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Impressions from a first-time Mac user

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Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#101

Post by nerdjon »

olyjohn wrote: post #64
rwc wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that it's right or wrong, but the behavior dates back to the very first implementations of Mac OS and Windows. Mac OS has always been an application switching interface, and Windows has been a window switching interface. Takes getting used to the paradigm shift.

I can't get used to the fact that I can't alt-tab to a minimized window. Nor can I figure out how to switch to any particular minimized window. You have literally no way of knowing that a minimized window exists other than right-clicking the dock icon, or going to the "Window" menu after you switched to the application. The dock was fine 20 years ago when they released OSX, but they've literally done nothing to make…

Has Mac changed its default settings?

The Dock shows you any minimized windows on the right.

If for some reason this is no longer default (I don't remember the last time I setup a new Mac and didn't carry over settings) Right Click the dock >> dock preferences >> Uncheck "Minimize windows into application icon"

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#102

Post by ysleepy »

gen220 wrote: post #40

Re: cmd+tab issues, consider trying cmd+space+(first letter or two of the app), followed by cmd+`. Especially for touch typists, I think it's faster than cmd+tab: doesn't require you to use your mental "app icon classifier", and it's impossible to over/under-shoot the target. Scales O(N), where N is the number of windows open in the app you're switching to, whereas cmd+tab + cmd+` is O(N) + O(M), where M is the numbe…

Just use Hot Corners and "Application Windows"+"Mission Control", its superior.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#103

Post by Tagbert »

paxys wrote: post #10

File management is another one I'd like to add to the list of macOS screwups. How can viewing lists of files and moving them over from one place to another be so complicated?

What is complicated about it? I typically keep a handful of tabs open in Finder and drag and drop between them or to applications. You can also always do CMD-C and then either CMD-V to copy a file somewhere or OPT-CMD-V to move a file.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#104

Post by colinmhayes »

Tagbert wrote: post #98
colinmhayes wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure macOS was designed to have every window in fullscreen 100% of the time and the user would three finger swipe to switch windows. Seems like having a shitty experience when trying to do anything besides fullscreen is kind of the point, "do things the way we want you to or suffer."

I almost never use that kind of full-screen mode in Mac OS. I do too much work between apps and rarely restrict myself to just one. Drag-n-drop has been a major interaction model in Mac OS for many decades

I do most of my work in many apps too. It's pretty easy to remember to three finger swipe left twice to get to my browser from tmux etc. and is faster than other methods i've found. Plus I need all the screen space I can get, 16 inches is barely big enough.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#105

Post by itslennysfault »

Honestly, for something with a disclaimer about it being a rant, this read pretty positive to me. Pretty sure this guy will be in love with Apple by the end of the year and will start weeing the shortcomings in windows/linux. (at least that was my journey anyways)

For the cmd+tab thing I think it's a matter of taste and/or something that the author will get used to. I think I found it odd at first too, but now I get mad at Windows for not doing it that way. I love being able to switch between windows of the same program only.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#106

Post by count »

lbrito wrote: post #49
imwillofficial wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“You can get great hardware and battery life with system76 for instance.” The build quality of these two platforms is nowhere, and I mean nowhere close. Apples (heh) and oranges. I’m rooting for system76, but they have a long way to go.

Absolutely agree. Build quality is meh, not even good. But the battery is seriously good. Like 10+ hours good.

10+ hours isn't 'seriously' good anymore. I routinely can get 18-20 hours on my M1 MacBook Pro.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#107

Post by brimble »

divbzero wrote: post #47
ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #2

Despite the warning, I didn't find it nearly as "ranty" as the author cautioned, and instead seemed like a fairly comprehensive and fair take on his experience. Having gone through the same thing myself several years ago, the UI aspect of it is something that I'd be curious to see how it develops for the author. I think it is not uncommon for Windows folk to find the windowing experience on macs rather painful, at le…

What I miss most in macOS is Super + Left and Super + Right to tile windows left and right..

I've used Spectacle with the defaults, for years. It's not actively developed but still works. There are actively-maintained alternatives, but since it has zero times done anything weird or glitchy for me, even with multiple monitors, I've not switched yet.

"brew install spectacle", start it, give it accessibility permissions it needs in the Settings panel, set to start at login (check a checkbox in Spectacle's settings panel). Forget about it until you set up a new Mac.

cmd+option+up/down/left/right for half-screen tile. Cmd+option+F for the equivalent of maximizing a window in Windows (not Mac-style fullscreen). Cmd+ctrl+left/right for upper-left and upper-right quarter tiles. Add shift to make it lower-quarter on that side. That's it. Was all available to me instantly via muscle memory inside a month, don't even think about it now. It's how I do nearly all my window placement/resizing.

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#108

Post by danaris »

thanatos519 wrote: post #37
etchalon wrote: post #22

"In summary, macOS does not behave like Windows or Linux."

"In summary, macOS does not behave like Windows or Linux out of the box, and it's difficult or impossible to change many of those behaviours."

...And can you easily change Windows or Linux to behave like macOS, in these fundamental ways?

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#109

Post by drewzero1 »

rwc wrote: post #7
ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #2

Despite the warning, I didn't find it nearly as "ranty" as the author cautioned, and instead seemed like a fairly comprehensive and fair take on his experience. Having gone through the same thing myself several years ago, the UI aspect of it is something that I'd be curious to see how it develops for the author. I think it is not uncommon for Windows folk to find the windowing experience on macs rather painful, at le…

Not that it's right or wrong, but the behavior dates back to the very first implementations of Mac OS and Windows. Mac OS has always been an application switching interface, and Windows has been a window switching interface. Takes getting used to the paradigm shift.

This reminded me of a post on Macintosh Folklore[0] about the early development of application switching on Mac OS. It certainly gave me some insight into why things work the way they do in the Mac world.

[0] https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Switcher.txt

Re: Impressions from a first-time Mac user

#110

Post by Tagbert »

bombcar wrote: post #57
paxys wrote: post #10

File management is another one I'd like to add to the list of macOS screwups. How can viewing lists of files and moving them over from one place to another be so complicated?

MacOS apparently caches directory views somewhere, and I can routinely get the "Downloads" folder to not actually show what is in the Downloads folder; often having to resort to "open" on the terminal to access the file. I wish I knew how to force it to refresh the actual contents instead of reading it from the cache.

Do you have that folder set to sort by something useful like “date added”? Then it should work. If you have it set to not sorted then maybe the file is lower on the list and off screen.

~\Downloads is always the first tab in Finder for me and I almost always keep it to show the most recently added files at the top.

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