question for all the linux users out there, which DE most closely follows the windowing style on a mac(preferably out of the box/with a script)? I've enjoyed the multi-virtual-desktop windowing style during my stay here but as noted, the experience isn't keeping pace
Apple's Software Quality Crisis
541–550 of 1001 posts
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#542As someone forced to use a Windows laptop for work with the new job, I've stopped complaining about my Mac. It's so much worse on the other side of the fence... Working on Windows makes me appreciate the Mac ecosystem so, so, so very much.
I know the feeling. I'm forced to use a Mac laptop for work, and it's really made me appreciate Linux.
Linux makes you use the terminal and read manuals and edit configs to accomplish the most basic tasks. At least neither Windows nor macOS need that. Linux is fine for servers, but I can't fathom using that on my actual computer.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#543Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you look at the macOS feature history, it's pretty clear that the bulk of the team got shifted to iPhone in 2007 and never really recovered. The widely acknowledged Snow Leopard high water mark happened shortly after. To be fair, Apple can still pull off the occasional amazing feat of vertical integration -- HDR, APFS, keeping audio latency under control despite the relentless assault of apathy from all directions…
Snow leopard is fondly remembered but was buggy has hell when initially released. It got good , with time…
I wish for snow leopard strategy to be applied to modern scaled operating systems. Let's all agree to spend a year fixing and optimizing rather than making existing functionality worse or launching half baked ideas.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#544Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having joined a large established FAANG, it's become quite apparent that in any large established entity with so much management and meta work, with strong incentives driving more energy towards the meta work than where the rubber meets the road, it's inevitable for product quality to deteriorate. Internally the prioritized output becomes the meta work, not what reaches customers. What reaches customers is almost som…
Interesting observation. I suppose most startups haven't existed for long enough for the meta-optimizing employees to be promoted over work-optimizing employees, yet.
There is no budget for this kind of stupidity, if a start up employs to many people like this they won’t succeed.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#545As someone forced to use a Windows laptop for work with the new job, I've stopped complaining about my Mac. It's so much worse on the other side of the fence... Working on Windows makes me appreciate the Mac ecosystem so, so, so very much.
I know the feeling. I'm forced to use a Mac laptop for work, and it's really made me appreciate Linux.
I have a windows for work, Mac as a laptop and Linux on my workstation desktop. Windows is by far the worst, I don’t think Linux is vastly superior to Mac, they both have some things they do better than the other. My main issue is arm vs x86.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#546While I worked at Apple in 2021-22 their issues seemed about the same as nearly every other company producing consumer apps and devices; bloated slow garbage with very mediocre quality. Their engineering culture is terrible, especially as it relates to transfer of the “Apple ethos” to the next generation of devs. Apple is going to be indistinguishable from the rest of the pack within the next decade. But most of all…
> It was designed by people who don’t even know what it is for. This rings especially true with Windows. There was a not-so-serious rumor that the whole MS design department uses Macs. This may or may not be true, but recent UX changes make it clear that the designers don’t really use Windows beyond a superficial level. Many common interactions have become increasingly tedious and visually sluggish, both due to exces…
TBF a ton of windows users aren't primarily from the platform, and have either a second machine or more experience on other OSes.
The dev community might be an outlier, but people choosing a windows machine to get WSL on a mainstream and well-supported hardware is not uncommon.
Same for those with a macos work laptop but a windows gaming machine, or artists using a mac for personal stuff and windows for 3D/2D creation.
Having Windows designers making platform transitions easier kinda makes sense, though I agree it shouldn't penalize existing users as much as it does now.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#547I feel there's a cliff drop of quality in both hardware and software with the release of Big Sur, the version where I believe they rewrote a lot of the softwares. It's very obvious when I replaced my 2015 MacBook Pro with a 2020 MacBook Pro M1, everything downgraded, but now I'm getting used to software being clunky and buggy.
I always really liked a lot of apple software, like Preview.app. It's a viewer for almost everything, images, documents, 3d models, but it doesn't feel bloat at all, I'm glad Apple doesn't seem to change the app much. Also shocked the first time I found out TextEdit.app is also a WYSIWYG HTML editor.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#548This is not the only instance of the software quality crisis in Apple.
TL;DR Apple just does not have a qualified team (from the top) or the right team size (the one in the company is far too small).
I test beta releases of Apple’s OSes and report issues. I’ve seen a few factors over several years:
* There is not enough QA (or probably no QA at all) at Apple. So many bugs just creep through to release even after having been reported with tons of information and system logs provided. There is no attention paid to any bug report unless it is known and believed (by someone at Apple) to affect hundreds of users. Even then there’s little chance of attention to it.
* There is no feedback loop from Apple back to the bug reporter — you toss your bug report and assume it goes into some black hole.
* The direction of software development in Apple has moved to taking whatever is done on iOS — with a mediocre approach and plan — everywhere else. This includes things like Catalyst (the main reason you’d hate a macOS app from Apple). Try navigating Reminders or Music or any other Catalyst app on macOS with the keyboard — it’s as if the developers have never ever heard of tab order or have never used a keyboard that has non-alphabetical and non-numeric keys.
* Continuing on the previous point, Apple’s own app developers know something about how to create a mediocre iOS app, but over time the developer base has changed such that it has no knowledge of or history with desktop operating systems. I have no idea what top executives like Craig Federighi are even doing and why (I’m sounding generous here) they’re seemingly held hostage to such poor quality.
* When you look at the issues across device platforms and OSes, Apple seems to have one tiny team of software developers who work part time on all of those. Monday is iOS OS day, Tuesday is iPadOS day, Wednesday is macOS day, Thursday is iOS app day, Friday is iOS app day, Saturday is Apple Intelligence day and Sunday is a tvOS, homeOS and AirPods day. Apple’s services get a few hours here and there every few months.
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#549question for all the linux users out there, which DE most closely follows the windowing style on a mac(preferably out of the box/with a script)? I've enjoyed the multi-virtual-desktop windowing style during my stay here but as noted, the experience isn't keeping pace
Vanilla GNOME has most of the features you'd expect from Mac windowing. It doesn't go out of it's way to replicate the Mac desktop, but IMO it's much simpler as a result.
Been running GNOME for about 2 years now and the experience is really smooth. If you've got a Magic Trackpad, it works wonders on modern Linux. I also recommend GSConnect or Valent for a handoff-like experience with your phone:
Re: Apple's Software Quality Crisis
#550As someone forced to use a Windows laptop for work with the new job, I've stopped complaining about my Mac. It's so much worse on the other side of the fence... Working on Windows makes me appreciate the Mac ecosystem so, so, so very much.
Any system you have deep knowledge and experience with makes all the others look like garbage, because you don't know the right menus, can't intuit what you are trying to do and don't know the right workarounds/what the designers intended. As someone who uses MacOS, Windows and Linux on the regular, let me just say, uh... man, Solaris is pretty bad!