Genuine question, how is MacOS better for coders? I think those that do usually choose it because they’re used to it or their company offered either a bulky ThinkPad or a Mac and they wanted something thin and light.
Everytime I see tutorials for setting up or building something there will be a simple Linux install command, downloading a zip for windows (or if you’re lucky you can find it on Choco), and then there will be the multiparagraph homebrew setup.
macOS offers a lot of stability, it’s reliable, predictable, boring even. It works out of the box and stays that way, it survives upgrades, and rarely crashes.
The release cycle is steady, and changes are generally gradual and incremental. Mac users don’t usually have to worry about a new release breaking their system or their workflow because a developer wants to reinvent the wheel or a UI designer wants to make their mark. The only big shifts have been processor transitions.
The Mac ecosystem also allows users to have a foot in both the proprietary and open source ecosystems on a single platform. Being able to run, say, web development environments and Adobe CS for example, can be a lot easier than farting around with Wine or WSL.
Granted, there’s plenty of downsides to the Mac as well, but the platform definitely has merits.
Macs are pretty solid for coding. You don’t need to tinker with them, most of the time stuff just works. On the other hand, I spent lots of time to make sure stuff just works well on my Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu or pop.
For software, I’ve found that some software doesn’t give you much help if you get into problems on Linux.
And there is always something with Linux that doesn’t work for me. Like my Dell laptop with pop!os doesn’t charge over usb-C from Dell monitor (it worked on windows). Touchscreen doesn’t always work after waking up. I had ThinkPad with awful fan control on linux and hibernation issues. I had issues with scaling with external screens.
yeah it’s mostly because of the official support that reduces a lot of faffing about. I don’t wanna be a nix guru I just want to search stackoveflow and paste in commands when I have issues.
I don’t really think it’s better. They’re fine for coding.
They’re basically the corporate default because they’re easier for companies to buy and remotely administer, they’ve got good VPN software, good resale value, etc.
I code daily on mine, by choice. I also have no issue coding on Linux and will happily spend all day in a CLI. Homebrew is just as easy as using apt or what have you, at least in my personal experience.
It isn’t always perfect.There was a bit of head scratching over shared libraries one time, until I figured out what stupidity I had to do to make Apple happy, but that is the only notable thing I can remember.
However, coding on Windows can be super painful depending on the language, especially with all of the backwards paths. The only coding work I enjoy doing on Windows is C#. Worst case WSL2 is around when I need some sanity.
No matter what, I have any of them available to me and the battery life on a MacBook Air is amazing. The corporate laptop is actually a decent machine and the size and weight is pretty good, especially considering the monstrous bricks the previous models were. Mobile workstation woes I guess. The most amusing part is AutoCAD 2024 running smoothly on the Mac. I never knew it could be that snappy.
WSL wasn’t a thing when I started with that, and it still doesn’t do everything I want it to, so I much prefer to not use WSL at all and instead manually manage the VM.
There’s nothing wrong with the WSL approach, it’s just not one I like
Genuine question, how is MacOS better for coders? I think those that do usually choose it because they’re used to it or their company offered either a bulky ThinkPad or a Mac and they wanted something thin and light.
Everytime I see tutorials for setting up or building something there will be a simple Linux install command, downloading a zip for windows (or if you’re lucky you can find it on Choco), and then there will be the multiparagraph homebrew setup.
macOS offers a lot of stability, it’s reliable, predictable, boring even. It works out of the box and stays that way, it survives upgrades, and rarely crashes.
The release cycle is steady, and changes are generally gradual and incremental. Mac users don’t usually have to worry about a new release breaking their system or their workflow because a developer wants to reinvent the wheel or a UI designer wants to make their mark. The only big shifts have been processor transitions.
The Mac ecosystem also allows users to have a foot in both the proprietary and open source ecosystems on a single platform. Being able to run, say, web development environments and Adobe CS for example, can be a lot easier than farting around with Wine or WSL.
Granted, there’s plenty of downsides to the Mac as well, but the platform definitely has merits.
Macs are pretty solid for coding. You don’t need to tinker with them, most of the time stuff just works. On the other hand, I spent lots of time to make sure stuff just works well on my Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu or pop.
For software, I’ve found that some software doesn’t give you much help if you get into problems on Linux.
And there is always something with Linux that doesn’t work for me. Like my Dell laptop with pop!os doesn’t charge over usb-C from Dell monitor (it worked on windows). Touchscreen doesn’t always work after waking up. I had ThinkPad with awful fan control on linux and hibernation issues. I had issues with scaling with external screens.
yeah it’s mostly because of the official support that reduces a lot of faffing about. I don’t wanna be a nix guru I just want to search stackoveflow and paste in commands when I have issues.
I don’t really think it’s better. They’re fine for coding.
They’re basically the corporate default because they’re easier for companies to buy and remotely administer, they’ve got good VPN software, good resale value, etc.
Exactly this. I was about to answer the question and realize you pretty much already had. Thanks very much.
They’re significantly better than windows, and you could make an argument on the stability front compared to Linux
I code daily on mine, by choice. I also have no issue coding on Linux and will happily spend all day in a CLI. Homebrew is just as easy as using apt or what have you, at least in my personal experience.
It isn’t always perfect.There was a bit of head scratching over shared libraries one time, until I figured out what stupidity I had to do to make Apple happy, but that is the only notable thing I can remember.
However, coding on Windows can be super painful depending on the language, especially with all of the backwards paths. The only coding work I enjoy doing on Windows is C#. Worst case WSL2 is around when I need some sanity.
No matter what, I have any of them available to me and the battery life on a MacBook Air is amazing. The corporate laptop is actually a decent machine and the size and weight is pretty good, especially considering the monstrous bricks the previous models were. Mobile workstation woes I guess. The most amusing part is AutoCAD 2024 running smoothly on the Mac. I never knew it could be that snappy.
Windows is a nightmare for development. Linux is generally not an option, so a UNIX based system is still easier than windows
For C++/C I used to agree, but now with WSL it’s easy.
My problems come with Java (versioning is a pain), JavaScript, Node, etc
C/C++ is probably the second easiest after C#
Node really? nvm makes it very easy, or using choco
Despite trying at least 6 times, I’ve never been able to successfully start a node project on windows. No such problems on Linux or Mac.
I tend to do my dev work at home with an Ubuntu server VM and ssh into it from my windows desktop now. Find that it’s the best of both worlds.
Huh fair, for me that’s cmake projects on Windows.
That’s just WSL 💀
WSL wasn’t a thing when I started with that, and it still doesn’t do everything I want it to, so I much prefer to not use WSL at all and instead manually manage the VM.
There’s nothing wrong with the WSL approach, it’s just not one I like
Ah yes, I love WSL deciding to consume 12 of my 16gb of memory
That’s a fair complaint