MacOS is a masterclass in bad design and lackluster features.
I always considered buying a Mac but was always hesitant to change. Once I got one for work I swore to never ever spend a dime on a Mac.
People that will disagree haven't used Windows in years.
That said, I agree with your 2010 estimate of Mac software peaking in 2010. Mac laptop hardware is still better than Linux laptop hardware. As someone who's considering my first Linux laptop, I need to balance the inconveniences of Linux hardware now with the likely fact I can probably use that laptop significantly longer than current Mac. Somebody has to pay for all those convenient Mac support folks.
The funny thing about that is that it's only with the Apple Silicon Macs that's true. The 2016-2020 Intel MacBooks were a garbage fire.
It has literally never happened to me. However it happens weekly on Mac, where I will lose the focus of my window and be prompted for an update.
That you can disable in System Preferences. On Windows Home, for example, updates cannot be disabled, and the OS will install them even if this means ruining everything you're doing.
System Preferences -> Notifications -> Do Not Disturb
I set Turn On Do Not Disturb 'from 12:01AM to 11:59PM'
That is really just not true. I don't even think one could consider it an opinion. Irregardless of what Windows does, macOS constantly gets in your way. Try to rename iTunes, because that's the only way to keep it from opening every time you connect your non-Apple Bluetooth headphones (there's a convoluted procedure to do so). Try to control the brightness or volume of an external monitor. You cannot. Even the monitor itself isn't as good as it is on Windows due to poor resolution and text handling on macOS, and a Macbook Pro with a discrete video card struggles to drive the monitor. External mice and keyboards are touch and go with macOS and reset settings nearly on a daily basis for me. Developer tools, such as asdf or others installed from Homebrew are incredibly finicky and often require workarounds depending on whatever macOS version you're on and whatever thing it decided to break. (For example, it's actually easier to get Erlang's observer running on WSL on Windows with the GUI interface than it is on macOS, which requires all sorts of hacks in Homebrew.) I don't know why Apple doesn't get the same hate as Windows, because my Macbook Pro constantly installs stuff all on its own. I get pinged by several apps to update through their own update mechanism on macOS.
My CLI do you mean the Unix-like underlying system (like through Terminal, zsh, bash, etc.)? I enjoy WSL on Windows more because it's actually Linux and usually just works. The only trouble I have there sometimes is network related activities, as is usual for VM-like setups.
And yes, I mean the unix like environment. WSL isn't an option for me on my work computer since our giant corporate IT department has the windows machines on an older build (and locked down to the point of productivity sacrifice) that has poor WSL support. I've used it on my home PC and it works surprisingly well and gets better with each update.
> Try to rename iTunes, because that's the only way to keep it from opening every time you connect your non-Apple Bluetooth headphones (there's a convoluted procedure to do so)
Never happened once with any of my non-Apple Bluetooth headphones. What the ** are you talking about? Do you constantly hit the play button on the headphones when you connect them? That's the only time Apple Music or iTunes would launch without the user starting the app explicitly.
> due to poor resolution and text handling on macOS
Yeah. Apple has basically told everyone without a Retina display to go ** themselves. While Windows does handle those in-between resolutions much better.
>I don't know why Apple doesn't get the same hate as Windows, because my Macbook Pro constantly installs stuff all on its own
You can turn off auto-updates on the Mac. You do know that right?
> Macbook Pro with a discrete video card struggles to drive the monitor.
My guess is that you're using a 2016-2019 MBP. If so, try plugging in the dock/monitor to the right side Thunderbolt ports. For some ungodly reason MBPs tend to throttle if a dock is plugged in on the left side.
Regarding the headphones, it's a common issue. In our case, it was done when the Bluetooth headphones (a model sold in Apple stores!) simply connected, as another commenter mentioned. There's all sorts of forum posts about this with a litany of solutions. The only solution that worked for us was to rename iTunes (the name at the time).
Really? You have a 5120x2880 monitor that macOS is messing up? I've never heard that before. Talk to LG, there's got to be something wrong with it.
>Auto-updates can be turned off on Windows as well. I still get updates I didn't expect on macOS, often when I've told it explicitly not to do so (like when you get the notification requesting it).
Not Apple's fault that you don't know what you're doing. I've turned off auto-updates and nothing updates unless I tell it to. There are some apps that auto-update on their own, like Chrome and Firefox. But they do that on Windows too.
> Regarding the headphones, it's a common issue. In our case, it was done when the Bluetooth headphones (a model sold in Apple stores!) simply connected, as another commenter mentioned.
Basically the headphones that do that send a play command when they connect. Apple will auto-start iTunes/Apple Music when nothing is loaded and play is hit. Yeah, that's annoying. I wish Apple didn't program iTunes that way, but that is entirely the fault of the headphones. That's why bluetooth headphones today don't do that.
I can also confirm that OSX doesn’t have a good case with external monitors, but I am no longer sure that it is possible at all. Frankly, all OSes suck at it so hard that one should just try to avoid the situation. Strangely enough the new Wayland on Linux may be the most adequate at it, though it is still far from perfect.
You've merely succeeded in demonstrating many examples of "one mans lackluster features is another mans streamlined interface". All of your examples are things that many people won't run into. External monitor? Non-Apple bluetooth? I don't use either of those so, yes indeed, I find it to be a streamlined interface.
Really not my current experience and I use W10 daily at work and W11 at home. Not saying it's a good OS, just saying that your statement is plain wrong.
If certain (third party) apps are annoying then you can control notifications through the focus assist setting just like with any mobile OS.
We all have our preferences, obviously, but to assert that MacOS UI is 'a masterclass in bad design and lackluster features' is a grandiose exaggeration stated as fact.
The dock leaving empty space on 50% of the width of your monitor is also a fact.
Or having to run a weird command in the CLI to add an empty space as separator in the dock.
Or having no "Apply to all displays" when changing background images on monitors.
That's just 30 seconds out of the top of my head.
I've been using Macs since 1988 and I've never wanted your point 1, 3, or 4, and my dock doesn't take 50% of the width of the screen, it takes about 5% of it because it's on the side where it belongs and where it was on NeXTstep.
So none of this has ever applied to me, and TBH, I can't even imagine it applying to me.
You just don't know how bad you have it, that's it.
But sure, MacOS is great, go back to installing a 3rd party software to snap windows xD
Linux wins for dev and loses for apps. Windows wins for apps and loses for dev. Mac is second-best at both which is why I prefer it.
That said, I'd love to be running production-ready Mint on my M1 Air.
Edit: I forgot to say, and it's the reason I responded to you in the first place, that I agree. It's really sad that something like Rectangle has to exist just to get decent window handling.
Secondly, I was a Windows early adopter and have used it since version 2.01. I do not see any relevance.
3rd, yes, I have Rectangle, which replaced Spectacle. So?
Pot, kettle, black?
To make window management bearable in Windows, I install Powertoys (Fancy Zones). Granted, it is not third-party, it is by Microsoft, but then it is version 0.something, it shows and there's a reason why it is not shipped with the OS.
1) It’s very annoying that, in a full screen window, moving your mouse to the top of the screen causes the window to rescale. When reading a book in chrome, realizing the window causes the text to reflow to every time I accidentally move the mouse too far up (when trying to rearrange tabs, for example) all my text jumps around
2) when unzipping a file on the desktop by double clicking it, the unzipped folder appears right behind the zip file and I have to precisely drag it elsewhere. This happens even when i have snap to grid turned on (the new folder ignores the grid)
3) When an app is hanging, I want to click the apple icon in the menu bar to open the force-quit tool. But the menu bar hangs when the focused app does! So I have to switch to a different app just to force-quit the hanging one.
4) If you want to see all possible resolutions of an external monitor, clicking the “Scaled” checkbox in the display settings window won’t do it. Instead you have to option-click the checkbox. How’s that for discoverable?
5) Whyyyy do my virtual desktops rearrange themselves randomly???
6) Dragging a .app from ~/Applications to the trash can doesn’t remove any folders the app has created in ~/Libraries
7) Finder is just terrible compared to windows explorer. Oh how i miss having an editable path bar to make it easy to copy/paste a path! By default you can’t even see the current path and basic functionally like “go up” is missing
8) The default terminal sucks. The windows one does too but at least windows has the microsoft terminal in the windows store.
9) Try dragging an app from launchpad into an app folder. it’s impossible.
10) Yesterday I tried to do an os update. A pop-up appeared saying “you don’t have enough disk space to install the update”. I clicked “ok” and then my computer restarted and installed the update anyway. ????
For this, believe it or not, it's actually a FEATURE. If this again doesn't prove my point I don't know what does.
The good news is that you can disable it: https://www.appsntips.com/learn/how-to-stop-mac-spaces-from-...
You can also command-click the directory name in the window at the top to see the path/access parent directories.
2) I do not have this issue. But then again I don't really use the desktop for storing files. I use list view and lots of subfolders of Documents. Double-clicking a zip file in list view unzips it to a folder which appears before the zip file in the list (when sorting by date)
3) command-option-escape is the global hotkey to open the force-quit menu. You can also right-click the dock icon and hold option to change the quit command into force quit.
4) That sounds annoying. I have never used an external monitor on my MacBooks.
5) Desktops (the numbered ones you create by clicking +) don't rearrange themselves. It's only full screen windows that do. The desktops stay where they are relative to each other.
6) Why would I want unrelated files to be deleted when deleting one file? That's more of an iOS thing. On my Mac I only want to delete the files I specify and no others.
7) Press command and click on the current folder name at the top of the window to go back in the hierarchy. When you hover over the folder name you can also see an icon next to the name. This icon can be dragged and dropped into other windows to paste the text path to that folder. Or if you like, turn on the path bar under the View menu in Finder to be able to quickly jump back to any higher level in the path hierarchy. Press command-shift-g to open the go-to window where you can tab complete your way to a new path. The go-to window also respects relative directories like ~ for home and ./ for the current directory.
8) I love the default Terminal. It's way faster than all of the other terminals I've tried. It's nicely customizable and it has tabs which are good enough for me.
9) I never use the launchpad. Try using command-space to search for stuff from spotlight.
10) That's weird. In general, funky things happen when you run low on disk space for most operating systems. It's a good idea to keep a healthy amount of free space (20%). Try going to Apple -> About This Mac... -> Storage tab -> Manage... This nifty included tool will help you find and delete things that are taking up a lot of space, particularly things you aren't using very often. You can also turn on a feature that deletes files which have been sitting in the trash for 30 days. I never manually empty the trash anymore!
2. Possible solution? Open the Archive Utility app and change the preferences.
3. Command+Option+Esc
5. By default Mission Control uses most recently used ordering. This can be changed in System Preferences.
7. Command+Shift+G (This is in the menubar under Go > Go to Folder...) You can also go up the current folder tree by right clicking on the name of the folder on title bar. (This also works in some apps.)
Hope this helps a little.
2) Yeah, this one could be better. Right/alt click and "Clean Up" might help you a bit.
3) You can also right/alt click the icon in the Dock to force quit [0], but agreed that a hanging application shouldn't cause OS components to hang.
4) I'll admit I wasn't even aware of the option-click ability, so fair enough. In my experience though, the options under Scaled have almost always been the most sensible options for the display.
5) As someone else mentioned, you can turn this off. I personally also hate that they made this the default. Spaces as a whole work really well though IMO.
6) IIUC it _can_, depending on the app. I wouldn't say Windows is any better, though... it's not like Windows deletes files when you uninstall something. Cleanup is purely up to the application's implementation. Also, there's the registry. Also, if you just "delete" an application (i.e. the executable) like you would any other file, you likely just broke the application, not uninstalled it. You might've even broken the uninstall functionality.
7) Yeah, Finder does make some strong assumptions about how you're expected to use it. It doesn't completely replace using text, but try the multi-pane view. It largely accomplishes a similar navigation style involving the up function (which you can also directly achieve with Cmd+Up).
8) The default terminal (Terminal.app) is actually quite good, if barebones. It has some of the lowest text-to-update latencies out there [1]. Though admittedly, I have no idea about terminal latencies on Windows.
And you touch on probably the single-biggest issue I have with Windows: backwards (in)compatibility to a fault. If they made a better terminal, why is that not just the terminal now? I know the answer is "because people are familiar with Command Prompt", but that's kinda my point. MS rarely replaces anything. They just keep adding more versions that are available. It's great that you get the choice, but it sucks that you have to make all these choices [2] for a useable system.
I have a similar issue with Control Panel vs Settings. Edge vs IE [3].
And I'm not saying I want them to replace all the applications every year or something like that. Too bad MS does that, too. Except you also have to use the old one.
9) Totally agreed on this one. It sounds trivial but is absolutely infuriating.
10) I'm... not sure what happened here. Confusing, but sounds like it's okay?
[0]: Although honestly, this might hang as well.
[1]: https://danluu.com/term-latency/
[2]: Assuming you're even aware of the choices.
[3]: To be fair, IE is EOL, but that process has taken a LONG time. Edge and IE have both been included in Windows systems for the better part of a decade at this point.
A lot of what makes a good UI (which is the main part of the OS we've been talking about) is that it takes relatively little effort for the person to understand [0]. This is highly dependent on the person -- their preferences, modes of thinking, use-cases, and historical usage. Even the "type of user" they think they are can play a role [1].
One person's deal-breaking bug is another person's killer feature.
[0]: For lack of a less-overloaded term: "intuitive".
[1]: e.g. someone who considers themselves a "power user" might eschew anything that doesn't provide a ton of options... even if the only options available are the ones they would choose anyway.
10 years ago it was the most polished and consistent UI experience among all the major OSes. Today it's a mess (though IMO still better than the alternatives).
On Windows, my development environment is seamless. With WSL, I get an actual Linux distribution. And to be honest, Windows just has a lot less friction than macOS these days. You don't have to jump through all sorts of hoops to actually use your computer.
One example of the inanity of macOS and Apple is that in using an external monitor, macOS or the Macbook Pro is incapable of adjusting the brightness and even volume (!) of the external monitor. It's not that the keys don't work. It's that you just simply cannot do it even from the OS. It's absolutely insane people consider Apple the more simple solution. And oh yea, basically every day, my mouse and keyboard settings change or reset or stop working. The exact same setup works flawlessly with my home Windows 11 PC. I setup things, and they stay that way. Updates do not break my computer or reset settings. Applications work. And Windows 11, for whatever reason, does not hog as much RAM as macOS does.
It's a Chesterton's Fence situation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Chesterton's_fence
While marketing does play a bog role, it is still rooted in the reality: Apple makes good products (that are often leagues better than the competition in several areas), and as a whole the experience of using Apple products is better for a significant number of people.
All I hear are attributes that are supposed to be better (spoiler, they're not), but always without a single concrete example.
First, stop calling people fanatics. And then, and only then, you will hear all the factual arguments.
Finder is the worst file manager I've ever used. Mac's notification UX is a fucking mess. Not to mention users cannot uninstall pre-installed bloatwares.
User account to download from app store? Why the hell should I give an email address and phone number to download apps and SDKs for developement?
Also let's not forget that Mac OS sends hash of the application to mothership each time you start it. Unless it sends the hash and verifies it you cannot open the app. I really doubt if it is my computer.
Excluding system apps from the VPN? No, thanks.
I have the Touch ID Keyboard making sign in seamless (and that’s if my Apple Watch doesn’t unlock if first). Everything is fast, smooth, and if I move away from the screen but want to keep looking at what I’m doing (like reading documentation) I can take my iPad and use either Handoff or iCloud tabs to keep it going. If I deviate from my iPad or go somewhere new and want to continue that process, I can airdrop the page to my Mac or use the aforementioned features to do the same.
This isn’t even touching document previewing in files but just pressing the spacebar , opening any PDF file in Preview, viewing my synced Notes, calendar, and Mail in the native apps and be assured they’ll show up on my other Apple Devices .
All of these things add up to a calm seamless workflow when I develop or do anything on my Mac. All without having to download a single thing. On windows I have to rely on third party services to replicate the same. Added friction that I just don’t have to deal With Mac . It just works (for me). The only edge my windows has over my Mac is gaming (which isn’t an issue for me issue that’s what having a windows machine is for and I prefer having a dedicated machine for that) and windows snapping that I solved using Magnet from the App Store that ensures it’s sandboxes and not collecting data per the App Privacy Page.
+9999999.
I wish they'd just sell hardware and keep the OS.
It’s fine as the OS that I use to play games or occasionally poke at a hobby project in Visual Studio (full fat version, not VS Code) with, but the moment I start trying to use it for actual work it starts driving me insane. It has just as many papercuts as desktop Linux does, just in different places and with far less flexibility to fix any of them. Like yeah, Linux has some legit annoyances but at least I could fix them either by installing a different package or writing something of my own if it’s bothering me badly enough.
I certainly wouldn’t choose Windows over macOS. Among macOS, Windows, and Linux, easily Windows is the one that gets booted out.
> People that will disagree haven't used Windows in years.
Nah, I have a Ryzen 5950X/3080ti tower running Windows 11 (and formerly 10). It gets used at least every other day. I’m plenty familiar with Windows, and it still drives me crazy when using it for anything more than a fancy game console.