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Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

support.system76.com

121–130 of 380 posts

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#121

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

best comment ever (well, to be more precise, best consumer software comment ever)

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#122
post #116

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

I find this funny, in that I struggle with Mac all the time. The worst grievance lately is that I don't know how to just pop back and forth between three windows. Something about the way command tab works just kills my ability to reason about what the window stack currently is. And, for the life of me, I never get copy paste from a terminal to work like I want it to.

You might like to try rcmd? No affiliation, and I’ll add that it didn’t work on my external MS Natural keyboard, so I stopped using it. But I like the idea. Perhaps it would work for you?

https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#123
post #108

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

yup yup yup. i would pack my bags from Mac land and move to that distro right away. (if i had adobe too, lol…) having a global menu interface that presents a uniform structure for navigating applications to the end user with sane default keyboard shortcuts (but universally configurable) would be a -game changer- it also opens the doors to novel ideas up like Command Palette-like UX paradigms. imagine changing the res…

The global menubar is such a big thing for me that it’s tempting to try to maintain forks of various things that ensure that global menubars like those in KDE and XFCE (w/extension) work properly — that is, the menubar in the app window hides (if present) and in apps that don’t have a menubar normally (like GNOME stuff) also populate global menubars.

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#124
I can't say much about the MacOS side of things (I do use a Mac at my day-job, but only because the choice is Mac or Windows, no Linux option). But as far as PopOS goes... I've been using it full-time on my personal laptop for several months now, and I'm very happy. Surprisingly so, you might say.

Why "surprising?" Well TBH, I always looked at PopOS as kind of a niche / oddball thing, along with any other distro that exists only because a device manufacturer is pushing it. I had assumed that when I got my System76 box I'd immediately install Fedora or something. But when it got here I felt too lazy to do that on "day zero" so I figured "Aaah, heck, I'll keep this PopOS thing around until I get some spare time, then I'll do a reinstall." Fast forward 6+ months now and I'm still running PopOS and am pretty happy with it. It mostly "just works" and I have access to basically all of the same packages as Ubuntu so everything I've needed to install (modulo a very small number) has been right at my fingertips, a quick "apt install" away.

Net-net, if anybody out there is thinking of trying PopOS, I'd encourage you to give it a whirl. Note: I am not associated with PopOS or System76 in any way, aside from being a System76 customer. I have no financial stake in this discussion.

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#125
Distro does not matter as much too me like Desktop Environment or Window Manager. I tried many distributions, in the end, I got back Fedora but then to Ubuntu (mostly because of the ZFS on Root thing and everything works out of the box experience). Artix was pretty good, but KDE and krohnkite was "too customizable" for me and dwm to less desktop environment.

BTW: If someone would like to have a tiling window manager on MacOS, try Amethyst[1]. Pretty awesome ;)

[1]: https://github.com/ianyh/Amethyst

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#126

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

Why doesn't someone use kmonad or libinput or something to make a utility that holds a database of the most-used applications and, whenever the user focuses a window, remaps the keyboard to some set of consistent system-wide bindings?

I don't think that exists, does it? EXWM comes close, but it doesn't have the database.

I know, I know, I just said "someone" when I should do it myself.

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#127
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol. I came here to say the only thing that matters is that copy and paste in Linux is 'cntrl+shift+c'. You can try changing it, but your still fucked in most terminals, and then you end up with two key combos depending on context. It's a nightmare, and I'm really glad you have the top comment. Clearly I'm not alone.

Why bother implementing ctrl+c and ctrl+v in Linux when highlighting text copies it, and middle click pastes it? Ctrl+c feels like the dark ages in comparison.

I usually use middle paste on a desktop mouse but keyboard paste on a touchpad device. As for copying on highlight it depends how you manage your windows, if you use a traditional floating WM and typically click windows to select them you end up with a lot of single character copies messing with your clipboard. Doubly so in the touchpad case again. Or if you like to highlight to bulk delete/replace or if you like to highlight to simply highlight the section on your terminal as you read a manpage or whatever in another window or probably more use cases that didn't immediately come to mind.

Point being it's more about use case matching than one option being the dark ages and another being The One Right Way™. Layer on that some like using clipboard history and others just want a single parking space and it gets even more blurry.

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#128
post #78

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

For me, getting the keybindings right is the killer feature Elementary OS provides. Sadly it doesn't actually install on any of the old MacBooks I have, so I don't actually use it.

How old are your MacBooks? It works fine on a pre-Retina 2012 MacBook Pro.

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#129
post #116

All I want in life is a Linux distro with a package repo full of meticulously reworked & reconfigured packages that make all the keyboard shortcuts across the entire system and every application be like and be as consistent as my old Macs. I've been full-time Linux (Kubuntu) for a few years now, and I've hobbled together something that only irritates me to death about 30% of the time rather than the 100% of the time…

I find this funny, in that I struggle with Mac all the time. The worst grievance lately is that I don't know how to just pop back and forth between three windows. Something about the way command tab works just kills my ability to reason about what the window stack currently is. And, for the life of me, I never get copy paste from a terminal to work like I want it to.

Window switching on mac has always driven me mad. I cut my teeth on windows so that is probably why.

Why can’t one switch between windows of the same application on MacOS with a modifier+tab combination?

Re: Switching from macOS to Pop_OS

#130
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Throw them in the trash and buy a new PC. They are pretty cheap.

Having worked at an independent PC repair shop, there are a lot of people who would rather keep using their old 6+ year old laptops and have SSDs installed in them than go out and buy a new laptop. Yeah there are cheap ones for sale, but they're underpowered, have regular old HDDs, and only 4GB of RAM. Plus, now they're coming with Windows 11 preinstalled, which will annoy a lot of people who are used to Windows 7 or…

Currently work at an independent PC repair shop, and can confirm this.

It's not uncommon for us to get a machine which is limping along on Windows 7 for the 15th year in a row, add an SSD and reinstall 7, 10, or rarely Linux Mint depending on how stubborn the user is on not upgrading to 10 and how open they are to change.

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