Comment by jjoonathan | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jjoonathan | Hacker News Reader

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It's funny because you seem to be in exactly my situation, but in reverse (I'm going mac->windows). We have similar types of gripes, maybe we can help each other out.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6973925

A few suggestions:

* Use QuickTime and avoid VLC if possible. QuickTime on mac is awesome. VLC is often worse and seldom better.

* Command+Shift+4 is the only screenshot shortcut you need (toss in ctrl if you want it clipboarded, not in a file). Waaay faster than printscr+paint+paste+crop.

* OSX respects a subset of emacs keyboard movement and editing shortcuts. Ctrl+ae replace home/end. I usually remap capslock to ctrl to make them ergonomic. I like them better (no need to move hands), any way to get them on windows?

* On OSX, the universal installer app lets you list the files installed and view a textual install log. Install scripts are bash scripts. Console.app helps with both system problems and application problems (that's where stdout goes by default). Go there to start your debug journey. Haven't found the equivalent in windows.

* You can debug hangs with a time profile from Activity Monitor (yep, time profile built into the gui) or spindump. Any way to do this on Windows?

* I'm in the opposite situation wrt HFS+ and NTFS but I've had great luck with the commercial solution "Paragon" ($20, worth it). WTF is up with the whole thing where NTFS wants to spend 8 hours checking the disk every time the computer crashes? Apple figured this shit out 16 years ago.

* Command-Shift-T puts TextEdit.app in plain text mode. Hey, it's better than Notepad. What's the killer text editor that's windows only?

How 'bout you list some of those little nitpicky features you like so much from Windows. I've already written my list of things I miss from the mac side (see link, Small Gripes and More Minor Gripes sections). While I'm stuck here I might as well enjoy what it has to offer. Ditto for you, of course.

What's good about windows:

* Explorer is better than Finder.

* Right click that works

* Start menu + Win7 taskbar is better than OSX Dock/Launchpad (can't comment on Win8 metro but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't like it)

* Maximize

* clicking the clock gives you a calendar

I'm not exactly pro-windows but I believe the GP's point is that OSX is not flawless (neither is windows by far) but there's a lot of dumb things in OSX that should've been fixed but weren't because MS did it therefore it is not elegant by definition.

I've been able to make OSX work for me only because I get my real work done on the command line. Finder is nothing but a source of frustration. Also I ought to be able to right-click the volume icon on the menu bar and get the same menu as option-click but I don't...probably because that would be too windows-like.

Hey, I'm not trying to say OSX is flawless. That would be silly. What we're both saying is that we feel like we have to make the opposite OS work and that it's an unsatisfying exercise in frustration whichever way you go. It's about the pain of learning different conventions and the unwillingness of OS vendors (both of them) to copy each other's good bits.

Neat about the calendar. I have to disagree about the dock because it can force quit things, the Windows taskbar won't auto-hide, and some of the ugliest UI hacks in Windows all live in the tray (2 finger scroll, task manager, etc).

I disagree about explorer, mostly because I can't figure out how to get it to sort in alphabetical order (instead of folders and files sorted separately), a feature that's crucial for keyboard navigation and extracting files after download without scrolling through the entire downloads folder.

> there's a lot of dumb things in OSX that should've been fixed but weren't because MS did it therefore it is not elegant by definition.

Yeah I think that sorta sums up lots of the issues I see. Over a few OS X revision you'll see Apple circling around the solution, which was solved in Windows decades ago, but refusing to do it because it's solved in Windows. The result is a hodgepodge of conflicting half-ideas that doesn't create an elegant or productive computing experience.

For evidence look at the grueling 20 year battle Apple has had with Maximizing/minimizing a window/app.

Thanks for the advice. I'm going to put it to use!

Nitpicky issues from Windows:

* Registry is an abortion of a bad idea. I remember in Windows 3.x how much better life was dealing with .ini files (if that can be believed). It corrupts all the time, fails in weird ways, has duplicate and triplicate entries for everything and is almost impossible to play around in without risking the entire system.

* CMD.exe needs a complete overhaul. I don't need a very powerful shell, but I'd like to use one that wasn't a fixed width dos prompt from 1983.

* I don't ever want to see a defrag utility again. I'm a firm believer that the more OS utilities there are for something the bigger a problem it is and there are hundreds of defrag utilities for Windows.

* I wish the default apps that shipped with Windows were a hair more powerful.

* Searching for stuff is molasses slow compared to spotlight. I actually install a utility called "everything" on all my machines that solves 80%-90% of my issues with finding things, but it seems stupid that something of equivalent power and speed isn't a built-in app.

* OS X exclusive apps. Most of them are forgettable fixes for brokenness in OS X or similar, but there are a few that are simply awesome and don't have a good (enough) equivalent in Windows. I was just thinking about this subject the other day with the release of OpenEmu.

* System slowdown. Eventually every windows system will slow down to a constant disk grind. There's no real explanation for it, you can tend the system as carefully as you want but it will happen. You can defrag as much as you want etc. But before long you'll have 10 minute boot times and it sucks. I'm trying a new approach this go around doing my day-to-day in a virtualized Windows VM and trying to keep my host system "pure" or for only things that require lots of system resources like games or music production. That way when the VM starts to slow down and piss me off I can just jettison it out an airlock.

* Multiple workspaces/desktop. I mean common! It's so well done in OS X I can't believe there isn't even a basic version of this in Windows by now.

* I hate the libraries, my documents "here's how to organize your shit into folder" noise. I've avoided it since XP and haven't ever been disappointed I did so.

* I hate how various programs will just create folders in my documents

* The installation stuff it messed up and I hate how uninstalling software leaves bits of it all over the system. I can't believe that this isn't better sandboxed by now. For a while I used to use sandboxie to solve this, but it got annoying enough that I've just solved it with VMs now.

* hiding file extension, in favor of just showing them in another column is an abortion of an idea and I turn on file extension as the first thing I do when I setup a new machine.

* windows update loves to restart my machine when I'm in the middle of doing things. There's a fix for it, but I've made a rule not to edit the registry for annoyances.

* sticky keys, until I turn it off.

* UAC still gets annoying. Especially during startup. Some apps, like Everything, still trigger it when I startup, and it's stupid and I want to have an option to stop prompting me about it. There is a resolution, but it's so involved that I can't be bothered.

* right-click context menus either don't populate or they get cluttered. I've never been "happy" with what's in them and there's not a clean way to edit it.

The Event Viewer is actually pretty solid for solving problems, once you learn how to read it.

A few of the utilities from the SysInternals team (particularly Process Monitor and Process Explorer) make life a bit better.

Also, WinDbg might be the best debugging suite ever. These are things I will miss leaving Windows but not enough to keep using Windows.

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