Features macOS should copy from Linux | Hacker News Reader

Features macOS should copy from Linux

zdnet.com

This is subpar content and I don’t know why it’s posted here. It feels like the author had to meet their article quota for the month.

> …MacOS already has some foundation features (such as similar command line tools) borrowed from Linux.

This is factually incorrect. MacOS / OS X is derived from BSD. We can argue whether “derive” is the right word or if macOS is rightfully BSD but the commonalities were certainly not borrowed from Linux.

Points:

1) No. macOS is not that type of system. This is what Linux is for.

2) MacOS package management is abysmal comparatively but give some details. Better how? How is Linux package management superior? What technology could be useful?

3) I will let the author handle this: “[the reason] I use Linux is because I can turn any distribution into exactly what I want.”

4) I guess if you like the animation that much but I fail to see how that would improve anything.

5) Probably try SteerMouse

6) MacOS does this but better. The author literally describes Bundles[0].

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundle_(macOS)

I’m not seeing any compelling points here.

Wants better package management because Homebrew is too complicated? Surely you could articulate why it’s not good?

But also wants multiple desktop environments and a very niche middle click macro?

This feels like clutching at anything to write an article that grabs attention.

The article feels a bit written by AI somehow, although I’m probably jumping to that conclusion too much these days.

Anywho, a lot of the stuff discussed in the article is actually available on macOS but maybe not without a bit of work, the macOS version of Linux setup work.

1. Different desktop environments: you can totally install many X11 desktop environments on your Mac via macports, they won’t feel native but they’ll run faster than if you put them in a VM. I ran awesome tiling WM on my Mac for a while. Ports doesn’t seem to offer Firefox or Chromium but there are other browsers like Epiphany available.

2. Command line package management: yep, no built in tool. There’s ports, brew, nix and others, but you have to install by hand. I’m not sure brew is any more confusing than apt, if you’re comfortable with the CLI you should be fine to figure out brew or ports.

3. Imagine what MacOS would be like if you could change anything you wanted: sounds good I guess? I would add tiling, although there’s already a tiler for macOS called Yabai which seems pretty good.

4. Desktop cube: welp, a cube animation plays when you switch macOS users via fast user switching maybe that’s enough.

5. Middle click paste: not perfect since it doesn’t have a second clipboard, but this seems like it could work: https://github.com/josephlbarnett/macpaste

6. Snap/Flatpak/apps that include their dependencies: all Mac apps already include their deps or use a system framework that’s backwards compatible for years. You can install them from a store ui, too. Snap/Flatpak need a Linux kernel, they’re always gonna run a bit slower if you need to run a second kernel in a hypervisor so why bother?

This person should just use Linux.

> After all, MacOS already has some foundation features (such as similar command line tools) borrowed from Linux.

For me this set the tone of the article. I think that the author in more on the "end user" spectrum rather than on the "dev" spectrum. No harm in that specifically, but some things might not be 100% accurate.

If MacOS had something similar to apt, it would make installing, removing, updating, and purging applications so much easier (at least for those who prefer the command line).

About 60% of the time, I don't use apt from the command-line. Instead I use the GUI Synaptic front-end for apt/dpkg, because of its 'search' function. Quite often, I don't know what the package I need to install is called. Synaptic to the rescue!

Hands-down the greatest feature of Linux is the multiple-workspaces. I hear that even Microsoft has copied that idea in the last few years, finally.

I am not sure to follow for "easier app installation"? You download installer, then yes yes yes, then BAM you have the application running

Also can drag the application file into Application folder.

What's complicated about it

The more intuitive approach would be to find your sources.list file and add the URL to the repo that houses the app you want to download, I trust any user already knows this by heart. Then open up the terminal and issues the commands to pull the latest data from that newly added repo, and then type another command to install it, I trust any user already knows the proper name to type here when installing. If the app in question doesn’t exist prepackaged in a repo, go ahead and build it from source.

What could be be easier than that /s

I will admit the dragging the app to the applications folder does trip up a lot of new users. A well designed visual in the dmg can solve this, and the App Store eliminates the problem completely, which is likely where were most new users are getting their software on macOS.

If the App Store is so bad, why would Linux has copied it… Modern Linux has seemingly taken a lot of ideas from macOS in an effort to make it more appealing to end users.

I've learned it's rather irrelevant whether macOS could become better by being more like other platforms. Because there's enough of the users who will defend obviously bad UX, and I guess apple doesn't do UX studies that would otherwise reveal it, so things like its poor file management and poor window management will persist forever out of lack of caring to be better.

This comment looks like it could be written about any OS and still sound true and accurate.

I've used both Linux and MacOS for years, now, and every point listed in the article is why I mostly use MacOS. Sure, it's not as changeable - that just makes it harder to f--- it all up. I kinda feel like that's a good thing.

If I really want to screw around with that stuff, I can easily set up a Linux environment in a VM.

The last things an OS needs are fragmentation and lacking one official way to accomplish things.

This is good example of smart people being myopic. There is a type of person that loves Linux, macOS or Windows. The typical user of every one of the three platforms feels they are somehow "normal" and the other platforms are inferior.

For sure the author is missing the point, but that doesn't mean macOS is normal. By most definitions normal in the consumer, non-mobile space would be whatever Windows does. And, there's things Linux & macOS share in common (unseen, CLI) and things Linux and Windows share in common (Desktop environment behaviors). Given most people interact with a desktop environment than a CLI, I'd say macOS is the abnormal one.

What is easier than Apple’s App Store to install & drag to Trash to uninstall. And, non-App Store downloadable dmg installers (and app update utilities available to 3rd parties — albeit not Apple’s updater). macOS is pretty easy.

Apple knows better.

More desktop managers? Users do not need the KDE vs Gnome thing.

"Command line package management"? The whole point of Mac is to not need a command line.

I think homebrew is pretty solid. I use it all the time. I install a lot of apps using homebrew, even GUI apps.

Sure it works. It's also the worst package manager I've used.

I'm not an Apple user and while I've heard of homebrew, I've never used or even really looked at it. Out of curiosity, what do you not like about it?

I switched to MacPorts. Much faster and more stable.

10 years ago MacPorts had a fame of messing up the path or something like that, I don't really remember. But it existed prior to Hoembrew and when Homebrew was launched, everyone switched to it. I'm guessing MacPorts was a hassle and Homebrew came as something simpler? How's the state of things now?

Eh, homebrew is one of the best things macOS has going for it over Windows, even if it's not as nice as apt or XBPS or whatever.

> "Command line package management"? The whole point of Mac is to not need a command line.

Weird, that was a selling point when BSD-based OSX came out. Maybe you don't want to use it, but Apple definitely pushed it for marketing.

In my recollection, the selling point was that it had a command line for those who wanted one (¿maybe just that it was a Unix, without explicitly mentioning the command line much?), not that you needed to use it.

Still, a selling point.

A selling point is also that the average user will never need it. I’ve yet to setup a single Linux system without needing to jump into then command line day 1, that’s not a good thing. Having a command line is good, needing one for daily tasks is bad.

>6. Snap or Flatpak

Linux doesn't even want Snap

Like what? Most of the suggestions in the article only would further confuse the user experience.

In fact, the "features" suggested by the author is the reason why non-tech folks still people don't care about Linux Desktops and want to get things done rather than to mess around and waste time playing around with their computer because of a silly desktop environment issue in the dotfiles.

Apple doesn't need to add "Different desktop environments", "Desktop Cubes" or "Snap or Flatpak" alternatives of alternative competing system implementations. Just sane defaults that just work without touching the command line.

A very weird list with only "better command line package management" and "middle-click paste" being obviously reasonable items in it.

> Different desktop environments

Standardized coherent desktop experience arguably is the number-one thing people love Macs for.

> Desktop Cube, wobbly windows

Arguably the most pointless Linux features ever. A perfect example of a feature which exists purely "just for fun" and for no other reason.

> Snap or Flatpak

... are the Linux world's attempts to clone the way apps are managed on Mac.

>> Desktop Cube, wobbly windows

> Arguably the most pointless Linux features ever. A perfect example of a feature which exists purely "just for fun" and for no other reason.

Fun is an excellent reason, but also it's my personal opinion that there was a while there when a significant number of new users to desktop Linux were enticed in by compiz (which I am counting as a pragmatic win).

Fun is an excellent reason when its really fun and keeps being fun long, comes at a reasonably humble cost. To me compiz always felt the buggiest pieces of software ever while the real fun of it was just some minutes of wow, then just unnecessary pain.

Okay, if that's your experience then that's fair. I don't recall ever hitting any bugs in compiz and I don't recall it ever getting old, though it may have eventually faded a bit into the background. So honestly that alone is probably enough to explain the differing opinions of it. Of course, nowadays I've got approximately zero visual flair on my computing environment, so I'm not sure what to conclude from that...

My apparent bias is because I have never had a dedicated GPU since the golden days of 3DFx, only laptops with built-in mostly-Intel graphics. Compiz apparently was not made for these. And the only week I had a PC with a full-blown nVidia GPU in my disposition it was bleeding-edge new so no driver worked well with it. One lesson (or whatever you call it when you learn something questionable because of the inherent bias in the circumstances) my whole life has been teaching me is 3D acceleration is always about bugs and quirks, often also about slowness and I hardly want these in my window manager. And now as I am transitioning into an old fart, I dream of my whole UI to look like an zen-boring e-Ink eBook reader rather than a wobbly&colorful bells&whistles flying circus :-] Surely I agree the MacOS DE could use a lot of customizations to allow though.

Stability please. It’s amazing how a whole modern advanced OS freezes on network or IO timeouts.

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