Ask HN: Why are Macbook Pros so common in the developer/hacker community?

POSIX-compliant OS combined with Apple's software and hardware design sense.

You have a shell, you have access to some great apps like Keynote, OmniFocus and Papers2, and great hardware.

They're brilliantly designed, well made, price competitive, and offer the opportunity to run OS/X along with Windows and Linux. Also, there's a point at which spec'ing out machines is an exercise in tedium, and with Apple, you pick the screen size, RAM, HDD/SSD, and sometimes processor, and you're done. That's really nice.

actually, the answer to your question is "Baaa Baa"--the sound of sheep following other sheep. i am going to offer a dissent here. there is no intellectual rationale for the mac worship.i think linux as as easy to work with as any mac os (and are we talking dvlpr or enduser?). & um, when was the last time you built an Apple machine customized to your needs? last i checked steve jobs didn't know--or understand--what my needs were(the guy thought aluminum was a non-conductor--genius to you, maybe...). apple products are not designed for pros(ask an apple marketing person about their swim lanes). and i think many ntwrk adms will have many unpleasant stories about mac problems on corporate networks. there was a time when apple hardware was better but june 2006 changed all that. there was a time when apple's software more closely mirrored the hacker community's push toward quality and innovation (and not just with FreeBSD) but those times are over, too. i'm going to quote a very ordinary man, who once said, "Apple is not a computer company anymore." That was Steve Jobs; and he's right. dr. jrrodriguez

I guess the main reason is that it gives you access to the Linux development stack without having to use Linux :)

I personally use a Lenovo x220 with Linux on it.