month13

macOS is so frustrating at times, as there's some cool features that are gated by magic, so not only do they not work at times and offer no diagnostic resolutions, also cripple networks.

I recall disabling the `awdl` adapter can stop a lot of this behavior, at the cost of breaking these systems. I used to do this when using Moonlight, as it would cause periodic ping spikes.

I recently had tried to use Nix again after a hiatus. I wished to use Nix to replace Homebrew, but also for managing versions, of like Ruby or dotnet.

Sadly, it's not quite there for my needs, but it's getting better. Flakes are more fleshed out, the CLI is improving in it's user experience. I still don't feel like I understand the language works and build my flakes off of copying/pasting the one that works.

After using a stream deck for some odd automation, I think the real flaw was having the touch bar be so contextual, and replacing the existing function keys. Had both existed, and and allowed the user to extend their customisation; say buttons for common actions, siri suggestions, shortcuts it may have been perceived differently, and more of power user tool.

Most of the actions just duplicated existing UI elements.

I was trying to find the original justification for why macOS was removed from Proton, but could not find any official word apart from some comments here https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Proton/issues/1344.

It was quite odd because the original herald of Steam Play had macOS front and center, even with exclusive cosmetics if you launched the game on macOS.

I do remember a large kerfuffle over the very poor state of OpenGL on macOS, which if I remember correctly was stuck on 3.2 for a long while, before being completely deprecated.

Teams at least is slightly better than Skype For Business, which would hijack copy paste to put the sender's name and for some reason insert zero-width characters between every space.

The reliability of the joycons is absolutely unacceptable.

The repair isn't too tricky and a set of replacements can be had for pretty cheap. I'd recommend people look at getting them repaired, rather than buying a set of (highly overprices) replacements.

Oh no doubt. To be clear, mixing and matching manufacturers was a cost-saving measure, and in retrospect, should have done better research.

I did eye the ProArt board, but considering it was over twice as expensive in my region for a machine not really intended for content creation, i went with the far cheaper option.

Also using the CalDigit TS3+. Fantastic dock.

This is a long standing flaw of macOS. The common workaround is a lot of these docks will offer a TB3 passthrough, where a standard USB-C to whatever-you-need, will work.

I've recently tried this. It's not much improved. I have a PC, and invested in the TB3 compatible motherboard and add-in card. Displays rarely work, but so I instead hardwire this machine to the displays, as they have the extra inputs. On some boots, Thunderbolt isn't detected and will need a few reboots to be picked up. Getting the drivers installed, for a custom build PC, was also a nightmare. The thunderbolt headers are unique to manufacturer, so my Gigabyte Titan Ridge has a 5 or 3pin connector, whereas my Asus board is a 12 pin. Luckily, it seems to only be present for DMA security, so if you bridge pins 3 and 5 on the Add-in card it works. The motherboard still needs to support thunderbolt however, this didn't work on an older, z270 chipset.

On the MacBook side the only issue is that when disconnecting, a display won't sleep and just show a frozen image.

So, at least rest well knowing you've cut your losses wasting time with thunderbolt.

Yeah, it’s not as nice as macOS. There’s a ton of magic happening too, so I found it easy to get lost and not fully understand what was happening.

I had tried to compile some software that linked against macOS SDKs, and did not realise that Nix essentially maintains it’s own version, and it was quite tricky to adapt to it or get back to using Xcode’s toolchain.

There's also a way using Apple Configurator. Process is start an update for the desired app via configurator and nab the IPA from the temp directory on the Mac and install it, and remove the quarantine bit.

https://reincubate.com/support/how-to/download-run-ios-app-m...

The dotnet team have been running into some issues getting .NET 5 running well, but improvements are coming with new macOS releases.

https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/44897

I use a 1080p and a 4k display, it's pretty tricky getting consistent scaling per display.

My head sweats a lot playing VR, I couldn't imagine the torrent of sweat mixing them together.

FYI to any WSL2 users, in it's migrated configuration the WSL VM can request as much RAM as it needs, but has no means to free this back. There's an option to use .wslconfig to specify a limit.

https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/4166

Quite exciting, I've been keen to realise my iPad for this sort of thing, and have experimented with code-server.

Does make me lament the fact that I can't tap into the perfectly viable OS beneath the hood, but oh well.

After the AirPods Pro noise-cancelling-regression (resolved, albeit after months), this may be a desirable feature.

Disappointing to see the pricing model has changed; there used to be a license for unlimited project sizes, but now appears to be a $15/mo sub for their paid service.

Understandably, this was before they transitioned from on-device models to more complex, larger cloud models.

The free 400KB limit is quite generous, but you may need to spend time tuning the ignore if you have junk in your project folder.

There is [ImmersedVR](https://immersedvr.com/), but it's expensive and only compatible with the Oculus Go/Quest.

It can create extra displays, but you have to buy an Elite license for that.

Doubtful, there's still a wide difference between MacOS and iPadOS, if anything they've diverged more in recent years. The multitasking workflow on iPadOS is flux, and has complexity issues.

Tossing this in for people interested, Kodex (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/kodex/id1038574481) is a great text editor that can integrate with Working Copy locally.

As more apps have adopted MacOS' dark mode, I've been having a nice experience letting it change throughout the day.

It's a nightmare as well if you're trying to multitask an app that isn't in your dock. Often I'll have to do this dance of tap home, open the app I want on the side, it opens full screen switch back to that app and then drag it GENTLY to the place I want.

The watercolour effect from the de-noiser in iOS results in watercolour-esque patterns in the final image, and washes away most of the fine detail at 1:1.

FWIW, I have an iPhone X. The watercolour trend started around the iPhone 5s, IIRC.

I've found bigscreen pretty terrible for this, try something like virtual desktop.

If bigscreen has the option, curved displays are also a great way to preserve clarity, as the lenses start to distort near the edges.

I have this bug where until reboot, some albums from Apple Music would destroy media playback. Changing volume would be delayed by about five seconds, the device would become hot in my pocket culminating in a respring in three minutes.

Had Target Display mode still been a thing i'm sure many would've bought a 5k iMac to use only as a dumb display.

Great idea, implementation is a bit intrusive. Not a fan of the by default sidebar ribbon or the highlight popup menu. Luckily this can be disabled.

Importing history and indexing that is cool.

Could, it's just a hassle.

I'm in a similar boat with a kext that enables unsupported Thunderbolt 3 docks.

I have an Apple Watch, and it's a love/hate relationship. I'd love to wear another more simpler watch but would lose so many features I always opt for the Apple Watch.

I do criticise the fact that only the Apple Watch contributes to their "Activity" app.