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Comment by april_22 | Hacker News Reader

Also I think MacOS is still much better than Windows in terms of design and usability

I think Linux is still much better than MacOS in terms of design and usability, but that doesn't really mean much when operating systems compete on compatibility with programs (which themselves compete on compatibility with operating systems). It is a vicious cycle.

If your job requires you to run AutoCAD or VSC++ or something, you're just going to use windows. The average user isn't going to figure out how to use KVM or Wine or something. If your job requires some linux/unix tool, is the average user going to fidget with it until it works in MacOS or just use Ubuntu or something? MacOS is the worst of both worlds: it is both closed-source AND a minority OS.

I used a rolling release distro for a while on desktop and a NUC, it was really nice and convenient. But I switched over to Ubuntu for a laptop ("they'll sort out the touchscreen drivers and onscreen keyboard situation" I told myself), now and I kinda regret telling people to "just use Ubuntu or something" in the past.

It worked when I first installed it, until quite recently, when a new version hit. Upgrading every package at the same time is obviously destabilizing, something has changed in the plumbing and under certain circumstances some gtk programs require a 30 second timeout to occur before they start, and there's the whole snap firefox debacle. Longing for the stability of rolling release, oddly enough.

Anyway, I haven't used MacOS, but I've generally been surprised to find that my current system is hovering around near-Windows level usability, other than the familiar terminal which is nice. Probably time to try out tumbleweed...

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