Rent a Mac in the cloud for development • Hacker News Board

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#91

Post by Wilya » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:10 PM UTC

delinka wrote: post #77

Wilya wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how the fact that I don't want to pay for a specific set of tools (a mac machine) prevents me from being interested in alternative tools.

In the case of iOS development, alternative tools have their own cost: effort to set up and maintain. Akin to how most operating systems besides Windows take additional effort to set up on that new Dell. If you can afford this extra effort (i.e. have the patience to work through the quirks), then you're welcome to it. Complaining about needing to obtain a Mac to gain the convenience of Apple's development environment…

Oh, I agree on that. My point is that it's my own decision to choose what works best for me. I was more reacting on your "find another line of work".

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#92

Post by aespinoza » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:11 PM UTC

vtail wrote: post #87

So let's see who your potential customer is: - Someone who owns a computer, with a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse (of course) - Someone with a decent internet access - Someone who has either invested or going to invested 100's of hours to properly learn the iOS/Mac frameworks - Someone who is hoping to either make a living off his Mac development or threats this as in important hobby - Someone who will be able to af…

That is indeed right. But we just read this and in my office 6 people are already looking into it.

We are all Linux/Windows Devs. But we are interested in the iOS ecosystem. This service would allows to enter without many barriers. Also it would allows to interact and be part of team developing iOS.

I think idea rocks. We could at last port some of our apps to MonoTouch.(We are using MonoDroid already).

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#93

Post by bnr » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:15 PM UTC

bambax wrote: post #23

I run OS X on VMWare, it's fast, it's perfect. I wonder if they're doing the same (virtualized OS X, which works well but is, I believe, against Apple's EULAs) or if they use actual Macs (which would be quite burdensome)...? Edit: confused iOS and OS X. I feel stupid.

Which version/edition of OSX are you using? I tried this with a couple of original DVDs and pirated copies, but none of them would boot properly under VirtualBox.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#94

Post by trunghlt » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:15 PM UTC

heelhook wrote: post #86

Really? I need to submit a ticket after registering to give it a try? Ok, cool, thanks but, too much work to try it out. Would make more sense to queue me in and limit sessions to 5 minutes or something like that, but that much interaction is a deal breaker.

+1

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#95

Post by dxbydt » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:16 PM UTC

vtail wrote: post #87

So let's see who your potential customer is: - Someone who owns a computer, with a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse (of course) - Someone with a decent internet access - Someone who has either invested or going to invested 100's of hours to properly learn the iOS/Mac frameworks - Someone who is hoping to either make a living off his Mac development or threats this as in important hobby - Someone who will be able to af…

> Am I missing something?

I think you are. I work fulltime at a bank for my paycheck. I have an internet connection in my apartment, and an office assigned wintel laptop. When I get home at 6ish, I can maybe put it 2-3 hours of coding. Right now I code 8 hours of Scala for my dayjob. Have always been wanting to check out what objective-C is all about. Perhaps I could learn how to write an app. Don't have an iphone ipad imac etc. So paying $40 a month to check this out is not such a bad idea. I'll sign up, see if I can hack objective-C on the iOS, and take it from there.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#96

Post by IznastY » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:16 PM UTC

microtonal wrote: post #49

bambax wrote: post #23

I run OS X on VMWare, it's fast, it's perfect. I wonder if they're doing the same (virtualized OS X, which works well but is, I believe, against Apple's EULAs) or if they use actual Macs (which would be quite burdensome)...? Edit: confused iOS and OS X. I feel stupid.

Is OS X on VMWare supported, if you are not using a Mac has the host system with VMWare Fusion? (If so, that would be news.)

Yes it is possible to have OS X running on VMWARE, quite easy actually, A quick google/youtube search will point to you a number of guides to do so.

Edit: While it is possible, I wouldn't by any means call it 'Supported'.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#97

Post by Skywing » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:17 PM UTC

Has this been done before? If not, then why not? With all of the available services like this for Windows and Linux, why not Mac? Is there some sort of license fee or restriction that makes this type of service difficult to profit from? I'm just trying to figure out why I have not seen more of this type of service for Mac, especially with the large number of responses to this that seem to be really interested in it.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#98

Post by jasonlotito » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:18 PM UTC

joezydeco wrote: post #68

pieter wrote: post #27

Interesting idea, but the pricing is just much too complex. By having to choose between monthly/weekly, morning/day/evening and then number of hours there are perhaps 50 different plans available? I'm just too confused to make a choice.

What is a "3 hour minimum"? Do I have to log in for that amount of time each day?

It's how much you commit to paying for, whether you actually use it or not.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#99

Post by vtail » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:20 PM UTC

aespinoza wrote: post #92

vtail wrote: post #87

So let's see who your potential customer is: - Someone who owns a computer, with a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse (of course) - Someone with a decent internet access - Someone who has either invested or going to invested 100's of hours to properly learn the iOS/Mac frameworks - Someone who is hoping to either make a living off his Mac development or threats this as in important hobby - Someone who will be able to af…

That is indeed right. But we just read this and in my office 6 people are already looking into it. We are all Linux/Windows Devs. But we are interested in the iOS ecosystem. This service would allows to enter without many barriers. Also it would allows to interact and be part of team developing iOS. I think idea rocks. We could at last port some of our apps to MonoTouch.(We are using MonoDroid already).

It certainly is a valid point. However, your assumption seems to be that the biggest barrier to entry would be hardware? If so, I disagree, with all due respect. I spent best parts of the summer learning iOS - it's not extremely hard, but it has many non-obvious corner cases that you'll need to spend some time to discover. So with almost any reasonable hourly rate (even at the minimal wage) I've invested much, much more in the learning of the framework that I would spend on a minimal hardware that will allow me to develop for iOS.

Let's face it - if you're serious about porting your apps to iOS, you would buy a mac at some point.

Re: Rent a Mac in the cloud for development

#100

Post by amccloud » Thu, Oct 27, 2011, 4:22 PM UTC

Skywing wrote: post #97

Has this been done before? If not, then why not? With all of the available services like this for Windows and Linux, why not Mac? Is there some sort of license fee or restriction that makes this type of service difficult to profit from? I'm just trying to figure out why I have not seen more of this type of service for Mac, especially with the large number of responses to this that seem to be really interested in it.

Licensing I think. IIRC, Previous versions of os x did not allow virtualization. Lion does not have this restriction.