Hacker News Reader

Comment by carlosjobim | Hacker News Reader

> there’s no good app package service

It's called the App Store.

Not exactly...

The App Store install what you would install through .dmg or .pkg. This is, if you install, for example, Android Studio, Docker and UTM, you will have three QEMU executables, one for each app.

Homebrew does quite a good job as a package manager for Mac, however, it's far from how the package managers work in Linux distros. For example, by running ``sudo pacman -Syu`` I upgrade everything that is installed, including the kernel, standard libraries, Python packages, language packages, manpages and so on. In Mac, I have to upgrade the system through system updates, homebrew packages through ``brew upgrade``, Python packages through pip, the App Store installed stuff through App Store and the manually installed apps through whatever the way they are upgraded.

> For example, by running ``sudo pacman -Syu`` I upgrade everything that is installed, including the kernel, standard libraries, Python packages, language packages, manpages and so on.

I actually view this as a liability. System package management should be distinct from userspace package management.

You can still use pip inside pyenv or similar. Pacman would install the system-wide stuff, so you won't need to bother about the libraries that a package that you have installed is using.

Mentioning this classic XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1987/. This only made sense after using a Mac. While using Manjaro it was quite organized: only the pacman-installed libraries and the ones of my user projects. Now in Mac I have the default Python, the several Python versions installed from several dependencies in Homebrew, and so on.

> You can still use pip inside pyenv or similar.

That seems to be the worst of all possible worlds.

Perhaps not the best, which could be maybe something like Nix. But this is the opposite of what we have that in Mac

I think my point was:

> Pacman would install the system-wide stuff

Most system-wide stuff is userspace. I was more referring to a divide between the OS-core (kernel, drivers, init scripts) and userspace. Upgrading userspace should not incidentally not allow the system to boot.

Agreed. Joining system and user packages leads to cases like "how did my python upgrade break yum".

It won't happen if the packages are well maintained. Note that if you want a different version for your project you should use a pyenv or similar and have finer control on its dependencies

A pyenv is separating system and user / project packages. You could take it one step further and use pkgsrc, Nix, or homebrew. That way you can get a newer redis/RabbitMQ/whatever not just newer python.

You can use topgrade (https://github.com/topgrade-rs/topgrade) to update system, homebrew, npm, python, cargo with only one command. It also works on Linux and Windows.

Do developers use the app store? 99% of what I install on my computer isn't available through the app store. I just use it for Apple apps (Pages etc). Pretty much everything else is freely available and more fully featured outside the app store.

Plus, it's spammed with low-quality for-profit crapware—the iOSification of an otherwise fantastic platform

Yes, they publish their apps on the App Store and make money from customers.

As for Apple making life easier for developers by making their OS more like Linux, that is not good for the rest of their users, and these users are more important than developers. It's preferable that developers jump through some hoops, rather than making the OS worse for non-developers.

There's the third option of "not enshittifying the os but also not making it more like linux"

When's the last time you used the App Store to install a CLI utility or a shared library?

Usually Xcode.

    xcode-select --install

That doesn’t install Xcode.

Which forces sandboxing and App Store regulations on everything on it.

There’s a really good reason the Mac App Store isn’t that big.

I don’t think you can call the Mac App Store “good”.

Sure, it's horrible. It only makes it easier than any other platform for developers to make money by selling their software to users. And it only makes it easy and secure for users to purchase and install software. Awful.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com