Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I mortgaged my future with a Mac

rachelbythebay.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 131 posts

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#101

Post by nirvana »

revelation wrote: post #94
rayiner wrote: post #23

Sitting here, still using a Mac as a dev/everything machine. I know Lion is supposed to suck and all, but my 2010 MBA still gets insane battery life under OS X, the tool chain is top-notch (Clang, LLVM, etc), there have been a ton of improvements under the hood (TLS support being a big one), and I actually appreciate full-screen XCode or Emacs given the 13" screen. Even Xcode seems to, in 4.6, be getting back to the…

Not an OSX user, but many of the complaints seem to stem from Apples crusade on filesystems. For many (even not power users) this can lead to data loss; you open a file and sketch out some changes, and everything was magically written to the disk without you ever noticing so now you can't get the old data back.

This perspective is inaccurate. The auto-save feature is versioned, so if you want to go back to an eariler version, you can, and in fact, it's much easier. In the past if you made changes and saved the file, only the latest save was on the filesystme, now you can go back in history even past the last save.

You're able to get old data back now in a way that you couldn't before... and can't on other systems.

Whoever represented it as some sort of data loss was confused or lying.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#102

Post by rachelbythebay »

coldtea wrote: post #86
rosser wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(FYI, an appreciable number of the downvotes you're receiving are probably because you're consistently using male pronouns for the author of a post on rachel bythebay.com. You might want to fix that, and your assumptions...)

And what if it's a male called Rachel? (Like the "boy named Sue"). Or this guy: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1290&dat=19900628&...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#103

Post by nirvana »

niggler wrote: post #32
rayiner wrote: post #23

Sitting here, still using a Mac as a dev/everything machine. I know Lion is supposed to suck and all, but my 2010 MBA still gets insane battery life under OS X, the tool chain is top-notch (Clang, LLVM, etc), there have been a ton of improvements under the hood (TLS support being a big one), and I actually appreciate full-screen XCode or Emacs given the 13" screen. Even Xcode seems to, in 4.6, be getting back to the…

"Apple doesn't care about the Mac" There are two different arguments here: 1) Apple axed xserve and basically made it a risk to depend on osx servers (they may decide to axe the mac pro without warning). This is a legitimate argument. 2) The OS feels more consumer based and buggy. I think osx coasted on the lack of popularity for years (if you are writing malware, are you going to target a small mac population or the…

If OS X hasn't advanced as much as people would like, I suspect that has a lot to do with iOS sucking up a large portion of Apple's developer resources.

However they are over that hump and over the past 2 years with Mountain Lion they're moving faster on OS X than they have in the past.

IF they keep to what they said they intended to do, we'll have the follow on to Mountain Lion announced pretty soon.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#104

Post by nirvana »

rachelbythebay wrote: post #99
nirvana wrote: post #97

The idea that Apple has her data all locked up is completely asinine. Frankly, saying so is dishonest. Apple has been careful to not do what she describes. It's hypocrtical to say that Linux which stores stuff in a directory structure is good while, Macs, which do the exact same thing with the data she's complaining about are "opaque" Mountain Lion was the first of a once-a-year update cycle, and contrary to "not eve…

My tech skills are sub-par. 10 year old children code circles around me. I sob when I see a command line. Circular data structures make me dizzy. I am a fraud.

Well, you did call a directory structure that is easy to navigate "opaque", and all of your criticisms are like those from someone who hasn't bothered to even try and figure out how to accomplish what you claim to want to do.

It would be better if your tech skills really were sub-par, because that would mean your integrity isn't called into question by the dishonesty in your post.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#105

Post by rachelbythebay »

nirvana wrote: post #104
rachelbythebay wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My tech skills are sub-par. 10 year old children code circles around me. I sob when I see a command line. Circular data structures make me dizzy. I am a fraud.

Well, you did call a directory structure that is easy to navigate "opaque", and all of your criticisms are like those from someone who hasn't bothered to even try and figure out how to accomplish what you claim to want to do. It would be better if your tech skills really were sub-par, because that would mean your integrity isn't called into question by the dishonesty in your post.

Ah, I'm disreputable and dishonest, too. Got it.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#106

Post by joshlane4 »

derefr wrote: post #65
joshlane4 wrote: post #59

I agree with the author. I resisted Apple products for a long time for the same reason. As someone who was brought up with a command line OS and a basic knowledge of file structure I hate how Apple "tries" to take this away from their users. I say try. I bought a MBP in 2009 because I loved the physical machine (aluminum unibody). With time I was able to use the OS without it controlling me. All of my music is ripped…

> All of my music is ripped on EAC in MP3 VBR format. Why exactly? MP4 (M4A) is a less patent-encumbered format, and also has higher sound quality for the same filesize, and still plays on everything (except, I guess, decade-old MP3 players.) I can understand not wanting to use DRMed/fingerprinted songs downloaded from iTMS, but the file format itself is just better . Or are you one of those people who sticks to usin…

> Why exactly?

I haven't spent the time to stay up on codec development. I by all of my music in a physical format (usually a CD). I like the redundancy and the DRM free-ness of it. The last time I seriously investigated (and ripped the bulk of my library) was in 2005 when I was also active on Oink. The prevailing opinion then was that EAC with LAME and VBR was the best trade off of a secure rip, high audio quality and small file size. To let iTunes rip with it's default AAC codec produced to many errors. Also, at the time I was on a Windows machine and iTunes was so bloated and slow I refused to use it. I had an early iPod with Rockbox which freed me from the need to ever use iTunes.

When I got my MBP, I initially used RubyRipper. Then I found XLD and have been happy with it since (using LAME+VBR settings).

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#107

Post by olefoo »

scholia wrote: post #70
dechols wrote: post #28

It does not matter the platform you use. The data you use is far, far more important. I use Windows 8, Linux, and Mac OSX boxes on a daily basis. I play music from all of them. I watch movies, view photos, and browse the web from all of them. I code on all of them. The reason I'm able to do this is because I've relentlessly managed my data and set up systems to allow that data to be shared effectively between environ…

You left out: "Windows: Best for business and enterprise software"

Enterprise software is a game; corporations are just really boring LARPs.

pro-tip: 5th level marketing droids can be defeated if you ask them to sell something to themselves...

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#108

Post by javajosh »

Hi Rachel. What timing. Just yesterday I realized what I call the "primordial criticism":

    Good products get used.
    Usage creates dependency.
    Dependency is bad.
    Therefore, good products are bad.
Since bad products are bad, and good products are bad, all products are bad! You have just plugged in OSX into the syllogism.

But the syllogism results in a contradiction. So one of our assertions is wrong. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to decide which it is.

P.S. use Picasa on OSX, not iPhoto. And iTunes does indeed suck and I don't understand why someone hasn't written a replacement for it that fits the Sparrow:Mail==X:iPhoto equation. Perhaps I'll take a crack at it.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#109

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

curiousdannii wrote: post #20
comex wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

natermer, FYI, your comment is marked dead.

Maybe because of the last three words?

Natermer, that comment should not be dead. Indeed, it makes little sense that any of your comments are dead, save that you took unpopular opinions (I practice I support in general).

So, please allow me to register my sadness on this matter. It is poor form for anyone to be ignored, and certainly not OK for them to be ignored based on their opinions on a board called Hacker News. Its not surprising (we're much better as a species at saying stuff than we are at living up to those words) but it's still sad.

Re: I mortgaged my future with a Mac

#110

Post by rachelbythebay »

javajosh wrote: post #108

Hi Rachel. What timing. Just yesterday I realized what I call the "primordial criticism": Good products get used. Usage creates dependency. Dependency is bad. Therefore, good products are bad. Since bad products are bad, and good products are bad, all products are bad! You have just plugged in OSX into the syllogism. But the syllogism results in a contradiction. So one of our assertions is wrong. I'll leave it as an…

They were fine. They changed.

You can't not upgrade, either, since then you're subject to security holes and other anomalies as the upstream provider decides to leave you behind. My original iPad had this happen to it last year. My Mac will follow soon, I'm sure.

Post reply on HN