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Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

shkspr.mobi

561–570 of 740 posts

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you "zero mouse acceleration" people survive? I have three monitors side by side. If I went with zero mouse acceleration, I'd need a 3 meter wide mouse pad in order to be able to move the mouse cursor edge to edge! Or do you do that mouse bicycle move where you constantly pick the mouse up, bring it back to its original position, move it some more, pick it back up, and so on? Such a weird subculture :)

Well the m1 only supports one external monitor so thats not much of an issue ;) I use a Logitech G502 and I just like the high sensitivity. I don't need a huge trackpad or to pick up the mouse. When mouse movent maps 1:1 to pointer movement, your brain and muscle memory can do a much better job at fast & precise movement.

The Mac Studio supports up to 5 monitors.

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#562

Seems like the obvious tradeoffs you'd expect, mostly lack of control/ability to change things, which I'd expect of MacOS. In return you get stability, Apples locked down approach means the OS is far more predictable. Linux in my view takes the reverse approach, you lose stability relative to MacOS in exchange for complete control. Historically Windows has sat somewhere in the middle, though in recent years with all…

My personal laptop is a mac os, and agree with some of the criticism. However, stability-wise, it has been rock-solid. I also manage my own Ubuntu desktop for work, and had to reinstall the system 3 times from scratch because it magically stopped working. In the end it turned out to be something with a new kernel, but it took me, dunno, 2 days to debug.

I don't know what I have to do to get the sublime desktop experience that macOS is famous for...

My work-issued Macbook Pro regularly forgets which monitor (my external monitor or the built-in display) is the primary monitor and moves the dock and task bar between them seemingly at random.

My mouse sensitivity is cranked all the way up but my mouse still feels like it's mired in tar compared to my Windows and Linux machines.

The dock is always in the way. I can hide it when a window approaches/overlaps it, but it often takes multiple swipes with the mouse to get it to reappear. Completely removing the dock (which would be my preference) does not seem to be an option. I was able to move it to the left side of the screen, which is better - why take up so much valuable vertical screen real estate with a top bar and a dock on the bottom???

So... I don't know. I'm not seeing it personally. For me Gnome, KDE, Windows 10, and Windows all provide a better GUI desktop experience than macOS.

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#563
post #467

I switched from Linux Mint desktop to an M1 Air last year. Performance-wise, the M1 is very impressive, probably feels about 80% as fast as my 6 year old desktop (that sounds like snark, but it isn't). Meanwhile, the battery life is insane (I've never brought the charger anywhere but my desk, and will often use it for a week out and about). I opted for the Magic Keyboard and Magic Touchpad, because I had a lot of tro…

>Also, the fact that everything I want to tweak requires buying an app?

I find this is often the case with MacOS, sometimes with open alternatives available.

I wanted windows/linux like window snapping and found a free solution called Rectangle[0], but discovered however they do it was causing mouse lag in games. Apple dev friend investigated into it with logs from my machine and discovered they are "just not doing it properly, go buy bettersnaptool[1]"

Sure enough I go spend $8 on bettersnaptool and all my mouse lag is gone and I've got the tweakable window snapping I crave.

This is often the case it just depends if the open software solution is done "properly" or will have some small bug that may or may not bother you. Rectangle worked flawlessly in every other instance except once I would launch a game, the mouse lag was not present on desktop applications.

[0] https://rectangleapp.com/ [1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bettersnaptool/id417375580?mt=...

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you "zero mouse acceleration" people survive? I have three monitors side by side. If I went with zero mouse acceleration, I'd need a 3 meter wide mouse pad in order to be able to move the mouse cursor edge to edge! Or do you do that mouse bicycle move where you constantly pick the mouse up, bring it back to its original position, move it some more, pick it back up, and so on? Such a weird subculture :)

Well the m1 only supports one external monitor so thats not much of an issue ;) I use a Logitech G502 and I just like the high sensitivity. I don't need a huge trackpad or to pick up the mouse. When mouse movent maps 1:1 to pointer movement, your brain and muscle memory can do a much better job at fast & precise movement.

I used a total of three external monitors with the original m1, via a displaylink hub. Saying "m1 does not support it" is not accurate. Its not like a amd 3950x supports any external monitors, does it?..

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "it just works" It does just work. You're just using it wrong. Keep that second sentence in mind whenever people say that first line and you'll never have any issues with apple fans

I'm a fan of apple MacOS as of late, specifically because the rigidity leads to easier computer usage to me. I'd hesitate to lump all apple fans around the few vocal ones. The vast majority of people that like apple don't push a cult of "it just works". Most people I know just recognize a computer as a computer, not an identity.

What I find amusing is just how much of an identity being anti-Apple has be come. You know, the people who will jump at any vague opportunity to profess their hate for anything Apple. I used to be in that camp.

I gave up on fanboyism years ago and nowadays I've found I like almost every platform for different reasons.

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#566
post #88

I'll add some to the list: - Control external monitor sound volume. There are buggy paid and open source solutions, but they all trigger all kind of bugs with sound and macOS itself. - Capture game audio with OBS together with microphone input. - Being able to wait for files to copy and work Finder at the same time. Yeah I could find replacement for Finder, but why the hell? - Use Valve Proton. Yeah, Linux is great t…

> Being able to wait for files to copy and work Finder at the same time.

What?

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#567

My biggest bug bears with macOS: - No way to fullscreen a window without moving it into a separate workspace. All a new workspace achieves is making it difficult for me to switch between this app and my other apps! (individual apps can implement this, and some like VLC do, but most apps don't) - No native support for containerisation. Containers/Docker are a great technology, but even on my M1 mac where literally eve…

Hold Option and double-click the window corner. This will probably do what you want (fill all of the available space). You can also do this with the sides of the window and have it grow only horizontally or vertically.

I would also recommend trying out if BetterTouchTool can't change the behaviour of the green (+) button as it's pretty powerful.

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#568
post #467

I switched from Linux Mint desktop to an M1 Air last year. Performance-wise, the M1 is very impressive, probably feels about 80% as fast as my 6 year old desktop (that sounds like snark, but it isn't). Meanwhile, the battery life is insane (I've never brought the charger anywhere but my desk, and will often use it for a week out and about). I opted for the Magic Keyboard and Magic Touchpad, because I had a lot of tro…

> I had to pay for an app in order to properly emulate middle clicks on the touchpad! That's bonkers!

That’s just the traditional way in which the Apple ecosystem works. They provide you with a pretty phenomenal starting point and App developers fill in the gaps.

Base macOS with Amphetamine, Magnet, and perhaps some utility for file/network access provide you with a desktop experience that comes close to the productivity of a tiling window manager, but certainly meets or exceeds the features built into Windows 10 or KDE for window management. Plus you can use AppleScript if you really want to get creative with desktop management.

Re: Things I can’t do on macOS which I can do on Ubuntu (2020)

#569

Some things in that list are pretty silly (can you really blame Apple for not letting you swap the mouse button order or have the insane focus-follows-mouse option?) Here are some others anyway: * Record system audio. * Control HDMI audio volume (have to use Proxy Audio Driver which is somewhat buggy). * Set mouse acceleration (you used to be able to but they removed the option and now you can only set sensitivity).…

Soundsource for HDMI audio control, Steermouse for fine grained mouse settings - including acceleration - and Blackhole for recording system audio.

Yeah I use Steermouse (not free). Haven't tried Soundsource (not free again!).
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