Live data from Hacker News

Broken

tyler.io

431–440 of 571 posts

Re: Broken

#431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I switched from macOS to Linux [Fedora now] about a year and a half ago, out of the same frustrations that affect a lotta folks -- It took a little while to adjust, but since there are a lot of similarities between the Linux and Darwin command lines [and Linux package management being better than homebrew by my lights] , it wasn't very long before I was like "Damn, why didn't I switch 20 years ago!!!" Plus now my har…

Does the hardware actually work? I've used Linux several times over the years and the hardware never totally works. I've always had trackpad issues, issues with suspend and hibernate, wifi issues, screen resolution issues, battery life issues, sound issues, driver issues etc. It 'works' in terms of you can technically do work on it, but you have to make a huge number of concessions and this is before considering it h…

Ubuntu 18 on carbon x1 extreme. Really smooth, until I do anything special.

Never got external monitor working. Just had issues with my wifi yesterday that persisted through reboots and randomly worked after I booted back into windows and then linux again (dual boot). Lost hours of my life trying to get any combination of browser + smartcard reader to work with two different card readers.

Sleep/Hibernate still don't work properly all the time. Sometimes my laptop decides to do the right thing, and I pray it doesn't undo itself and drain the battery in my backpack.

Re: Broken

#432
post #370
post #203

It's all very depressing. Like most of us here, I have become increasingly frustrated with the state of Mac (touch bar, bad keyboards, odd choices that fit neither creators nor developers well, and so on). No point rehashing it all. But where does that leave us? I spent a year on Windows 10 not so long ago, on upper end laptop hardware with HiDPI screen, and it was less fun and more problem prone than macOS - especia…

> Getting and keeping a Linux Desktop in good working order is harder than it should be at this age of Linux. Maybe because all the developers ran away to Macs, instead of sticking around dogfooding and fixing bugs? Free software is a collaborative social enterprise - it's not really anyone's job to make free stuff for you to use. If, as a developer, you've taken the easy path of proprietary software for years, and n…

Well said, no pain no gain. If your not prepared to walk away from proprietary software and deal with the rough edges then you're a captive audience and the creators of the proprietary software have no incentive to improve.

And let's face it, most of these "rough edges" are just excuse making, the sound exactly like the sort of things people say to avoid losing weight, quitting smoking, etc.

Re: Broken

#433
post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Getting and keeping a Linux Desktop in good working order is harder than it should be at this age of Linux. Maybe because all the developers ran away to Macs, instead of sticking around dogfooding and fixing bugs? Free software is a collaborative social enterprise - it's not really anyone's job to make free stuff for you to use. If, as a developer, you've taken the easy path of proprietary software for years, and n…

Has anyone made an open-source micro-violin yet? Well, there are open-source violins... http://www.hovalabs.com/hova-instruments/hovalin

This is cool, thx for sharing.

Re: Broken

#434
post #203

It's all very depressing. Like most of us here, I have become increasingly frustrated with the state of Mac (touch bar, bad keyboards, odd choices that fit neither creators nor developers well, and so on). No point rehashing it all. But where does that leave us? I spent a year on Windows 10 not so long ago, on upper end laptop hardware with HiDPI screen, and it was less fun and more problem prone than macOS - especia…

> Desktop Linux (even on standard desktop computers, not just specialized laptops) is far from perfect. Getting everything to work is a lot of effort, and then mysteriously something will stop working.

For a counterpoint:

I have had less issues with my Linux setups than with Windows for 15 or so years and I use both for the same:

- development

- mail, timesheets, documents

- small amounts of gaming once in a while (mostly causual matches on CS:GO)

I believe that others have problems with Linux but generally it has a highter tendency to work well out of the box than Windows has.

Also, as mentioned elsewhere, the most annoying thing about Windows is how it "stops the world". It is only milliseconds but for me it is maddening to wait for a high end 2019 PC to respond to keyboard input.

Usually it is driver issues and usually I get it sorted after a few weeks or months but it should be unneccessary for a stock Dell or HP machine. (Protip: don't ever use consumer or prosumer editions, not even XPS, always go for the the pro models.)

Re: Broken

#435
post #343
post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's frustrating because it's the "least worst" option. I use MacOS because it has a thoughtful, consistent, coherent, beautiful user interface and desktop environment. The things I use all day are basically a web browser, mail client, code editor, and terminal. I can do actual work on any BSD really, there is no proprietary app that causes lock-in, I don't use iCloud or any of their services. All I want is their des…

What makes the MacOS UI so much better than say Gnome or Enlightenment? I personally can't stand most of the Mac UI experience, however, I am very curious what you (and others) love about it that cannot be replicated on a different OS?

I get it, for some people it doesn’t matter. There is zero difference between xfce (Gnome, Windows, etc) and MacOS.

But for some people, they have used MacOS since OS X 1.0 (or for me, System 7) and there is a particular "Mac" way of doing things. There are expectations and standards for how the system and user interface should work and respond.

Perhaps you could attribute this to baby duck syndrome. You could also attribute it to people having different mental models for the world, there are clean desks and messy desks, different cataloging systems. There is something for everybody. For people who like Macs, everything else seems like a clumsy intolerable mess.

There are themes and hacks to make systems "look" like MacOS, but they fall short of even remotely functioning like it.

https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guideline...

Re: Broken

#436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like there are people who get around the secrecy/isolation veil, they just have long-standing friends in other projects and can rely on them to push features and bugs though the bureaucracy. If you don’t have that, well, expect your Radars to sit in “punted from this release” until the end of time.

Seems crazy to hire the best engineers and pay them top dollar only to put a bunch of organizational barriers in the way they have to try and navigate if they want to get anything done.

I've never heard Apple referred to as paying software engineers top dollar.

Re: Broken

#437
post #203

It's all very depressing. Like most of us here, I have become increasingly frustrated with the state of Mac (touch bar, bad keyboards, odd choices that fit neither creators nor developers well, and so on). No point rehashing it all. But where does that leave us? I spent a year on Windows 10 not so long ago, on upper end laptop hardware with HiDPI screen, and it was less fun and more problem prone than macOS - especia…

Did your Windows laptop have a SSD or HDD?

I'd been using a laptop with an HDD (but otherwise great specs) and the experience was trash. Then I upgraded to an SSD and its an entirely new OS.

Re: Broken

#438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I switched from macOS to Linux [Fedora now] about a year and a half ago, out of the same frustrations that affect a lotta folks -- It took a little while to adjust, but since there are a lot of similarities between the Linux and Darwin command lines [and Linux package management being better than homebrew by my lights] , it wasn't very long before I was like "Damn, why didn't I switch 20 years ago!!!" Plus now my har…

Does the hardware actually work? I've used Linux several times over the years and the hardware never totally works. I've always had trackpad issues, issues with suspend and hibernate, wifi issues, screen resolution issues, battery life issues, sound issues, driver issues etc. It 'works' in terms of you can technically do work on it, but you have to make a huge number of concessions and this is before considering it h…

The hardware/driver situation is unambiguously better on Linux than it is on Windows. I've had ten times as many problems on Windows over the past ten years or so than I've had on Linux. (never been a serious user of OSX, although I imagine it's better than the situation on either Windows or Linux because Apple controls both the hardware and software)

The problem people run into is that they fall into one of two shitty extremes. You either dive into the deep end and try to configure your own kernel and forget something. (Common in Gentoo circles) Or you go with Debian stable or RHEL and their kernel is two years old and they don't have drivers for the latest generation of graphics drivers because of course they don't. Just install Ubuntu like a normal person and you'll be fine.

Problems with WiFi, trackpads, and hibernation haven't been a problem since like 2010 or so. I get 11 hours battery life on my XPS 13 9360 which advertised 9 hours battery life when it was new in 2016.

> people say it works flawlessly - except for [insert issue here]

This is a thread about how OSX works flawlessly except for [insert issue here]. And as it happens there are a pile of issues this time around. If you have a house that doesn't have stones thrown through its glass walls (besides TempleOS) I'd love to hear about it.

Re: Broken

#439

I was thinking on this the other day, and I think what ultimately boils down to is this: there’s no “why” anymore at Apple. Go back and watch old keynotes with Steve. Almost always, whenever he’s talking about a new feature or piece of hardware, he starts with the “why.” Not everyone will agree with the “why,” of course, but it’s still given. Why do we want to get rid of the CD drive on MacBook Airs? (We see OTA soft…

There's still a "why" to those product launches. It's just that the "why" is no longer design-driven and is instead driven by business needs– namely, "we need to diversify our revenue streams away from just hardware sales and into services." This started when Tim Cook (instead of Jony Ive) took over as CEO.

I think the actual turning point was when Scott Forestall was fired & Ive took over software design. Prior to that, Apple had been a software company first. Even Woz talks about making hardware so that he’d have to tools to make software.

Ive created some amazing hardware, but I’m excited to see where the next few product cycles go.

Re: Broken

#440
post #343
post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's frustrating because it's the "least worst" option. I use MacOS because it has a thoughtful, consistent, coherent, beautiful user interface and desktop environment. The things I use all day are basically a web browser, mail client, code editor, and terminal. I can do actual work on any BSD really, there is no proprietary app that causes lock-in, I don't use iCloud or any of their services. All I want is their des…

What makes the MacOS UI so much better than say Gnome or Enlightenment? I personally can't stand most of the Mac UI experience, however, I am very curious what you (and others) love about it that cannot be replicated on a different OS?

I think MacOS fails very badly at basic window and file management. Finder is still broken. Not being able to preview an open application by hovering on its icon (as in Windows) is a big productivity bottleneck. Minimizing/maximizing is plain confusing - why does the window sometimes take up the whole screen and sometimes only fill up 1/2 the real estate?
Post reply on HN