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Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

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Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#221

Post by caslon »

2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #167
jeswin wrote: post #142

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). Just like it wouldn't be fair to complain about macOS on a Hackintosh - sound didn't work well and had to patch the DSDT. > but there are rough edges for the power user. > I am an extreme power user, ... > In the end, I was able to replicate most of my macOS power tools setup via input hooks and sh…

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). So I Googled “laptops supported by Linux”. There is no official site. Ubuntu has a page. But it’s not on the first page of results. I only know about it because I’m familiar with it. Supporters keeps arguing people should jump through hoops. I’m on Linux right now, but people have better things to…

Not to give an argument along the lines of "You're holding it wrong," but...okay, yeah, I'm going to do that.

You hold a gun in one way. If you mess that up in any fashion, you probably won't hit what you're trying to, and, worse, might shoot yourself.

Saying things like "There is no official site" is holding Linux wrong. Linux isn't an operating system. Linux is just a kernel.

So phrase your search the right way:

"laptops that support GNU/Linux installation"

You'll be surprised to find, immediately it lists a whole bunch of laptops sold with a Linux kernel on them! I don't normally use Google, but just for you, I checked on it: It even has an easy-answers page.

If you want the whole package, look up an operating system, not a kernel.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#222

Post by carlesfe »

carlesfe wrote: post #186

Hello, author here. I knew that if this got posted to HN I'd need to explain myself more :) To address some of the top comments: - I clarified now in the article that the "Linux Laptop" is a Dell XPS 13" Developer Edition, which is marketed indeed as a Linux laptop, and the Ubuntu is marketed as "Ubuntu Dell". However, this is missing the forest for the trees, because only a couple of the issues I mentioned were rela…

Since a lot of people asked, some of my "power user" requirements:

- Perfect support for HTML email with attachments, calendar invitations, and conversations

- Use MS Office and Adobe Reader (with Wine in my case)

- Perfect support for Google Meet, Teams, Slack and Zoom, including screen sharing (full screen or just a window)

- Ability to customize the action for any keypress, combination of keys, mouse keys including the scroll wheel, and trackpad gestures.

- A good way to manage a constant flow of notifications: chat, email, calendar/reminders, and such

- Connectivity with bluetooth headsets. My Airpods microphone wouldn't work so I had to buy another brand of headphones.

- Support for a Wacom tablet, it was good but it lost my settings on reboot

- Local copy of Google Drive documents (did this with Insync, a paid tool)

- Working with two clouds with the same user: work and personal. This includes unified inboxes and calendars, task lists, etc.

If all I needed was to send plaintext email and edit code in vim I'd use OpenBSD ;)

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#223

Post by hurril »

zucker42 wrote: post #194
2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). So I Googled “laptops supported by Linux”. There is no official site. Ubuntu has a page. But it’s not on the first page of results. I only know about it because I’m familiar with it. Supporters keeps arguing people should jump through hoops. I’m on Linux right now, but people have better things to…

Again, that's like googling "laptops supported by MacOS" and expecting to find a list of Hackintosh compatible hardware. Dell and Lenovo both sell laptops pre-installed with Linux, and there are also boutique shops like System76 and TUXEDO. And I DDGed "Linux Laptops" and got all these suggestions. Of course, Linux doesn't quite have the mass market consumer experience you get with MacOS or Windows, but it's not exac…

No it is absolutely not. That googling will find a list of hardware supported by Hackintosh and it will find Apple. Two very good responses.

Laptops supported by Linux provides neither.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#224

Post by crubier »

Vinnl wrote: post #207
burlesona wrote: post #41

Preview is probably the most underrated app of all time, with “quick look” as a contender for most under-appreciated feature. Just hitting spacebar to see virtually any file, and the ability to open in preview and read or even markup and make small changes, is so nice. Whenever I use a non-Mac system I really miss those two features.

Hmm, I installed a quick look equivalent on my desktop because I saw that mentioned as being so useful a lot, but I keep forgetting I have it. In what situations would you use it?

You just prove the point of the author above.

If you had the real Preview on MacOS, you’d be using it all the time without even thinking, like 100% of MacOS users. Because it’s fast, it opens everything faster than you can think, and it just works well. The effort required to launch it is zero, or even negative. It’s just part of the OS.

But since you have a « sort of » copy cat which does not work as well or as fast, is not as well integrated, does not support as many files or any fatal flaw like that, you just don’t use it.

So yes, Preview is underrated and really hard to replicate.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#225

Post by carlosrg »

bArray wrote: post #177

Essentially the article boils down to "I am used to a Mac and anything that doesn't behave like a Mac is incorrect, and I'm unwilling to invest time into figuring it out". It's fair enough stance, but unless you are willing to invest time into becoming a Linux 'power user', you're going to remain locked into whatever hardware Apple happens to be peddling at the time. The M1 seems great today, but Apple will slump aga…

>Essentially the article boils down to "I am used to a Mac and anything that doesn't behave like a Mac is incorrect, and I'm unwilling to invest time into figuring it out".

It doesn't look like that. He has legitimate issues with things he needs for his job, like a good email client and calendar client. No matter how you try to adapt your workflow, the PIM situation in Linux is very poor.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#226

Post by thn-gap »

pfranz wrote: post #218

I'm sure Gimp has its fans, but do people just not know about Krita? I'm not saying it's as fast/easy at small changes in Preview, but it's cross platform and mostly a drop-in for people who are familiar with Photoshop. I know people who use it on non-Linux platforms and chose it on its own merits, not giving any excuses because it's Open Source or ported from Linux--they probably don't even know.

I've been using Krita for some time as a replacement of GIMP. However, I still don't understand how these programs are rather powerful and complete, and yet the text tool sucks in all of them.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#227

Post by rbanffy »

smoldesu wrote: post #35

>apt-get was a revolution when it was released in 1998 and it is still the best way to manage software today. brew is a mediocre replacement. While apt still isn't the best package manager (my heart belongs to pacman, no matter what the haters say), I completely agree that brew is a failed imitation. I wanted to use MacOS for the longest time, because I've been told that it's a real "Unix system". Brew has distilled…

> I completely agree that brew is a failed imitation

I recommend MacPorts instead. Brew broke my computer more than once.

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#228

Post by one2three4 »

2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #167
jeswin wrote: post #142

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). Just like it wouldn't be fair to complain about macOS on a Hackintosh - sound didn't work well and had to patch the DSDT. > but there are rough edges for the power user. > I am an extreme power user, ... > In the end, I was able to replicate most of my macOS power tools setup via input hooks and sh…

If you're complaining about Linux drivers please do so after using a Laptop that supports Linux (Thinkpads for example). So I Googled “laptops supported by Linux”. There is no official site. Ubuntu has a page. But it’s not on the first page of results. I only know about it because I’m familiar with it. Supporters keeps arguing people should jump through hoops. I’m on Linux right now, but people have better things to…

+1 I find it absurd that (some) linux supporters find it not only ok but even a must, to have to tinker around your machine in order to make everything work. I could understand it in the 90s but this is a very different era we're in. I get zero value from having to tinker with my x-org settings to make the external screen work (sometimes). I'm using a computer to create value elsewhere and having to even think about stuff that should just work eats up my time and energy.

I believe this is the main reason that OSx and even Windows are much more prevalent in company laptops that any linux distro. And I don't see this changing anytime soon. If even Ubuntu didn't make that cut I don't see which (distro) will.

Haven't tried a laptop that comes with preinstalled linux TBH. Maybe there's some light there. Dunno. But my last experience with a Thinkpad 550 and latest ubuntu was bad. As in no proper keyboard, terrible screen issues, networking issues...

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#229

Post by crubier »

symlinkk wrote: post #100
PurpleFoxy wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does and it mostly works but it doesn’t seem to be as fast as on macOS.

Knew I would get this type of response. The goalposts keep shifting

No. It’s just that performance and UX is capital for this software, and generally terrible on Linux as compared to MacOS

Re: Fed up with the Mac, I spent six months with a Linux laptop

#230

Post by xrisk »

darkandbrooding wrote: post #80
xtian wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes Homebrew a failure? I don’t generally have issues with it for my needs.

There is one single feature of homebrew that regularly bites my coworkers. You can refer to software by name@version ("brew install postgresql@11" or "brew install postgresql@12") and there is no confusion about what you are installing; or you can refer to software by name only ("brew install postgresql") and the version number is calculated to be "most recently released." (v13 at the time this was written.) Hypothet…

What you want to do is maintain a tap for your organization and pin formula versions there.
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