I am thinking of transitioning from Mac OS to Windows, because I have seen good things about WSL2. Has anyone made the switch, and if so, how is the experience compared to developing open source applications on Mac?
There are a ton of complaints about Microsoft windows, but honestly, I love it. I think the complaints about how terrible windows is come from the early 2000s - 2010. The idea that it has terrible UX is outdated, and in my belief, is somewhat a result of apple branding than anything else. Microsoft is a different company now, and puts out some great products.
For the record I've been writing software for about ten years
MacOS is, in my opinion, a neglected and quasi-orphaned platform, they are keeping the lights on only and depending on the ecosystem/services friction to keep the product going. My "daily driver" PC is a no-longer-mobile Macbook Pro with an ancient Dell USB keyboard. But I invest as little time as possible into anything that is Mac-only, as Apple is a harsh mistress.
The old reasons for using MacBooks are less relevant. The market is very different than 2008-12, when Apple was 10x better at 1.5x the cost. Shitty corporate laptops aside, if you look at some of the newer HP, Dell and Microsoft devices that are in the $1,500-2,000 range, they are now meet or exceed the Apple lineup from a quality and engineering perspective.
I'm a web developer and found that the filesystem/IO performance on WSL was woeful. An "npm install" that would take 20 seconds on Mac would take 2/3 minutes if not more on WSL. That on its own was a deal breaker. Other things with regard to folder sharing across Windows/WSL was also a realy challenge. Finally, the Windows experience itself I felt was poor. Many of the subtle things I had become used to on Mac are completely missing (preview for example)
You're trading a tool that's been designed to serve you well (although quality it slipping lately) for a "tool" that's designed to waste your time with advertisements and violate your privacy.
The first tool manufacturer's incentive is to make a product that works for you so you keep giving them money (in the form of buying new machines and their cloud services). The second manufacturer's incentive is to waste as much of your time with ads and other crap they shove in your face since that's how they want to make their money. The "tool" aspect of it is secondary and is only there to make you stay on the platform, but since Windows 7 hasn't been the primary objective.
But speaking of WSL itself, I have concerns regarding filesystem performance on lots of small files (during Git clones, NPM install operations, etc). I think it's a limitation of NTFS more than anything and I'm not sure if there's an easy solution for them.