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Switching from macOS: The Basics

blog.elementary.io

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Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#251

Post by mohanmcgeek »

embik wrote: post #203
kybernetyk wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I don't begrudge him either. I run a small software company myself. We're selling our software on the internet. But our website focuses on getting people to download the free trial first. The "asking for money" is then done once the trial period ends. It's already hard to get people to download your stuff for free. With obviously visible download buttons. If we did what Elementary is doing we would be closing our…

As far as I know the GPL does not allow trial periods and asking for money later on, but feel free to correct me. That's why elementary cannot do such a thing.

No. Gpl has no such thing. But you'll have to provide the source code with your software, so I'll just modify the source to give myself infinite trial.

_that's why it won't work_

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#252

Post by lloyd-christmas »

natch wrote: post #192
pjmlp wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I think this is just a phase triggered by those that actually aren't developers invested into Apple, rather people that want UNIX with a pretty GUI.

I think the emphasis including that in the article on pretty is a fundamental misunderstanding of why developers like macOS. For me and a lot of others what I really want is a UNIX that just works. Meaning it just works with its hardware in all ways... audio and video playing, recording, editing and everything else all work very well, without having to recompile the kernel or hunt down and install alpha drivers witho…

The single thing that keeps me with macOS is a universal key that is truly universal. Apps on mac are built around the command key. The windows key and the linux super key don't have anywhere near the consistency across applications that the command key does. `cmd + shift + [` flips through tabs in every application I have. In linux, it works only if I set up the keys for that application, and only if that application has the ability to set those keys. I spend more time in xkb config files than I do programming.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#253

Post by natch »

Beowolve wrote: post #2

I appreciate them capitalizing on people looking to switch. I think they could have done a better job of describing how to switch instead of talking about what people love. I think it would have been better for them to talk about some main sticking points, like how to get out of the ecosystem (say iTunes or Photos). Either way, nice to see the competition stepping up and capitalizing on the situation.

LOL! I doubt many people are looking to switch, the article just said that as it is trying to market something. Funny that HN readers are buying it so gullibly.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#254

Post by falcolas »

fnl wrote: post #211

I try Ubuntu about once a year, in the hopes of getting rid of OSX. But each time, the reason for going back to Apple ID is interoperability : Try dragging stuff (images, fotos, links, files, formatted text ...) from one program to another, including the "dreaded" Finder; Works nearly always in OSX. While Ubuntu has come a long way with these things, I think it's still an even longer way away from what OSX can do. So…

Eh, that functionality has a tendency to break after being used a few times in OSX.

Specifically, dragging images from your browser to the finder works the first few times, providing an overlay image which becomes a file icon as you hover over the finder window. A few transfers later, the file icon stops appearing. Then the semi-transparent image stops appearing; though the files are still being copied. Then, silently, the copying starts to fail completely. Not fun.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#255

Post by pmontra »

embik wrote: post #203
kybernetyk wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I don't begrudge him either. I run a small software company myself. We're selling our software on the internet. But our website focuses on getting people to download the free trial first. The "asking for money" is then done once the trial period ends. It's already hard to get people to download your stuff for free. With obviously visible download buttons. If we did what Elementary is doing we would be closing our…

As far as I know the GPL does not allow trial periods and asking for money later on, but feel free to correct me. That's why elementary cannot do such a thing.

The GPL and payment are orthogonal. They could GPL a piece of software that stops working after 30 days if you don't pay. You decide if to compile out the code that checks for the payment (and possibly distribute your version) or pay them those money.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#256

Post by muyuu »

asadkn wrote: post #146
Void_ wrote: post #39

I'm really hoping this is just a phase. Hoping that Apple will reduce prices of new laptops and we'll be back to normal. Right now everybody is using Macs. Walk into the Bay Area coffee shop, you see Macs everywhere. I love that. I build desktop software for Macs (focuslist.co). My apps are prettier than any others. They are easier and faster to use. This is the reason why people pay me $5 while they can get the job…

Doesn't change the fact that Mac marketshare is around 7%. Just because they're targeting the coffee shop crowd doesn't mean everyone's using Macs.

In the USA it's 13.5%, and I'm willing to bet that in urban US areas it's even much higher. Here in London (UK) it has to be at least 20%-30%.

But yeah, not everyone's using Macs. It's the biggest vendor, but there are more non-Macs than Macs.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#257

Post by vladimir-y »

I think for those who are not able to install and configure Linux manually from scratch not using a graphical installer would be better to use Windows 10 (not a bad OS), with no irony. Since such kind of articles and "simplified" systems like that "elementary OS" do hide Linux complexity. One day user will face a really serious OS issues and will stuck with that not knowing what to do (for example not bootable system after the update, it's not so likely, but might happen with Linux).

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#258

Post by mikeash »

xd1936 wrote: post #172
kybernetyk wrote: post #33

So I went to their main page to download an ISO to give it a try in a VM. They hid the download button really well: You have to type in "0" into the "how much you'd like to pay" field for the "Purchase" button to change to "Download". I mean I understand that open source projects need funding. But if you want people to try your niche OS at least make it obvious how to download it. Ask for money later after people had…

Everybody in the FOSS community gets really mad at that decision... I thought it was intuitive. "How much do you want to pay?" "0 Dollars." "Great!" Why is that so horrible?

Because for most people, "0 dollars" is not a sensible answer to that question. Getting something for free is perceived as a separate kind of action from purchasing something, even if you can ultimately boil it down to the same "exchange $X for Y" process.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#259

Post by dharma1 »

wlesieutre wrote: post #232
dharma1 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what toolkit Adobe use but I have a feeling it's not easily portable to Linux. Inkscape and Gimp are the stalwarts, but for someone coming from Sketch or Photoshop they feel quite ancient and somewhat messy. https://www.figma.com is cross-platform (web based), and a pretty good Sketch competitor For a Lightroom replacement, Darktable is actually quite good (though I really miss the high quality shadows/h…

Check out Krita sometime as a Gimp alternative. It's geared toward digital painting a bit more, but it works for general image editing too.

I've played around with it a bit - someone packaged Krita as a snap for Ubuntu and I wanted to test installing it. Looked good, more for painting like you say but looked powerful enough for basic image editing. I've seen people produce beautiful digital art with it

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#260

Post by Unkechaug »

natch wrote: post #192
pjmlp wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I think this is just a phase triggered by those that actually aren't developers invested into Apple, rather people that want UNIX with a pretty GUI.

I think the emphasis including that in the article on pretty is a fundamental misunderstanding of why developers like macOS. For me and a lot of others what I really want is a UNIX that just works. Meaning it just works with its hardware in all ways... audio and video playing, recording, editing and everything else all work very well, without having to recompile the kernel or hunt down and install alpha drivers witho…

Yeah, everyone is over complicating the issue. Why is it so hard to understand that people want UNIX without the pain?

Unfortunately that doesn't exist apart from macOS right now.

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