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

Switching from macOS: The Basics

blog.elementary.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 610 posts

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#71

Post by oneeyedpigeon »

truncate wrote: post #42
toyg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Linux world should really get together and bang out a solution for the hiDPI problem that is consistent across X servers and window managers.

Most apps I use on Ubuntu work well on hidpi. The main problem I face is when I connect my laptop with 4k screen with some external monitor with 2k or 1080p display.

What issues do you face, because I currently use that exact workflow with a MacbookPro retina, and a 24" dell monitor. Apart from windows not resizing/positioning automatically (so I have to manually re-layout everything whenever I switch from monitor to laptop), I haven't really suffered any problems so am curious to know what issues I'd face if I switched to Ubuntu.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#72

Post by pmlnr »

matthewking wrote: post #54
kornakiewicz wrote: post #35

I'm long term Linux user and I played with Elementary sometime ago. While just after installation everything is great and beautiful, it changed shortly when I need to install apps outside the ecosystem. Experience gives you feeling I could compare to using old-java application on Windows 10.

Along with seemingly everyone else, I had a quick look at my options to migrate away from Apple over the last few days. First thing I looked for was a decent mail app, was immediately put off the whole idea, exactly as you describe.

> a decent mail app

This is probably the most painful thing on desktop at the moment, because no one gives a s* to desktop mail apps these days.

I recently switched back to evolution from Thunderbird, but where one if great, the other falls short ( in this case, GPG with Evolution is _painful_ ). Geary is... well, not mature, Claws and Sylpheed are a bit too oldschool and mutt is ... well, mutt.

I'd love to see something like Rainloop[1] as a real desktop app. Mailpile[2] is a nice idea, but is nowhere even close to the usability of Rainloop.

[1]: http://www.rainloop.net/ [2]: https://www.mailpile.is/

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#73

Post by mtw »

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…

I'm with you but to be objective Apple hasn't done significant efforts for the pro market in last years. They have stated the future is in the iPad. Their pro line is stagnant or receding (where is Mac OS X server, Final Cut pro dumbed down, etc.).

Times are changing

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#74

Post by driverdan »

Every few years I investigate switching back to a Linux laptop. Every time I find there are still issues. Last time it was poor GPU support (no fast switching) and buggy sleep.

What issues still exist with using Linux on laptops?

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#75

Post by rimantas »

pmlnr wrote: post #58
matwood wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Lightroom. And please do not say Darktable is a replacement. Maybe one day, but not yet.

The truth about PS and Lightroom is that many of their users wouldn't really need them. A workflow of, for example, Rawtherapee + GIMP would be more than enough for basic to upper intermediate tasks to replace Lightroom with. ( No, I'm not talking bs, my wife is actually using this for work; just like Mixxx is usable for professional DJing. ) There is also digiKam, which is rather impressive; it is lacking a few feat…

Sure, because who deserves a decent UI&UX.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#76

Post by cm3 »

toyg wrote: post #31
my123 wrote: post #26

Elementary is quite nice on HiDPI until you use apps which need other graphics toolkits...

The Linux world should really get together and bang out a solution for the hiDPI problem that is consistent across X servers and window managers.

Not trying to downplay issues or shame another system, but if you compare Linux's HiDPI support to Windows, it doesn't look so bad anymore. For one, it's more likely to find apps that scale on Xorg/Wayland than on Windows, most Microsoft Windows official system apps included. Simple things like apps with list controls that have a huge number of entries where you're not able to resize the window while other more prominent MS apps waste white space like macOS and GNOME is an interesting phenomenon to observe.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#77

Post by pjmlp »

pmlnr wrote: post #45
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…

> Take Mac away and high quality desktop apps will go away. Well... no. Ubuntu, Gnome, KDE, XFCE; they are all high quality desktops. Don't mix the desktop with the applications you're running on it. > We'll have to endure multi-platform Electron stuff. Now that is indeed a real issue, and yes, ugh. Edit: I've misread the original, sorry, so adding a few things: if you're using the default apps or the ones built for…

Not really.

GNU/Linux doesn't have desktop stack capable of matching Objective-C, Swift frameworks both in feature set and related GUI tooling.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#78

Post by audunw »

goombastic wrote: post #20
anondon wrote: post #12

The software is there, but what about the hardware to go with it? The only laptops comparable to Macbook Pro hardware quality and battery life are the Dell XPS series and the Thinkpad X1. I feel there is a serious shortage of good laptops with linux pre-installed that the non-technical user can pickup and start using.

The other problem is that laptops are being built like mobile phones, with everything soldered to the board and the whole thing either sealed shut or taped down. Upgradeable & portable laptops just dont seem to exist at the price points they used to.

Get used to it. This is the way the industry is going, for very good reasons. Increased demands for more (or same) performance at lower power means you want more connections with shorter traces, and more functionality in the same chip or package. It seems likely that eventually all components except primary storage (SSD) will be in a single package.

On the flip-side, we've gotten external GPUs through Thunderbolt. So we've gotten the ability to extend laptop GPUs.

Another positive development is that SSDs are likely to continue getting faster. Maybe RAM won't be upgradeable anymore, but if Intel can push out their Octane/3D XPoint tech, you might get SSDs so fast that you can get almost the same benefit swapping to a faster SSD as upgraded RAM.

I mean, you've never been able to upgrade your CPU cache. If RAM is a glorified cache for the SSD, why complain that you can't upgrade that anymore?

Maybe one day SSDs will be soldered on in laptops too though :/

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#79

Post by annoying_tech »

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…

> Mac developers don't want to just get the job done. They want to get the job done while winning an Apple Design Award.

Well, thats kind of a narcissistic statement. How many people develop for Windows? How many for Linux? How many for Mac? oh.

I try to make my software as beautiful as I can, and keep a simple and usable UX. There are developers who don't care about guidelines, or design. That's not a platform fault, is just that there are developers who just want the job done, even in a ugly fashion.

Re: Switching from macOS: The Basics

#80

Post by matzipan »

toyg wrote: post #53
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…

This is a long-standing criticism of Elementary. I think they initially didn't even provide a way to get a free download, and eventually settled for the current UI. Basically the founder-owner is adamant that someone has to pay for his time, and tbh I don't begrudge him.

The argument is that the potential user needs to be aware of his action when he's entering in "0". Otherwise, it's just automatic - you don't even think about it.
Post reply on HN