How to Set Up a Mac for Web Development
upandrunningtutorials.com
upandrunningtutorials.com
Why complicate with things like third-party terminal emulators? Nobody at the level of getting started needs something like that.
By far, the lowest latency terminal emulator on OSX.
Personally I also use iTerm partly due to habit, been using it for well over 10 years all the way back to the pre-fork days on my PowerMac G5. But it always had features that kept me on (although they've varied over time), for one I've had better true-color support, handles cursors-states better with vim inside of tmux. More font configuration options. I used the Tmux-integration before but don't feel that it adds value for me personally anymore as I'm so used to using tmux directly, GPU-rendering was a nice addition for the 5k/LG UF 4K monitors.
Tried going back to Terminal.app (mainly for ultra low vi latency inside of tmux) but always ended up going back.
EDIT: also worth mentioning that if you use VS Code (or another GUI editor) and a separate terminal emulator, you may find VS Code's built-in terminal emulator to be very, very convenient. Although if you're overwhelmed with everything you already have to install, then it might be better to stick to iTerm 2 in the beginning, because it's a drop-in replacement for Terminal.app with awesome improvements
Although I was not aware of “click to download”, I wonder how that works.
The stock terminal is nice for being able to alt+click directly in to the middle of a command input.
However terminal.app is decent enough, I would prefer urxvt on linux (or even termite) but not because terminal.app is missing anything major, I just like customisability.
I shrugged it off as pointless hipster dev for FAR too long and now I can't live without it. I only use 1/10th of what it does but the fact that I get that 1/10th with minimal fiddling it's so worth it. My favorite feature is typing part of a command and hitting the up arrow (similar to ctrl+r but easier).
It also has the full color palette for ansi escapes and other ansi features, though I realize they aren't crucial.
Repeat the same experiment with iTerm 2 (although you may need some custom setting for this one). There are different results: iTerm 2 will copy the text that you selected, while Terminal.app will not. The idea is that the only time you select text in the terminal (with your mouse) is to copy it. It's very nice IMO
It's a Mac; the default usage model is direct manipulation rather than windows-style "object -> verb". So you select the text and drag the selection into where you want it, though as you say cut/paste is available as well.
I have personally not seen the point of anything beyond the built in terminal (though it's a taste matter) though I typically use the shell inside Emacs anyway. I think for beginners the least customization is the best.
My default mode for decades is to try to change defaults as little as possible, though my .emacs file tries as much as possible to bring Emacs back to the defaults of version 170.
Why, exactly?
Chrome has a solid track record, IE was ALWAYS a shit show.
I don’t know how anyone who was a web developer back when the majority were using IE6 could say Chrome’s current dominance is anything like what we experienced supporting IE6 well into the 21st century.
Personally I use Firefox on my MacBook for slightly better battery life and the tools are good enough for the most part. AFAIK in terms of batter life it goes Safari > Firefox > Chrome.
I feel like all of this and more should have been mentioned in the article. It's surprising that Safari wasn't even mentioned when it has clear benefits in some cases (coming from someone who hates Safari).
I’d argue that it’s getting easier to get a modern web dev environment going on a Windows box than much else these days, especially with WSL2 about to land. It’s fun that Microsoft is investing so heavily in the developer experience.
But keep in mind, the only reason I use Hyper is because of the borderless window aesthetic.
If you're on macOS, you can fairly happily get by with the default terminal (it's also super fast). Otherwise I would use iTerm2, alacritty, or kitty—all of which I've used individually for 6+ months straight at a time.