that runs it well is just not comparable to a…

I've been using Linux almost exclusively for many years, and I had to google what screen tearing is after all the comments about it in this thread.

I do get people's resistance to switch. I bought a M1 Mac Mini because I wanted to be able to test and optimize code for it, but found the difference in experience jarring enough that I enabled remote desktop and now mostly run code on it through ssh. I'm sure I could configure it to behave more like I'm used to, but, why bother? If things were flipped, and I was that comfortable with the Mac experience while Linux felt alien, I'd probably feel the same way.

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