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Switching from macOS: The Basics

518 points by SunShiranui 10y ago

Beowolve 10y ago
I appreciate them capitalizing on people looking to switch. I think they could have done a better job of describing how to switch instead of talking about what people love. I think it would have been better for them to talk about some main sticking points, like how to get out of the ecosystem (say iTunes or Photos). Either way, nice to see the competition stepping up and capitalizing on the situation.
- fnordsensei 10y ago
  While I agree, I can also understand why they would want to give people coming from macOS an impression of what they can expect from the switch in terms of apps, etc. "Exiting the ecosystem" is a guide crying out to be written though.
- natch 10y ago
  LOL! I doubt many people are looking to switch, the article just said that as it is trying to market something. Funny that HN readers are buying it so gullibly.
xaduha 10y ago
Check Solus instead https://solus-project.com/ https://solus-project.com/
- GavinMcG 10y ago
  I've downvoted you for now, since your comment doesn't tell us anything about the project and appears to be a lazy effort to piggyback off the resource that (I presume) a competitor has offered.
  - xaduha 10y ago
    I wrote that comment first, but then got a login prompt and thought it didn't go through. But it did, so I deleted my second comment, which went something like > I recently installed Solus and was pleasantly surprised I don't have a detailed comparison or anything like that, I haven't used that many Linux desktop distros to begin with, but I did try Elementary OS and found it wanting.
- rocky1138 10y ago
  I think there might be something wrong with that website. I went there and saw no screenshots nor any real information on what Solus is. There was a learn more link but it took me to something called Budgie.
  - xaduha 10y ago
    Yeah, site under-delivers somewhat. There are some screens in this pdf https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Ymf8oYXx-PSXU2eFlsR0NvY1E/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Ymf8oYXx-PSXU2eFlsR0NvY1E...
- TillE 10y ago
  Why do both of these hide the fact that they're Linux distros? Only nerds are going to be installing a new OS. That's not a small detail; it means you can run thousands of useful programs.
  - r3bl 10y ago
    Because they're not trying to appeal to the "nerd market", they're trying to appeal to the general users with their design. As someone who has used elementary quite a bit, I can guarantee you that the elementary OS is way simpler to use to Average Joe than both Windows and macOS.
- keeganjw 10y ago
  I've been using Solus on my laptop for almost a year now and I must say, for everyday use, it is quite good. I'm not sure about using it as a dev machine. But if you just want to browser the web, listen to music, and occasionally write a document or something, it's very stable. I don't think I've ever seen it crash. Also, it's very easy to install and is definitely one of the best looking linux distros around. That and elementary.
- ff10 10y ago
  Why 'instead'? Why not 'in addition'?
  - xaduha 10y ago
    To save time, I guess. Elementary OS doesn't hit the mark.
youdontknowtho 10y ago
I love the work that the elementary project is doing. Really great stuff...
- rocky1138 10y ago
  I tried running it this week since I have a lot of friends who use Macs. I figured I could help them out if they had questions, etc. But after a few minutes I went back to KDE as Elementary was horribly broken coming from Kububtu. It probably assumes you'll be installing from fresh.
  - boredpudding 10y ago
    elementary is indeed not meant to be 'just a desktop environment like gnome / kde'. Installing it that way is not supported. It's a full operating system including default apps, etc. all sorts of things you probably didn't install. You should indeed install it fresh. I hope you didn't give your friends a bad expression.
    - 72deluxe 10y ago
      But as others have stated, as you have access to all the giant repos, installing any other software than the elementary-oriented stuff instantly feels disjointed, as toolkits etc. don't match. This isn't really a problem with Elementary OS itself, more the proliferation of toolkits available, but to pretend that it is a drop-in replacement for a Mac (with its unified Cocoa UI) isn't quite right. (Yes, I know you can run FLTK and X apps on Mac so it's ugly too).
    - rocky1138 10y ago
      I didn't. I didn't tell them anything. I just don't have any interest in installing it full. Instead I went with KDE Neon.
      - youdontknowtho 10y ago
        KDE Neon looks great too. I really respect their work.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
r3bl 10y ago
The thing I've used the most while I used elementary is the option to direct perform actions of the apps. I find it so easy to just press the keyboard shortcut and do something like "2+2" and get "4" as a result. I absolutely loved that!
- mangeletti 10y ago
  Check out the Alfred App for Mac. It's this and it's wonderful.
anondon 10y ago
The software is there, but what about the hardware to go with it? The only laptops comparable to Macbook Pro hardware quality and battery life are the Dell XPS series and the Thinkpad X1. I feel there is a serious shortage of good laptops with linux pre-installed that the non-technical user can pickup and start using.
- antouank 10y ago
  Check the Razer blade series
  - m_mueller 10y ago
    How are their touchpads?
    - keyle 10y ago
      Great question. It's hard to get even close to the Mac touchpads.
      - m_mueller 10y ago
        Why is that such a hard problem? Do they all just not care? Patents?
        muyuu 10y ago
        Not sure if it's so hard, but patents certainly exist for Apple's trackpads.
  - epse 10y ago
    They are really annoying on Linux.
    - antouank 10y ago
      How so?
sschueller 10y ago
The only reason I am still using a Mac is because I need to be able to compile iPhone apps and unlike android I can only do this in OSX. All my other tools are already available in Linux or even Windows.
- Void_ 10y ago
  Sounds like you only need it for compilation. Do you develop in Xcode? What IDE/tool do you use?
aorth 10y ago
Yes, the Elementary team has been doing great work for years. Sad that it's all parallel to the efforts of the larger GNOME Desktop project. I don't know how much code gets shared between the two, but I cringe to think that Elementary is dragging along a suitcase full of patches! Some of their apps are forks, while others are written from scratch to fit their design (UI/UX/simplicity) goals. I think their decision to use what amounts to a random, third-party web browser (Midori) as the default is laughable (this day and age, would any security-conscious person NOT recommend Chrome?). Nonetheless, bravo to the Elementary team for taking the time to even write up this blog post (which is apparently the first in a series). Edit: replies pointed out that Epiphany is the default web browser. Point still stands that Chrome implements the most security mitigations out of ALL browsers on the market.
- rvschuilenburg 10y ago
  > I think their decision to use what amounts to a random, third-party web browser (Midori) as the default is laughable They switched to the default GNOME browser "Epiphany" in the latest release of elementary OS. But I agree, the first thing i did was install a different browser. In my case Firefox.
  - matzipan 10y ago
    The version of Epiphany which has to ship with Ubuntu (because Ubuntu is only shipping GTK 3.18) is pretty outdated [1]. I have been trying to move away from Chrome to Epiphany slowly but was encountering quite a few issues which I reported to GNOME and they were like "Oh yeah, we fixed this a long time ago, get the latest version". I got the latest version via flatpak and I've completely replaced Chrome. There are still a few issues to be ironed out in flatpak (like notifications and downloads support), but it's getting there! [1] https://blogs.gnome.org/mcatanzaro/2016/03/30/positive-progress-on-webkitgtk-security-updates/ https://blogs.gnome.org/mcatanzaro/2016/03/30/positive-progr...
- morganvachon 10y ago
  Midori is not the default browser, it's Epiphany, as stated in the blog post. Besides, Chromium is available in the software store, and official Chrome is installable directly from Google. Also, how is this any different than macOS shipping with Safari only, or Windows shipping with Edge only? You're holding an open source project to a higher standard than two highly successful commercial offerings.
bitslayer 10y ago
One thing I have wondered about is keyboard shortcuts. Does Elementary follow the Mac conventions?
- matzipan 10y ago
  I don't know mac conventions as I generally don't use keys on my mac. But elementary certainly has a configurable keyboard shortcuts panel.
tambourine_man 10y ago
Unfortunately, no Photoshop, no go
- matwood 10y ago
  Or Lightroom. And please do not say Darktable is a replacement. Maybe one day, but not yet.
  - DoofusOfDeath 10y ago
    Agreed on Lightroom and Photoshop as sticking points, sadly. Windows 10 with forced updates is too big if a reliability risk, especially when we're under deadline. Even if we could accept the spyware. MBP could work, but it's very expensive, and the 16GB limit would be painful. Mac Pro is expensive and somewhat outdated, and also is not portable. Windows as a guest on Linux may work for us, but I'm still unclear on how that will impact color calibration / transforms. I wish Adobe would just offer CS for Linux. Even at twice the price it would be our best option.
  - pmlnr 10y ago
    The truth about PS and Lightroom is that many of their users wouldn't really need them. A workflow of, for example, Rawtherapee + GIMP would be more than enough for basic to upper intermediate tasks to replace Lightroom with. ( No, I'm not talking bs, my wife is actually using this for work; just like Mixxx is usable for professional DJing. ) There is also digiKam, which is rather impressive; it is lacking a few features, yet, but not as many as you'd think. PS & Lightroom is everywhere, that is what's tought in schools; it's the MS Office of photo & design, and it shouldn't be. There are, of course, situations, when the all-in-one PS is needed, but it's really, really rare. Give digiKam and GIMP a go, but give them weeks, not minutes. Most of those who run away are only literally trying them for hours at max while these are utterly different tools.
    - rimantas 10y ago
      Sure, because who deserves a decent UI&UX.
blowski 10y ago
How does this compare to Ubuntu Desktop? Why would I use one over the other? I ask as somebody who used to use Ubuntu a few years ago, and wants to switch back to Linux in the next few months.
- izacus 10y ago
  It's a distribution based on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, but with customized default applications and desktop. It's more Mac-like, simpler, but because of that also has significantly less customization features.
- toyg 10y ago
  In my very limited experience, Elementary is really minimal and tries hard to get out of the way, but it provides what is still fundamentally a desktop/mouse-oriented interface: you have a dock, a systray, and a "Start" menu. Ubuntu veered towards the touch stuff, using nontraditional approaches; I honestly get lost these days when I have to use it.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- rvschuilenburg 10y ago
  The best answer to this would be to try out both using a live USB. You really have to use elementary to see the differences. But as mentioned, it's based on Ubuntu so all apps that run on Ubuntu will also run on elementary. I prefer it over Ubuntu because the UI makes more sense to me than Ubuntu's Unity.
- abrowne 10y ago
  I'm (slowly) switching from Mac to Linux, and in the process I tried a lot of options. I settled on Ubuntu as my preferred distro for several reasons (although I liked a lot about Fedora too), but I think the choice of desktop is most personal preference. Unity, GNOME, MATE and Xfce all have offical Ubuntu flavo(u)rs and work well, while Elementary uses an Ubuntu base which is nearly the same thing. (Lately I'm mostly using Xfce/Xubuntu.) The great thing is that they all use the same core system, so try them, or even install them at the same time (except Elementary), and use them until you find your favorite.
my123 10y ago
Elementary is quite nice on HiDPI until you use apps which need other graphics toolkits...
- toyg 10y ago
  The Linux world should really get together and bang out a solution for the hiDPI problem that is consistent across X servers and window managers.
  - truncate 10y ago
    Most apps I use on Ubuntu work well on hidpi. The main problem I face is when I connect my laptop with 4k screen with some external monitor with 2k or 1080p display.
    - michaelgrafl 10y ago
      A couple of years or so ago, I managed to "solve" this issue in Ubuntu 14.04, if I remember correctly. I somehow figured out how to drive Unity at 162% scaling for my XPS 13 and scale it down to 100% for my external display. There definitely were some artefacts, but it basically worked. I'm sorry to say though, that I don't remember how I did it, since I've been using mainly macOS and Windows for quite some time now.
      - truncate 10y ago
        Did that solution involve using xrandr scaling parameter? unfortunately that's not right solution IMO, as I observed it takes lot of CPU. Hacky and feels laggy. My solution is to organize myself so that I don't have to move windows around. I mostly need browser, terminal and emacs. I open chrome in one monitor with specific scaling option, and when I move emacs or terminal around I manually decrease font size with Ctrl-+/-
    - oneeyedpigeon 10y ago
      What issues do you face, because I currently use that exact workflow with a MacbookPro retina, and a 24" dell monitor. Apart from windows not resizing/positioning automatically (so I have to manually re-layout everything whenever I switch from monitor to laptop), I haven't really suffered any problems so am curious to know what issues I'd face if I switched to Ubuntu.
vonklaus 10y ago
interesting project, would like to check it out. I recently upgraded from MacOS to Yosemite and have been quite happy. That said it would be nice to see other options.
kybernetyk 10y ago
So I went to their main page to download an ISO to give it a try in a VM. They hid the download button really well: You have to type in "0" into the "how much you'd like to pay" field for the "Purchase" button to change to "Download". I mean I understand that open source projects need funding. But if you want people to try your niche OS at least make it obvious how to download it. Ask for money later after people had to chance to try it out. I only typed in 0 because I know that "trick" from other websites. If I hadn't known I would have just left the website and would possibly never return.
- toyg 10y ago
  This is a long-standing criticism of Elementary. I think they initially didn't even provide a way to get a free download, and eventually settled for the current UI. Basically the founder-owner is adamant that someone has to pay for his time, and tbh I don't begrudge him.
  - kybernetyk 10y ago
    Oh, I don't begrudge him either. I run a small software company myself. We're selling our software on the internet. But our website focuses on getting people to download the free trial first. The "asking for money" is then done once the trial period ends. It's already hard to get people to download your stuff for free. With obviously visible download buttons. If we did what Elementary is doing we would be closing our shop rather soon.
    - embik 10y ago
      As far as I know the GPL does not allow trial periods and asking for money later on, but feel free to correct me. That's why elementary cannot do such a thing.
      - teddyh 10y ago
        If Elementary wants to alter some program to add a time bomb, the GPL cannot stop them. The GPL only ensures that the user can take the time bomb out (either by themselves or by following instructions on the internet, or by hiring somebody to do it).
kornakiewicz 10y ago
I'm long term Linux user and I played with Elementary sometime ago. While just after installation everything is great and beautiful, it changed shortly when I need to install apps outside the ecosystem. Experience gives you feeling I could compare to using old-java application on Windows 10.
- matthewking 10y ago
  Along with seemingly everyone else, I had a quick look at my options to migrate away from Apple over the last few days. First thing I looked for was a decent mail app, was immediately put off the whole idea, exactly as you describe.
  - pmlnr 10y ago
    > a decent mail app This is probably the most painful thing on desktop at the moment, because no one gives a s* to desktop mail apps these days. I recently switched back to evolution from Thunderbird, but where one if great, the other falls short ( in this case, GPG with Evolution is _painful_ ). Geary is... well, not mature, Claws and Sylpheed are a bit too oldschool and mutt is ... well, mutt. I'd love to see something like Rainloop[1] as a real desktop app. Mailpile[2] is a nice idea, but is nowhere even close to the usability of Rainloop. [1]: http://www.rainloop.net/ http://www.rainloop.net/ [2]: https://www.mailpile.is/ https://www.mailpile.is/
    - matzipan 10y ago
      Check my comment above (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12854312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12854312)
  - etatoby 10y ago
    I recently switched to Mint Cinnamon and I'm completely satisfied. There is not one thing I miss from Mac OS X and many where GNU/Linux is much better. As for mail, Thunderbird is not so bad.
    - 10y ago
Void_ 10y ago
I'm really hoping this is just a phase. Hoping that Apple will reduce prices of new laptops and we'll be back to normal. Right now everybody is using Macs. Walk into the Bay Area coffee shop, you see Macs everywhere. I love that. I build desktop software for Macs (focuslist.co). My apps are prettier than any others. They are easier and faster to use. This is the reason why people pay me $5 while they can get the job done with paper and pen. This is thanks to Mac as a platform. Mac developers don't want to just get the job done. They want to get the job done while winning an Apple Design Award. That's why Mac apps are the best. Take Mac away and high quality desktop apps will go away. We'll have to endure multi-platform Electron stuff. Ugh.
- pmlnr 10y ago
  > Take Mac away and high quality desktop apps will go away. Well... no. Ubuntu, Gnome, KDE, XFCE; they are all high quality desktops. Don't mix the desktop with the applications you're running on it. > We'll have to endure multi-platform Electron stuff. Now that is indeed a real issue, and yes, ugh. Edit: I've misread the original, sorry, so adding a few things: if you're using the default apps or the ones built for that specific environment only, you're good to go with GTK3, QT, whatever. The trouble comes when you mix these, but that is true even for the MacOS. Personally I really dislike the approach of Chrome, not giving a s* how it _should_ look like to look at least a little native.
  - matthewking 10y ago
    I think his point was that the Apple/Mac ethos foster high quality design and attention to detail, which is applied when developers build apps for the Mac.
    - Mayzie 10y ago
      To be fair, so does elementaryOS. They really try to encourage developers to adopt their HIG.[1] So much so that most developers using or targeting elementaryOS integrate their design really well.[2] For those that don't but still use GTK3, they also integrate quite well out of the box. [1] - https://elementary.io/docs/human-interface-guidelines https://elementary.io/docs/human-interface-guidelines [2] - https://quassy.github.io/elementary-apps/apps/ https://quassy.github.io/elementary-apps/apps/
pmlnr 10y ago
eOS again, within a few days. I see they are pushing their marketing well. I'm just going to link conversation from a couple of days before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761
FrankBlack 10y ago
Perhaps I am just dense, but the article references, specifically, the "Pro" market. For most pros that I know (and I am among them), our OS choice is often based on our tools, not the other way around. If I need Photoshop, Lightroom, Logic Pro, Visual Studio, etc., switching will be quite a chore. For the average user, this is probably a much more appealing argument.
- matzipan 10y ago
  Unfortunately, Linux lacks in the creative market. There's no way this can change soon without support from big players, like, for example, Adobe.
  - 7Z7 10y ago
    That depends on what kind of creative pro you are. In general I'd completely agree with you, but the major VFX vendors all run on Linux - with Nuke, Maya, Houdini, Modo, Clarisse, Mari, etc.
    - natch 10y ago
      If you get lucky with your particular combination of hardware and drivers, yes this can be true for some people.
  - wingless 10y ago
    From what I've seen it's been getting much better. Linux has very powerful tools for media creation/editing now: Blender, Krita, Darktable, Natron are some quality apps that I'm aware of.
    - erikbye 10y ago
      The problem is that they still pale compared to the Windows/Mac applications.
  - dharma1 10y ago
    I'm not sure what toolkit Adobe use but I have a feeling it's not easily portable to Linux. Inkscape and Gimp are the stalwarts, but for someone coming from Sketch or Photoshop they feel quite ancient and somewhat messy. https://www.figma.com https://www.figma.com is cross-platform (web based), and a pretty good Sketch competitor For a Lightroom replacement, Darktable is actually quite good (though I really miss the high quality shadows/highlights algorithm from ACR)
wjd2030 10y ago
Otherwise known as the "Here are the reasons Apple will probably sue us" blog.
bborud 10y ago
It wasn't the UI that got me using macs. In fact the UI was a pain in the neck since it couldn't do what my Linux window managers could do. And I kinda liked how I had my WM set up. It was the fact that software I needed was available on Mac and I didn't want to use Windows.
aq3cn 10y ago
Is there a place where I can directly ask experts or experienced users about alternative apps of my need. I have been making my mind about complete switch but few of the most used apps from Mac holds me back. I wish someone can suggest me a decent alternative to those apps. I must also add that I will lose several licenses of purchased apps in the process but I am willing to make that sacrifice. I wish I could find a reliable way to keep running those apps in VM.
driverdan 10y ago
Every few years I investigate switching back to a Linux laptop. Every time I find there are still issues. Last time it was poor GPU support (no fast switching) and buggy sleep. What issues still exist with using Linux on laptops?
- pavelludiq 10y ago
  It highly depends on the laptop you're talking about specifically. Some will just work, others will steal your soul with frustration. I've had very few issues on my thinkpad x240 with Kubuntu. It's an older model, but back when it was less than a year old I still had very few issues with it. Mostly with the touchpad, but that particular model is horrible even with good drivers, so I don't use it in general. I had to fiddle with some bearded parts when I wanted my battery to only charge to 70%, rather than keep a full charge while plugged in as the lenovo bits are windows only(I vaguely remember having to set up shell scripts of some sort). Bluetooth didn't work in the beginning, but upgrading to a newer Kubuntu fixed that, and I don't use that very often either, so I didn't mind. Also generally battery life is slightly worse than windows but this also varies. And although Windows 10 is a fairly snappy, it spins my fans much more than Kubuntu does. The last computer I had significant hardware problems with on linux had a Pentium 4, but I've been vary careful with hardware choice in the last decade. Do your research and you'll be fine.
- kbart 10y ago
  "What issues still exist with using Linux on laptops?" It depends on laptop model, some are worse than others. Just google "<latop_name> linux problem" and see what others encounter. Personally, I don't have any problems with my 5 years old Dell laptop running Kubuntu.
- 2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
  My pet peeve with Linux: Wifi. I have a HP laptop for work running Ubuntu that appears on their Certified hardware list. Wifi is buggy, using an external monitor is buggy, there are always "Internal Errors", sleep simply does not work, it crashes regularly.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
Shivetya 10y ago
So I am clueless here, how does swapping the OS rectify any issues people had with machine pricing or lack of desired new hardware features? I don't get the angst. To me the disappointment is wholly related to the action bar/etc/whatever it is called. Its such a lame approach to adding additional functionality I would have never expected it from Apple. The Windows environment has many machines fully embracing touch screens right where the action is.
vsh 10y ago
Vultures ;-)
simonhorlick 10y ago
It's great timing for elementary. I'm having a lot of software problems with the Mac, and since I develop exclusively for Linux it seems like it'd be a lot easier if I could build and run everything on my target platform.
- matzipan 10y ago
  The elementary community would love feedback on how to solve pains with mac. There's a subreddit or you could post bug reports on launchpad.
  - simonhorlick 10y ago
    No - Linux runs great, it's macOS I'm having issues with!
haffla 10y ago
I find Apricity OS (Arch Linux) much better suited for developers. In fact at work I switched from Ubuntu to Apricity. Through yaourt (paceman frontend) and AUR (Arch User Repository) it's a breeze to install the latest versions of literally everything you need be it Docker, Java or IntelliJ. I think it's comparable with brew. Plus Apricity looks so much better than Elementary in my opinion and almost manages to give you that macOS feeling.
- jjuel 10y ago
  Oh Apricity looks really nice. Might have to check that one out. Love Arch way more than Deb based distros.
- fizzbatter 10y ago
  That is pretty! I may have to give this a try when the time comes. By far the best looking Linux GUI i've seen yet. I can't wait to see an a GUI layer made for NixOS though. I really want to be done with stateful OSs, NixOS is so tempting.
  - BoorishBears 10y ago
    From a previous discussion of Apricity: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11421395 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11421395
- vladimir-y 10y ago
  Why not Manjaro? Does Apricity ship Arch packages passed through the its own repositories doing some testing and making sure core components are not broken and work well one with each other in the Apricity terms and in general? Manjaro does that, there is a kind of release cycle, every 1 or 2 week updates come, ie updates come not directly from the Arch repos (except AUR stuff obviously).
  - adultSwim 10y ago
    (sincerely) Why Manjaro and not just straight Arch?
88e282102ae2e5b 10y ago
I would highly recommend Xubuntu instead. Aesthetically I don't think there's a better Linux distro, and it's almost to the point quality-wise where I'd recommend it to my parents.
noir_lord 10y ago
Playing with it in VirtualBox. First impressions, it's very very pretty, the design out the box is nice though it's completely the antithesis of how I work (3 screens, panel on each, window buttons only for windows on that screen). The level of integration is nice, it feels cohesive. That said XFCE4 with some tweaking is pretty much perfect for me, it exactly works the way I want things to work.
nsxwolf 10y ago
So USB-C is what it takes to get you to switch to Linux? What are you going to do when all other laptop manufacturers follow suit - switch back? Mac users who make this threat sound just like people who threaten to move to Canada every election cycle.
- nicolas_t 10y ago
  Personally, USB-C is the least of my problem. I care about having a fast, powerful laptop with 32 or 64GB ram (I run a lot of VMs for my work, I could offload it to the cloud but then it's more of a hassle). I complain because Apple decided to make the macbook pro 15 inch lighter and thinner resulting in 25% less battery (going from 99.5 watt-hour to 76.0-watt-hour), this means that they have to make more compromises to keep a good battery life and instead of having a decent graphic card like the nvidia gtx 1080 or 32GB ram, the new macbook pros are underpowered. Since, apple is unlikely to decide to go back to the previous form factor, they are unlikely to ever sell a laptop with decent performances compared to their competitors. And to add insult to the injury, switching to usb-c forces users (at least for a year or two) to carry a lot of extra adapters which makes the weight loss moot.
  - snowwrestler 10y ago
    > Since, apple is unlikely to decide to go back to the previous form factor, they are unlikely to ever sell a laptop with decent performances compared to their competitors. Once the next generation of Intel processors land, I bet we'll see Macbook Pros with faster processors and 32GB or more of RAM. At that point they will catch up to their competitors. But it's important to remember who Apple considers their competitors. They've never competed on the cheap end--everyone knows that--but they've also never competed on the high-power end. For at least the past 8 years it's been possible to buy laptops that deliver more horsepower than a Macbook Pro, by caring less about size, weight, and battery life. I think that will always be true.
    - nicolas_t 10y ago
      It's true, but I don't remember having ever seen such a big gap in term of performance (or at least since apple switched to intel). The macbook pro 17 inch used to be not bad when compared to competitors.
throwsincenotpc 10y ago
They need to watch out because apparently the Gnome foundation wants to ditch Vala for Rust to cut cost and "attract more developers" : https://siliconislandblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/31/thoughts-on-dx-gnome-and-rust/ https://siliconislandblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/31/thoughts-... > and support a preferred programming language (Vala) https://launchpad.net/elementary https://launchpad.net/elementary
- pmlnr 10y ago
  Gnome foundation: when you finally gain traction, you press reset, bravo.
  - throwsincenotpc 10y ago
    lol right, I expect them to move to QT anyway ... /s
- matzipan 10y ago
  I agree with the article. Vala is a wonderful language, but it doesn't have the necessary tooling built around it.
  - throwsincenotpc 10y ago
    > I agree with the article. Vala is a wonderful language, but it doesn't have the necessary tooling built around it. Sure but they had like 10 years to do that, I remember a french guy who ever wrote a complete IDE with autocompletition + package manager for Vala on Windows. Support from the Gnome Foundation ? zip . Oh, and I even found the link. http://www.tarnyko.net/en/?q=node/24 http://www.tarnyko.net/en/?q=node/24 So the tooling my ass, they just don't want to bother with Vala
    - matzipan 10y ago
      No, I'm talking about gdb support, for example. I'm talking for a testing framework (right now you have to write your own build process capable of bundling the unit tests with your source).
bluedino 10y ago
Are there any distributions where the display scaling works at least as good as Windows 10? I don't expect it to be as perfect as the Mac but the current Ubuntu is a mess when you change the scaling factor.
- matzipan 10y ago
  elementary should automatically handle your hidpi quite well.
  - philbot1008 10y ago
    source?
    - matzipan 10y ago
      I'm part of the community. I have seen alot of work being put into making hidpi work properly. I can't find any changelog mentions though :( Here's a community post: https://www.reddit.com/r/elementaryos/comments/53gkr1/elementary_os_loki_hidpi_experience_and_tips/ https://www.reddit.com/r/elementaryos/comments/53gkr1/elemen... And some hidpi icon work: http://blog.elementary.io/post/124193007916/whats-up-with-hidpi-icons http://blog.elementary.io/post/124193007916/whats-up-with-hi...
      - matzipan 10y ago
        Found it: https://blueprints.launchpad.net/elementaryos/+spec/hidpi-support https://blueprints.launchpad.net/elementaryos/+spec/hidpi-su...
bluepill 10y ago
Why do macOS users seem to want to migrate to elementary? I mean why elementary as your choice for a Linux distro?
- natch 10y ago
  They don't... my take is it's just a fiction made up by someone trying to promote a distro.
  - bluepill 10y ago
    thanks for the clarification.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- Semiapies 10y ago
  There's interest because of a recent, popular post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 As to how many people really are migrating, who knows. I'm an Apple user, but I'm not going to take the rabid fanboy position that these distro makers must be lying when they say they've noticed more interest, lately.
fnl 10y ago
I try Ubuntu about once a year, in the hopes of getting rid of OSX. But each time, the reason for going back to Apple ID is interoperability: Try dragging stuff (images, fotos, links, files, formatted text ...) from one program to another, including the "dreaded" Finder; Works nearly always in OSX. While Ubuntu has come a long way with these things, I think it's still an even longer way away from what OSX can do. So while I haven't tried Elementary, I'd be astonished if it's any better at interoperability than Ubuntu...
- epmaybe 10y ago
  My biggest gripe with OS X right now is that Safari doesn't play nice with some website when it comes to dragging pictures and pasting them in from the clipboard.
  - jansenv 10y ago
    I also can't stand the lack of plugin support on Safari. Is uBlock origin or similar available on that platform yet?
    - mrcarrot 10y ago
      There are adblocking plugins available now, yes. Though last time I checked uBlock Origin wasn't one of them, unfortunately.
    - jungturk 10y ago
      https://safari-extensions.apple.com https://safari-extensions.apple.com
    - Rebelgecko 10y ago
      uBlock is available for Safari, but uBlock Origin is not.
  - wyager 10y ago
    Part of this is sites like Facebook intentionally subverting proper click and drag behavior with photos, links, etc. It's incredibly annoying, and we should be shaming sites that do it.
aibottle 10y ago
Do people realize they can run Linux on their Macbooks? Who needs elementary, just install Debian.
- pmlnr 10y ago
  It takes time to get the mentality; took me years as well. The shiny & pretty, especially if you're coming from the shiny & pretty, seems better and you forget to appreciate the things that silently just work in the background. I've recently switched from the previous elementary (due to bugs and missing features) first to Mint 18 Cinnamon, just to find a lot of bugs there are well ( at least no missing features ), then to XFCE. I'm slowly building an itch towards where most distros are moving to (being swallowed up by systemd), so XFCE: to get familiar with something that is truly portable, and runs of BSDs as well. xfwm4 + tint2 as panel + synapse as "menu" to be specific, and I'm really happy I did it. No, it's not as nice as eOS or Gnome Shell; some apps are quite ugly and the terminal windows don't line up when tiled. But it works. It's fast, it's glitch and bug-free so far; power management flies, and it feels like I got all the good from the good ol' Gnome2 days with updates. The truth is, tint2 eliminated the need for fancy indicators: it has an executor, with which you can do (nearly) anything, like displaying weather, cpu temperature, fan speed, changing governors with clicks, etc. So, as I started: it takes a lot of frustration, but eventually, you'll get to the point of install the most simple, most robust thing.
- sndean 10y ago
  Last year I found that trying to use rEFInd (keeping OS X on the Macbook) was really painful, so I quit. Is the experience a lot better if it's just Debian alone?
- cuddlybacon 10y ago
  It's the hardware that is making people look at jumping (back) to Linux.
vladimir-y 10y ago
I think for those who are not able to install and configure Linux manually from scratch not using a graphical installer would be better to use Windows 10 (not a bad OS), with no irony. Since such kind of articles and "simplified" systems like that "elementary OS" do hide Linux complexity. One day user will face a really serious OS issues and will stuck with that not knowing what to do (for example not bootable system after the update, it's not so likely, but might happen with Linux).
- reitanqild 10y ago
  Plain wrong IMO. Have been using Linux professionally and on my personal machines on and off for 15 years, sonce I was a student. A bit more work than Windows in some ways, less in others. I came to Ubuntu back in 2005ish based on a tip from a then 50 year old electrical engineer who had fallen in love. My bus driver this morning loves it (we sometimes talk while waiting). So stop spreading this FUD. And this comes from someone who has started liking Windows UX lately.
  - vladimir-y 10y ago
    You didn't get a point of my message. But I'm not going to keep explaining conversation with a person who is writing to me to stop expressing my own opinion which is backed by some experience, you better keep chatting with your bus driver.
    - reitanqild 10y ago
      I think I got your point. It doesn't seem like you got mine: Lots of people - including people who aren't pro users - have been using Linux happily for years. Post like yours are likely to discourage people from even trying, which is why I try to correct what I see as misinformation. You are free to explain why I am wrong instead of starting to pick on the anecdote.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  A typical Windows user is going to have no clue what to do if they have a serious OS issue too.
Exuma 10y ago
Honestly, this looks abysmal. This is like 1/1000th of the complexity and flexibility of macOS. What are you actually so upset about that warrants building a new, hideous, kiddy-version of mac OS?
- matzipan 10y ago
  You clearly haven't tried neither elementary nor Linux in general. There are many legitimate reasons why you might want to use elementary just as well as there are many legitimate reasons why you might want to use macOS. You're condemning diversity? To each their own.
yalogin 10y ago
What exactly is the reason to switch to another OS? I thought the complaints were about hardware. How the hell is elementary OS going to make the hardware better? Also can someone tell me the main complaint about the hardware, is it the USB-C and the sd card?
- reitanqild 10y ago
  It can run on non-Apple hardware.
matzipan 10y ago
I think one needs to also highlight the differences. mac OS is built by one major player and they have a clear direction of where they want to take this. Linux, in general, is built by communities of people who may or may not have diverging opinions, priorities and interests. While this gives you a lot diversity, it can be quite problematic. The financial aspect is also important. elementary LLC itself, has only 2 full-time employees, while Apple is sitting on a pile of cash. Yes, elementary builds on a solid open-source base [1] built by thousands of developers world-wide, some volunteers, some employees, but it's still a significant difference. Having a smaller scale, it means elementary can be more agile in its changes. This also means that there is smaller testing base, which means there will be more bugs. The nice part is that, when you find a bug, you can help fix it [2]. [1] https://elementary.io/open-source https://elementary.io/open-source [2] https://elementary.io/get-involved https://elementary.io/get-involved
natch 10y ago
Please don't be so gullible, folks! When you see an article marketing a product, and they claim people are looking to switch to their product in droves, take it with a grain of salt! This is purely a promotional article, pretending to be a help article. Look at the unattributed quotes it uses. Pretty sure the part about anybody switching from anything to anything is made up. Sure people switch sometimes. Sure people are complaining about Apple products, what else is new? Way to capitalize on our sincere discussions of platform choices. If HN swallows this kind of marketing-masquerading-as-technical-advice article so easily, we're going to see a lot more of this writing pattern in the future. Which means more marketing noise. Please don't buy it so readily.
- Semiapies 10y ago
  Do you really think HN readers are so gullible as to not realize this, and that you are the only one to catch on?
  - natch 10y ago
    I would never think that. But I was taken aback by many of the comments on this thread.
    - Semiapies 10y ago
      Which, the angry griping about how the distro makers want money, or the yammering about how Photoshop users should just cowboy up and submit patches to Gimp until they find it usable? As far as I can tell, the "gullibility" you think you're seeing is anyone responding in any way, even skeptically, that's not just covering their ears and going, "La la la, I can't hear your marketing!"
  - Semiapies 10y ago
    Apparently, some readers do think exactly this of all other HN readers...
- Klarbichu 10y ago
  I'm not sure what the problem is. It's an interesting link to an interesting article about an interesting operating system. Perhaps you don't find it interesting, but as a developer, I like it.
jordache 10y ago
I would rather use BeOS
KKKKkkkk1 10y ago
The elephant in the room is that Elementary is infringing on Apple's copyright by imitating macOS design. Linux has great desktop environments (Unity, KDE, Gnome). Elementary's claim to fame is that it has good design (wink). If stealing others' GPL-licensed code is wrong, then so is this.
- gvb 10y ago
  You are confusing copyright[1] (covers written works, such as source code) with design patents[2] (covers look and feel). If Elementary is infringing on Apple's patents, that would be wrong. A cursory search of OSX design patents[3] turns up the Dock patent[4]. Whether Elementary infringes the patent is a legal matter (IANAL). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent [3] https://www.google.com/search?q=design+patent+osx&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=design+patent+osx&ie=utf-8&o... [4] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7,434,177.PN.&OS=PN/7,434,177&RS=PN/7,434,177 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=H...:
Jtsummers 10y ago
What's the gain of Elementary over other Linux distros? Is it really that much better than the start of the art anywhere else? Do the apps integrate, in some meaningful way, more easily with each other than with, say, a stock Gnome install on top of Red Hat? Is it as novel as Etoile? Or is it just a skin + conforming apps?
jjuel 10y ago
I am sticking with Mac because it just works. I have had quite a few non-Mac laptops previously. They rarely stay in good working condition for more than a couple of years. I currently have the late 2012 13" retina Pro and it has shown no signs of stopping. The only other one that has the sort of quality I see in a MacBook is Dell's XPS. The developer edition has me intrigued, but I really think this new MacBook with a Touchbar is going to be the future. The lack of ESC or function keys has no bearing on my development so that isn't an issue for me either.
- matthewking 10y ago
  I think the keyboard is tipping me over the edge on the new MacBook Pro's, its horrendous. There's no travel at all, the keys just immediately click. Interested to see what other people think about them as they start getting their hands on the new models, as a developer this is a very important aspect, and on top of the unwanted touchbar, the massive price hike, the lack of standard ports etc its all just a bit too much this time around.
  - todd8 10y ago
    I typing this on my coffeeshop computer, a 12" MacBook, with the butterfly keys. I don't like them very much; my four year old MacBookPro Retina has much nicer keys and so does my Apple Magic Keyboard on my desktop system. I'm curious about the new MacBook Pro keys, they allude to second generation butterfly keys. Have you had a chance to try the newly released system's keyboard?
    - matthewking 10y ago
      Yes its the brand new keyboard that I was referring to, a friend got one from his workplace, space grey looks amazing and the larger trackpad is nice but as mentioned, keyboard is a no go. I really hope the reasoning for it wasn't to shave off a few more mm! I have the 2014 MBP so my comparison is skipping the first generation of butterfly keyboard that you mentioned, I've been told that its worse than that one too but I can't say myself.
throw2016 10y ago
I regularly use Windows, OSX and Linux and I think Ubuntu Unity in 16.04 is by far the most polished Linux desktop and for people switching to Linux that would be the best first experience. In many ways I even prefer Unity. OSX is becoming a bit stagnant and bloated of late. The Unity UI is fast, the effects are polished and not gimmicky, the launcher and search across apps and file is near instantaneous, driver detection and configuration is streamlined and everything looks well put together. Most Linux users have put up with some pretty awful apps, UIs and configs over the evolution of Linux and I am glad how far Ubuntu has come. Elementary is decent but at the moment both Gnome and Unity have moved ahead and offer a more consistent and professional user experience for first timers.
veidr 10y ago
My own burning hatred towards Apple runs a little hotter than most, and I have been seriously googling (and trying) alternatives since 2012. That was when my $9000 Mac Pro — which had been a great machine, and still was, except for the little detail about not having been updated since 2009 and thus being stuck with USB 2 (!!!) to say nothing of Thunderbolt and any kind of modern accoutrements — started to feel like a personal affront, a sneering fuck you directed at not just me, but everybody remotely like me. (Wow!!! Déjà vu bro!!) Nevertheless, I didn't switch then, and all of us complainers won't switch now either. Because the fucking OS. I've tried every iteration of Ubuttnu, CentOS, and FreeBSD since. Even OpenWhatever, before the goblins bought it. I have Thinkpads and Dell XPS "Developer Editions" and a drawer full of other crap like that. Executive summary: it's all garbage time. It's like going back 10+ years. Nothing works right, on any of them. Copy/paste, batteries, wireless networking, drag and drop, high-res displays, multilingual input, even like fucking word processing and email and image editors and terminal programs... it's all like Mac OS X Jaguar level. We can't give Apple the finger, even though we want to (and definitely after last week, we all want to) because there literally isn't an OS in the world that can touch Mac OS for general-purpose workstation/laptop use. (For niche and limited-purpose, yes, there are options.) Elementary OS is a fucking joke. Every OS mentioned disparagingly above is a better choice for almost any purpose. But those are still horrible. Apple's OS advantage is what lets them say "Fuck you peons, here's some 3 year old technology and a bag of dongles, that'll be $4000." But we're mostly all gonna buy the new shitty MacBook Hipster, or gut it out with our old ones, until a better fucking OS happens. And that won't be soon — it's not even remotely on the horizon.
- tempodox 10y ago
  I suspect the political-correctness dogs around here might bark at your wording, but I still think you've nailed it.
- highace 10y ago
  Windows? It's really not that bad.
  - javajosh 10y ago
buckbova 10y ago
I currently use xfce[1] with docky[2] and it feels pretty good. Probably not as polished but I know it's stable. There were other distros in the past trying to copy macOS, pear os[3] was one of them. I remember Lindows[4] trying to market itself as a windows replacement. I can't believe they got sued and actually lost[5]! Xandros[6] was also in this space. They probably went BK. Every year is the year of Linux for the desktop but it's really not possible to capture this market. It'll have to come from someone like google. Why couldn't chrome os have been a legit linux distro instead of trying for a niche netbook market with a locked down OS? [1] http://xfce.org/ http://xfce.org/ [2] http://wiki.go-docky.com/index.php?title=Welcome_to_the_Docky_wiki http://wiki.go-docky.com/index.php?title=Welcome_to_the_Dock... [3] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=pear http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=pear [4] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=linspire http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=linspire [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Lindows.com,_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Lindows.com.... [6] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=xandros http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=xandros
- cooper12 10y ago
  Wait from the article on Windows, it actually claims the opposite, saying that the court rejected Microsoft's claims and that it later settled with Lindows, paying for their trademark.
  - buckbova 10y ago
    You're totally right. I guess I just mis-remembered it expecting the name change meant they lost.
nyxtom 10y ago
Still need to get better facetimehd support.
jezfromfuture 10y ago
Elementary doesn't seem to play nice with enterprise wpa2 wireless networks so I went back to OS X again
throwanem 10y ago
No Spotlight?
aoeuhtns 10y ago
Going by the comments here, I am surprised by how few people seem to use Linux on their laptop! Maybe selection bias due to the thread topic? Of course, not everything will work, but for me, they often fall into the nice-to-have category of features, not a must-have. Maybe my preferences are not shared widely. Been using Debian unstable and Xmonad for a long time, and it's hard to try and use anything else now. Most dev tools work natively ... no funky VMs to emulate, except Windows for Edge browser testing ... all works really well.
NuSkooler 10y ago
I've been using Elementary OS for a few years now. THIS is the Linux desktop for me & easily replaces Windows and/or OS X with the exception of serious gaming where you're likely be be running Windows no matter what.
vondur 10y ago
Elementary is one of the least stable Linux distros that are out there. I have a friend who's been running Debian forever using Afterstep as the WM, and it's rock solid. Granted, he does most of his work in the terminal using emacs. I've never had good luck with linux on the laptop, but I've had good luck using it on the desktop, so long as I stuck with Intel chipsets and Nvidia GPU's. The lack of apps is going to be an issue for most people though.
gotofritz 10y ago
I bought a MBP a few months ago because I was travelling to the UK and the low pound made it a no brainer (I saved 350€) but part of me was annoying at missing out on the latest version that was about to be released. It looks like I dodged a bullet; in 4-5 years, when I'll need an upgrade, all these issues will be solved, USB-C will either have become standard or gone firewire's way, the pointless emoji board will be quietly shelved, more RAM will be possible, etc

518 points by SunShiranui 10y ago

I appreciate them capitalizing on people looking to switch. I think they could have done a better job of describing how to switch instead of talking about what people love. I think it would have been better for them to talk about some main sticking points, like how to get out of the ecosystem (say iTunes or Photos). Either way, nice to see the competition stepping up and capitalizing on the situation.

fnordsensei 10y ago
While I agree, I can also understand why they would want to give people coming from macOS an impression of what they can expect from the switch in terms of apps, etc. "Exiting the ecosystem" is a guide crying out to be written though.
natch 10y ago
LOL! I doubt many people are looking to switch, the article just said that as it is trying to market something. Funny that HN readers are buying it so gullibly.

xaduha 10y ago

Check Solus instead https://solus-project.com/ https://solus-project.com/

GavinMcG 10y ago
I've downvoted you for now, since your comment doesn't tell us anything about the project and appears to be a lazy effort to piggyback off the resource that (I presume) a competitor has offered.
- xaduha 10y ago
  I wrote that comment first, but then got a login prompt and thought it didn't go through. But it did, so I deleted my second comment, which went something like > I recently installed Solus and was pleasantly surprised I don't have a detailed comparison or anything like that, I haven't used that many Linux desktop distros to begin with, but I did try Elementary OS and found it wanting.
rocky1138 10y ago
I think there might be something wrong with that website. I went there and saw no screenshots nor any real information on what Solus is. There was a learn more link but it took me to something called Budgie.
- xaduha 10y ago
  Yeah, site under-delivers somewhat. There are some screens in this pdf https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Ymf8oYXx-PSXU2eFlsR0NvY1E/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Ymf8oYXx-PSXU2eFlsR0NvY1E...
TillE 10y ago
Why do both of these hide the fact that they're Linux distros? Only nerds are going to be installing a new OS. That's not a small detail; it means you can run thousands of useful programs.
- r3bl 10y ago
  Because they're not trying to appeal to the "nerd market", they're trying to appeal to the general users with their design. As someone who has used elementary quite a bit, I can guarantee you that the elementary OS is way simpler to use to Average Joe than both Windows and macOS.
keeganjw 10y ago
I've been using Solus on my laptop for almost a year now and I must say, for everyday use, it is quite good. I'm not sure about using it as a dev machine. But if you just want to browser the web, listen to music, and occasionally write a document or something, it's very stable. I don't think I've ever seen it crash. Also, it's very easy to install and is definitely one of the best looking linux distros around. That and elementary.
ff10 10y ago
Why 'instead'? Why not 'in addition'?
- xaduha 10y ago
  To save time, I guess. Elementary OS doesn't hit the mark.

youdontknowtho 10y ago

I love the work that the elementary project is doing. Really great stuff...

rocky1138 10y ago
I tried running it this week since I have a lot of friends who use Macs. I figured I could help them out if they had questions, etc. But after a few minutes I went back to KDE as Elementary was horribly broken coming from Kububtu. It probably assumes you'll be installing from fresh.
- boredpudding 10y ago
  elementary is indeed not meant to be 'just a desktop environment like gnome / kde'. Installing it that way is not supported. It's a full operating system including default apps, etc. all sorts of things you probably didn't install. You should indeed install it fresh. I hope you didn't give your friends a bad expression.
  - 72deluxe 10y ago
    But as others have stated, as you have access to all the giant repos, installing any other software than the elementary-oriented stuff instantly feels disjointed, as toolkits etc. don't match. This isn't really a problem with Elementary OS itself, more the proliferation of toolkits available, but to pretend that it is a drop-in replacement for a Mac (with its unified Cocoa UI) isn't quite right. (Yes, I know you can run FLTK and X apps on Mac so it's ugly too).
  - rocky1138 10y ago
    I didn't. I didn't tell them anything. I just don't have any interest in installing it full. Instead I went with KDE Neon.
    - youdontknowtho 10y ago
      KDE Neon looks great too. I really respect their work.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

r3bl 10y ago

The thing I've used the most while I used elementary is the option to direct perform actions of the apps. I find it so easy to just press the keyboard shortcut and do something like "2+2" and get "4" as a result. I absolutely loved that!

mangeletti 10y ago
Check out the Alfred App for Mac. It's this and it's wonderful.

anondon 10y ago

The software is there, but what about the hardware to go with it? The only laptops comparable to Macbook Pro hardware quality and battery life are the Dell XPS series and the Thinkpad X1. I feel there is a serious shortage of good laptops with linux pre-installed that the non-technical user can pickup and start using.

antouank 10y ago
Check the Razer blade series
- m_mueller 10y ago
  How are their touchpads?
  - keyle 10y ago
    Great question. It's hard to get even close to the Mac touchpads.
    - m_mueller 10y ago
      Why is that such a hard problem? Do they all just not care? Patents?
      - muyuu 10y ago
        Not sure if it's so hard, but patents certainly exist for Apple's trackpads.
- epse 10y ago
  They are really annoying on Linux.
  - antouank 10y ago
    How so?

sschueller 10y ago

The only reason I am still using a Mac is because I need to be able to compile iPhone apps and unlike android I can only do this in OSX. All my other tools are already available in Linux or even Windows.

Void_ 10y ago
Sounds like you only need it for compilation. Do you develop in Xcode? What IDE/tool do you use?

aorth 10y ago

Yes, the Elementary team has been doing great work for years. Sad that it's all parallel to the efforts of the larger GNOME Desktop project. I don't know how much code gets shared between the two, but I cringe to think that Elementary is dragging along a suitcase full of patches! Some of their apps are forks, while others are written from scratch to fit their design (UI/UX/simplicity) goals. I think their decision to use what amounts to a random, third-party web browser (Midori) as the default is laughable (this day and age, would any security-conscious person NOT recommend Chrome?). Nonetheless, bravo to the Elementary team for taking the time to even write up this blog post (which is apparently the first in a series). Edit: replies pointed out that Epiphany is the default web browser. Point still stands that Chrome implements the most security mitigations out of ALL browsers on the market.

rvschuilenburg 10y ago
> I think their decision to use what amounts to a random, third-party web browser (Midori) as the default is laughable They switched to the default GNOME browser "Epiphany" in the latest release of elementary OS. But I agree, the first thing i did was install a different browser. In my case Firefox.
- matzipan 10y ago
  The version of Epiphany which has to ship with Ubuntu (because Ubuntu is only shipping GTK 3.18) is pretty outdated [1]. I have been trying to move away from Chrome to Epiphany slowly but was encountering quite a few issues which I reported to GNOME and they were like "Oh yeah, we fixed this a long time ago, get the latest version". I got the latest version via flatpak and I've completely replaced Chrome. There are still a few issues to be ironed out in flatpak (like notifications and downloads support), but it's getting there! [1] https://blogs.gnome.org/mcatanzaro/2016/03/30/positive-progress-on-webkitgtk-security-updates/ https://blogs.gnome.org/mcatanzaro/2016/03/30/positive-progr...
morganvachon 10y ago
Midori is not the default browser, it's Epiphany, as stated in the blog post. Besides, Chromium is available in the software store, and official Chrome is installable directly from Google. Also, how is this any different than macOS shipping with Safari only, or Windows shipping with Edge only? You're holding an open source project to a higher standard than two highly successful commercial offerings.

bitslayer 10y ago

One thing I have wondered about is keyboard shortcuts. Does Elementary follow the Mac conventions?

matzipan 10y ago
I don't know mac conventions as I generally don't use keys on my mac. But elementary certainly has a configurable keyboard shortcuts panel.

tambourine_man 10y ago

Unfortunately, no Photoshop, no go

matwood 10y ago
Or Lightroom. And please do not say Darktable is a replacement. Maybe one day, but not yet.
- DoofusOfDeath 10y ago
  Agreed on Lightroom and Photoshop as sticking points, sadly. Windows 10 with forced updates is too big if a reliability risk, especially when we're under deadline. Even if we could accept the spyware. MBP could work, but it's very expensive, and the 16GB limit would be painful. Mac Pro is expensive and somewhat outdated, and also is not portable. Windows as a guest on Linux may work for us, but I'm still unclear on how that will impact color calibration / transforms. I wish Adobe would just offer CS for Linux. Even at twice the price it would be our best option.
- pmlnr 10y ago
  The truth about PS and Lightroom is that many of their users wouldn't really need them. A workflow of, for example, Rawtherapee + GIMP would be more than enough for basic to upper intermediate tasks to replace Lightroom with. ( No, I'm not talking bs, my wife is actually using this for work; just like Mixxx is usable for professional DJing. ) There is also digiKam, which is rather impressive; it is lacking a few features, yet, but not as many as you'd think. PS & Lightroom is everywhere, that is what's tought in schools; it's the MS Office of photo & design, and it shouldn't be. There are, of course, situations, when the all-in-one PS is needed, but it's really, really rare. Give digiKam and GIMP a go, but give them weeks, not minutes. Most of those who run away are only literally trying them for hours at max while these are utterly different tools.
  - rimantas 10y ago
    Sure, because who deserves a decent UI&UX.

blowski 10y ago

How does this compare to Ubuntu Desktop? Why would I use one over the other? I ask as somebody who used to use Ubuntu a few years ago, and wants to switch back to Linux in the next few months.

izacus 10y ago
It's a distribution based on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, but with customized default applications and desktop. It's more Mac-like, simpler, but because of that also has significantly less customization features.
toyg 10y ago
In my very limited experience, Elementary is really minimal and tries hard to get out of the way, but it provides what is still fundamentally a desktop/mouse-oriented interface: you have a dock, a systray, and a "Start" menu. Ubuntu veered towards the touch stuff, using nontraditional approaches; I honestly get lost these days when I have to use it.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
rvschuilenburg 10y ago
The best answer to this would be to try out both using a live USB. You really have to use elementary to see the differences. But as mentioned, it's based on Ubuntu so all apps that run on Ubuntu will also run on elementary. I prefer it over Ubuntu because the UI makes more sense to me than Ubuntu's Unity.
abrowne 10y ago
I'm (slowly) switching from Mac to Linux, and in the process I tried a lot of options. I settled on Ubuntu as my preferred distro for several reasons (although I liked a lot about Fedora too), but I think the choice of desktop is most personal preference. Unity, GNOME, MATE and Xfce all have offical Ubuntu flavo(u)rs and work well, while Elementary uses an Ubuntu base which is nearly the same thing. (Lately I'm mostly using Xfce/Xubuntu.) The great thing is that they all use the same core system, so try them, or even install them at the same time (except Elementary), and use them until you find your favorite.

my123 10y ago

Elementary is quite nice on HiDPI until you use apps which need other graphics toolkits...

toyg 10y ago
The Linux world should really get together and bang out a solution for the hiDPI problem that is consistent across X servers and window managers.
- truncate 10y ago
  Most apps I use on Ubuntu work well on hidpi. The main problem I face is when I connect my laptop with 4k screen with some external monitor with 2k or 1080p display.
  - michaelgrafl 10y ago
    A couple of years or so ago, I managed to "solve" this issue in Ubuntu 14.04, if I remember correctly. I somehow figured out how to drive Unity at 162% scaling for my XPS 13 and scale it down to 100% for my external display. There definitely were some artefacts, but it basically worked. I'm sorry to say though, that I don't remember how I did it, since I've been using mainly macOS and Windows for quite some time now.
    - truncate 10y ago
      Did that solution involve using xrandr scaling parameter? unfortunately that's not right solution IMO, as I observed it takes lot of CPU. Hacky and feels laggy. My solution is to organize myself so that I don't have to move windows around. I mostly need browser, terminal and emacs. I open chrome in one monitor with specific scaling option, and when I move emacs or terminal around I manually decrease font size with Ctrl-+/-
  - oneeyedpigeon 10y ago
    What issues do you face, because I currently use that exact workflow with a MacbookPro retina, and a 24" dell monitor. Apart from windows not resizing/positioning automatically (so I have to manually re-layout everything whenever I switch from monitor to laptop), I haven't really suffered any problems so am curious to know what issues I'd face if I switched to Ubuntu.

vonklaus 10y ago

interesting project, would like to check it out. I recently upgraded from MacOS to Yosemite and have been quite happy. That said it would be nice to see other options.

kybernetyk 10y ago

So I went to their main page to download an ISO to give it a try in a VM. They hid the download button really well: You have to type in "0" into the "how much you'd like to pay" field for the "Purchase" button to change to "Download". I mean I understand that open source projects need funding. But if you want people to try your niche OS at least make it obvious how to download it. Ask for money later after people had to chance to try it out. I only typed in 0 because I know that "trick" from other websites. If I hadn't known I would have just left the website and would possibly never return.

toyg 10y ago
This is a long-standing criticism of Elementary. I think they initially didn't even provide a way to get a free download, and eventually settled for the current UI. Basically the founder-owner is adamant that someone has to pay for his time, and tbh I don't begrudge him.
- kybernetyk 10y ago
  Oh, I don't begrudge him either. I run a small software company myself. We're selling our software on the internet. But our website focuses on getting people to download the free trial first. The "asking for money" is then done once the trial period ends. It's already hard to get people to download your stuff for free. With obviously visible download buttons. If we did what Elementary is doing we would be closing our shop rather soon.
  - embik 10y ago
    As far as I know the GPL does not allow trial periods and asking for money later on, but feel free to correct me. That's why elementary cannot do such a thing.
    - teddyh 10y ago
      If Elementary wants to alter some program to add a time bomb, the GPL cannot stop them. The GPL only ensures that the user can take the time bomb out (either by themselves or by following instructions on the internet, or by hiring somebody to do it).

kornakiewicz 10y ago

I'm long term Linux user and I played with Elementary sometime ago. While just after installation everything is great and beautiful, it changed shortly when I need to install apps outside the ecosystem. Experience gives you feeling I could compare to using old-java application on Windows 10.

matthewking 10y ago
Along with seemingly everyone else, I had a quick look at my options to migrate away from Apple over the last few days. First thing I looked for was a decent mail app, was immediately put off the whole idea, exactly as you describe.
- pmlnr 10y ago
  > a decent mail app This is probably the most painful thing on desktop at the moment, because no one gives a s* to desktop mail apps these days. I recently switched back to evolution from Thunderbird, but where one if great, the other falls short ( in this case, GPG with Evolution is _painful_ ). Geary is... well, not mature, Claws and Sylpheed are a bit too oldschool and mutt is ... well, mutt. I'd love to see something like Rainloop[1] as a real desktop app. Mailpile[2] is a nice idea, but is nowhere even close to the usability of Rainloop. [1]: http://www.rainloop.net/ http://www.rainloop.net/ [2]: https://www.mailpile.is/ https://www.mailpile.is/
  - matzipan 10y ago
    Check my comment above (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12854312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12854312)
- etatoby 10y ago
  I recently switched to Mint Cinnamon and I'm completely satisfied. There is not one thing I miss from Mac OS X and many where GNU/Linux is much better. As for mail, Thunderbird is not so bad.
  - 10y ago

Void_ 10y ago

I'm really hoping this is just a phase. Hoping that Apple will reduce prices of new laptops and we'll be back to normal. Right now everybody is using Macs. Walk into the Bay Area coffee shop, you see Macs everywhere. I love that. I build desktop software for Macs (focuslist.co). My apps are prettier than any others. They are easier and faster to use. This is the reason why people pay me $5 while they can get the job done with paper and pen. This is thanks to Mac as a platform. Mac developers don't want to just get the job done. They want to get the job done while winning an Apple Design Award. That's why Mac apps are the best. Take Mac away and high quality desktop apps will go away. We'll have to endure multi-platform Electron stuff. Ugh.

pmlnr 10y ago
> Take Mac away and high quality desktop apps will go away. Well... no. Ubuntu, Gnome, KDE, XFCE; they are all high quality desktops. Don't mix the desktop with the applications you're running on it. > We'll have to endure multi-platform Electron stuff. Now that is indeed a real issue, and yes, ugh. Edit: I've misread the original, sorry, so adding a few things: if you're using the default apps or the ones built for that specific environment only, you're good to go with GTK3, QT, whatever. The trouble comes when you mix these, but that is true even for the MacOS. Personally I really dislike the approach of Chrome, not giving a s* how it _should_ look like to look at least a little native.
- matthewking 10y ago
  I think his point was that the Apple/Mac ethos foster high quality design and attention to detail, which is applied when developers build apps for the Mac.
  - Mayzie 10y ago
    To be fair, so does elementaryOS. They really try to encourage developers to adopt their HIG.[1] So much so that most developers using or targeting elementaryOS integrate their design really well.[2] For those that don't but still use GTK3, they also integrate quite well out of the box. [1] - https://elementary.io/docs/human-interface-guidelines https://elementary.io/docs/human-interface-guidelines [2] - https://quassy.github.io/elementary-apps/apps/ https://quassy.github.io/elementary-apps/apps/

pmlnr 10y ago

eOS again, within a few days. I see they are pushing their marketing well. I'm just going to link conversation from a couple of days before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761

FrankBlack 10y ago

Perhaps I am just dense, but the article references, specifically, the "Pro" market. For most pros that I know (and I am among them), our OS choice is often based on our tools, not the other way around. If I need Photoshop, Lightroom, Logic Pro, Visual Studio, etc., switching will be quite a chore. For the average user, this is probably a much more appealing argument.

matzipan 10y ago
Unfortunately, Linux lacks in the creative market. There's no way this can change soon without support from big players, like, for example, Adobe.
- 7Z7 10y ago
  That depends on what kind of creative pro you are. In general I'd completely agree with you, but the major VFX vendors all run on Linux - with Nuke, Maya, Houdini, Modo, Clarisse, Mari, etc.
  - natch 10y ago
    If you get lucky with your particular combination of hardware and drivers, yes this can be true for some people.
- wingless 10y ago
  From what I've seen it's been getting much better. Linux has very powerful tools for media creation/editing now: Blender, Krita, Darktable, Natron are some quality apps that I'm aware of.
  - erikbye 10y ago
    The problem is that they still pale compared to the Windows/Mac applications.
- dharma1 10y ago
  I'm not sure what toolkit Adobe use but I have a feeling it's not easily portable to Linux. Inkscape and Gimp are the stalwarts, but for someone coming from Sketch or Photoshop they feel quite ancient and somewhat messy. https://www.figma.com https://www.figma.com is cross-platform (web based), and a pretty good Sketch competitor For a Lightroom replacement, Darktable is actually quite good (though I really miss the high quality shadows/highlights algorithm from ACR)

wjd2030 10y ago

Otherwise known as the "Here are the reasons Apple will probably sue us" blog.

bborud 10y ago

It wasn't the UI that got me using macs. In fact the UI was a pain in the neck since it couldn't do what my Linux window managers could do. And I kinda liked how I had my WM set up. It was the fact that software I needed was available on Mac and I didn't want to use Windows.

aq3cn 10y ago

Is there a place where I can directly ask experts or experienced users about alternative apps of my need. I have been making my mind about complete switch but few of the most used apps from Mac holds me back. I wish someone can suggest me a decent alternative to those apps. I must also add that I will lose several licenses of purchased apps in the process but I am willing to make that sacrifice. I wish I could find a reliable way to keep running those apps in VM.

driverdan 10y ago

Every few years I investigate switching back to a Linux laptop. Every time I find there are still issues. Last time it was poor GPU support (no fast switching) and buggy sleep. What issues still exist with using Linux on laptops?

pavelludiq 10y ago
It highly depends on the laptop you're talking about specifically. Some will just work, others will steal your soul with frustration. I've had very few issues on my thinkpad x240 with Kubuntu. It's an older model, but back when it was less than a year old I still had very few issues with it. Mostly with the touchpad, but that particular model is horrible even with good drivers, so I don't use it in general. I had to fiddle with some bearded parts when I wanted my battery to only charge to 70%, rather than keep a full charge while plugged in as the lenovo bits are windows only(I vaguely remember having to set up shell scripts of some sort). Bluetooth didn't work in the beginning, but upgrading to a newer Kubuntu fixed that, and I don't use that very often either, so I didn't mind. Also generally battery life is slightly worse than windows but this also varies. And although Windows 10 is a fairly snappy, it spins my fans much more than Kubuntu does. The last computer I had significant hardware problems with on linux had a Pentium 4, but I've been vary careful with hardware choice in the last decade. Do your research and you'll be fine.
kbart 10y ago
"What issues still exist with using Linux on laptops?" It depends on laptop model, some are worse than others. Just google "<latop_name> linux problem" and see what others encounter. Personally, I don't have any problems with my 5 years old Dell laptop running Kubuntu.
2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
My pet peeve with Linux: Wifi. I have a HP laptop for work running Ubuntu that appears on their Certified hardware list. Wifi is buggy, using an external monitor is buggy, there are always "Internal Errors", sleep simply does not work, it crashes regularly.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

Shivetya 10y ago

So I am clueless here, how does swapping the OS rectify any issues people had with machine pricing or lack of desired new hardware features? I don't get the angst. To me the disappointment is wholly related to the action bar/etc/whatever it is called. Its such a lame approach to adding additional functionality I would have never expected it from Apple. The Windows environment has many machines fully embracing touch screens right where the action is.

vsh 10y ago

Vultures ;-)

simonhorlick 10y ago

It's great timing for elementary. I'm having a lot of software problems with the Mac, and since I develop exclusively for Linux it seems like it'd be a lot easier if I could build and run everything on my target platform.

matzipan 10y ago
The elementary community would love feedback on how to solve pains with mac. There's a subreddit or you could post bug reports on launchpad.
- simonhorlick 10y ago
  No - Linux runs great, it's macOS I'm having issues with!

haffla 10y ago

I find Apricity OS (Arch Linux) much better suited for developers. In fact at work I switched from Ubuntu to Apricity. Through yaourt (paceman frontend) and AUR (Arch User Repository) it's a breeze to install the latest versions of literally everything you need be it Docker, Java or IntelliJ. I think it's comparable with brew. Plus Apricity looks so much better than Elementary in my opinion and almost manages to give you that macOS feeling.

jjuel 10y ago
Oh Apricity looks really nice. Might have to check that one out. Love Arch way more than Deb based distros.
fizzbatter 10y ago
That is pretty! I may have to give this a try when the time comes. By far the best looking Linux GUI i've seen yet. I can't wait to see an a GUI layer made for NixOS though. I really want to be done with stateful OSs, NixOS is so tempting.
- BoorishBears 10y ago
  From a previous discussion of Apricity: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11421395 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11421395
vladimir-y 10y ago
Why not Manjaro? Does Apricity ship Arch packages passed through the its own repositories doing some testing and making sure core components are not broken and work well one with each other in the Apricity terms and in general? Manjaro does that, there is a kind of release cycle, every 1 or 2 week updates come, ie updates come not directly from the Arch repos (except AUR stuff obviously).
- adultSwim 10y ago
  (sincerely) Why Manjaro and not just straight Arch?

88e282102ae2e5b 10y ago

I would highly recommend Xubuntu instead. Aesthetically I don't think there's a better Linux distro, and it's almost to the point quality-wise where I'd recommend it to my parents.

noir_lord 10y ago

Playing with it in VirtualBox. First impressions, it's very very pretty, the design out the box is nice though it's completely the antithesis of how I work (3 screens, panel on each, window buttons only for windows on that screen). The level of integration is nice, it feels cohesive. That said XFCE4 with some tweaking is pretty much perfect for me, it exactly works the way I want things to work.

nsxwolf 10y ago

So USB-C is what it takes to get you to switch to Linux? What are you going to do when all other laptop manufacturers follow suit - switch back? Mac users who make this threat sound just like people who threaten to move to Canada every election cycle.

nicolas_t 10y ago
Personally, USB-C is the least of my problem. I care about having a fast, powerful laptop with 32 or 64GB ram (I run a lot of VMs for my work, I could offload it to the cloud but then it's more of a hassle). I complain because Apple decided to make the macbook pro 15 inch lighter and thinner resulting in 25% less battery (going from 99.5 watt-hour to 76.0-watt-hour), this means that they have to make more compromises to keep a good battery life and instead of having a decent graphic card like the nvidia gtx 1080 or 32GB ram, the new macbook pros are underpowered. Since, apple is unlikely to decide to go back to the previous form factor, they are unlikely to ever sell a laptop with decent performances compared to their competitors. And to add insult to the injury, switching to usb-c forces users (at least for a year or two) to carry a lot of extra adapters which makes the weight loss moot.
- snowwrestler 10y ago
  > Since, apple is unlikely to decide to go back to the previous form factor, they are unlikely to ever sell a laptop with decent performances compared to their competitors. Once the next generation of Intel processors land, I bet we'll see Macbook Pros with faster processors and 32GB or more of RAM. At that point they will catch up to their competitors. But it's important to remember who Apple considers their competitors. They've never competed on the cheap end--everyone knows that--but they've also never competed on the high-power end. For at least the past 8 years it's been possible to buy laptops that deliver more horsepower than a Macbook Pro, by caring less about size, weight, and battery life. I think that will always be true.
  - nicolas_t 10y ago
    It's true, but I don't remember having ever seen such a big gap in term of performance (or at least since apple switched to intel). The macbook pro 17 inch used to be not bad when compared to competitors.

throwsincenotpc 10y ago

They need to watch out because apparently the Gnome foundation wants to ditch Vala for Rust to cut cost and "attract more developers" : https://siliconislandblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/31/thoughts-on-dx-gnome-and-rust/ https://siliconislandblog.wordpress.com/2016/10/31/thoughts-... > and support a preferred programming language (Vala) https://launchpad.net/elementary https://launchpad.net/elementary

pmlnr 10y ago
Gnome foundation: when you finally gain traction, you press reset, bravo.
- throwsincenotpc 10y ago
  lol right, I expect them to move to QT anyway ... /s
matzipan 10y ago
I agree with the article. Vala is a wonderful language, but it doesn't have the necessary tooling built around it.
- throwsincenotpc 10y ago
  > I agree with the article. Vala is a wonderful language, but it doesn't have the necessary tooling built around it. Sure but they had like 10 years to do that, I remember a french guy who ever wrote a complete IDE with autocompletition + package manager for Vala on Windows. Support from the Gnome Foundation ? zip . Oh, and I even found the link. http://www.tarnyko.net/en/?q=node/24 http://www.tarnyko.net/en/?q=node/24 So the tooling my ass, they just don't want to bother with Vala
  - matzipan 10y ago
    No, I'm talking about gdb support, for example. I'm talking for a testing framework (right now you have to write your own build process capable of bundling the unit tests with your source).

bluedino 10y ago

Are there any distributions where the display scaling works at least as good as Windows 10? I don't expect it to be as perfect as the Mac but the current Ubuntu is a mess when you change the scaling factor.

matzipan 10y ago
elementary should automatically handle your hidpi quite well.
- philbot1008 10y ago
  source?
  - matzipan 10y ago
    I'm part of the community. I have seen alot of work being put into making hidpi work properly. I can't find any changelog mentions though :( Here's a community post: https://www.reddit.com/r/elementaryos/comments/53gkr1/elementary_os_loki_hidpi_experience_and_tips/ https://www.reddit.com/r/elementaryos/comments/53gkr1/elemen... And some hidpi icon work: http://blog.elementary.io/post/124193007916/whats-up-with-hidpi-icons http://blog.elementary.io/post/124193007916/whats-up-with-hi...
    - matzipan 10y ago
      Found it: https://blueprints.launchpad.net/elementaryos/+spec/hidpi-support https://blueprints.launchpad.net/elementaryos/+spec/hidpi-su...

bluepill 10y ago

Why do macOS users seem to want to migrate to elementary? I mean why elementary as your choice for a Linux distro?

natch 10y ago
They don't... my take is it's just a fiction made up by someone trying to promote a distro.
- bluepill 10y ago
  thanks for the clarification.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
Semiapies 10y ago
There's interest because of a recent, popular post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12830761 As to how many people really are migrating, who knows. I'm an Apple user, but I'm not going to take the rabid fanboy position that these distro makers must be lying when they say they've noticed more interest, lately.

fnl 10y ago

I try Ubuntu about once a year, in the hopes of getting rid of OSX. But each time, the reason for going back to Apple ID is interoperability: Try dragging stuff (images, fotos, links, files, formatted text ...) from one program to another, including the "dreaded" Finder; Works nearly always in OSX. While Ubuntu has come a long way with these things, I think it's still an even longer way away from what OSX can do. So while I haven't tried Elementary, I'd be astonished if it's any better at interoperability than Ubuntu...

epmaybe 10y ago
My biggest gripe with OS X right now is that Safari doesn't play nice with some website when it comes to dragging pictures and pasting them in from the clipboard.
- jansenv 10y ago
  I also can't stand the lack of plugin support on Safari. Is uBlock origin or similar available on that platform yet?
  - mrcarrot 10y ago
    There are adblocking plugins available now, yes. Though last time I checked uBlock Origin wasn't one of them, unfortunately.
  - jungturk 10y ago
    https://safari-extensions.apple.com https://safari-extensions.apple.com
  - Rebelgecko 10y ago
    uBlock is available for Safari, but uBlock Origin is not.
- wyager 10y ago
  Part of this is sites like Facebook intentionally subverting proper click and drag behavior with photos, links, etc. It's incredibly annoying, and we should be shaming sites that do it.

aibottle 10y ago

Do people realize they can run Linux on their Macbooks? Who needs elementary, just install Debian.

pmlnr 10y ago
It takes time to get the mentality; took me years as well. The shiny & pretty, especially if you're coming from the shiny & pretty, seems better and you forget to appreciate the things that silently just work in the background. I've recently switched from the previous elementary (due to bugs and missing features) first to Mint 18 Cinnamon, just to find a lot of bugs there are well ( at least no missing features ), then to XFCE. I'm slowly building an itch towards where most distros are moving to (being swallowed up by systemd), so XFCE: to get familiar with something that is truly portable, and runs of BSDs as well. xfwm4 + tint2 as panel + synapse as "menu" to be specific, and I'm really happy I did it. No, it's not as nice as eOS or Gnome Shell; some apps are quite ugly and the terminal windows don't line up when tiled. But it works. It's fast, it's glitch and bug-free so far; power management flies, and it feels like I got all the good from the good ol' Gnome2 days with updates. The truth is, tint2 eliminated the need for fancy indicators: it has an executor, with which you can do (nearly) anything, like displaying weather, cpu temperature, fan speed, changing governors with clicks, etc. So, as I started: it takes a lot of frustration, but eventually, you'll get to the point of install the most simple, most robust thing.
sndean 10y ago
Last year I found that trying to use rEFInd (keeping OS X on the Macbook) was really painful, so I quit. Is the experience a lot better if it's just Debian alone?
cuddlybacon 10y ago
It's the hardware that is making people look at jumping (back) to Linux.

vladimir-y 10y ago

I think for those who are not able to install and configure Linux manually from scratch not using a graphical installer would be better to use Windows 10 (not a bad OS), with no irony. Since such kind of articles and "simplified" systems like that "elementary OS" do hide Linux complexity. One day user will face a really serious OS issues and will stuck with that not knowing what to do (for example not bootable system after the update, it's not so likely, but might happen with Linux).

reitanqild 10y ago
Plain wrong IMO. Have been using Linux professionally and on my personal machines on and off for 15 years, sonce I was a student. A bit more work than Windows in some ways, less in others. I came to Ubuntu back in 2005ish based on a tip from a then 50 year old electrical engineer who had fallen in love. My bus driver this morning loves it (we sometimes talk while waiting). So stop spreading this FUD. And this comes from someone who has started liking Windows UX lately.
- vladimir-y 10y ago
  You didn't get a point of my message. But I'm not going to keep explaining conversation with a person who is writing to me to stop expressing my own opinion which is backed by some experience, you better keep chatting with your bus driver.
  - reitanqild 10y ago
    I think I got your point. It doesn't seem like you got mine: Lots of people - including people who aren't pro users - have been using Linux happily for years. Post like yours are likely to discourage people from even trying, which is why I try to correct what I see as misinformation. You are free to explain why I am wrong instead of starting to pick on the anecdote.
Grishnakh 10y ago
A typical Windows user is going to have no clue what to do if they have a serious OS issue too.

Exuma 10y ago

Honestly, this looks abysmal. This is like 1/1000th of the complexity and flexibility of macOS. What are you actually so upset about that warrants building a new, hideous, kiddy-version of mac OS?

matzipan 10y ago
You clearly haven't tried neither elementary nor Linux in general. There are many legitimate reasons why you might want to use elementary just as well as there are many legitimate reasons why you might want to use macOS. You're condemning diversity? To each their own.

yalogin 10y ago

What exactly is the reason to switch to another OS? I thought the complaints were about hardware. How the hell is elementary OS going to make the hardware better? Also can someone tell me the main complaint about the hardware, is it the USB-C and the sd card?

reitanqild 10y ago
It can run on non-Apple hardware.

matzipan 10y ago

I think one needs to also highlight the differences. mac OS is built by one major player and they have a clear direction of where they want to take this. Linux, in general, is built by communities of people who may or may not have diverging opinions, priorities and interests. While this gives you a lot diversity, it can be quite problematic. The financial aspect is also important. elementary LLC itself, has only 2 full-time employees, while Apple is sitting on a pile of cash. Yes, elementary builds on a solid open-source base [1] built by thousands of developers world-wide, some volunteers, some employees, but it's still a significant difference. Having a smaller scale, it means elementary can be more agile in its changes. This also means that there is smaller testing base, which means there will be more bugs. The nice part is that, when you find a bug, you can help fix it [2]. [1] https://elementary.io/open-source https://elementary.io/open-source [2] https://elementary.io/get-involved https://elementary.io/get-involved

natch 10y ago

Please don't be so gullible, folks! When you see an article marketing a product, and they claim people are looking to switch to their product in droves, take it with a grain of salt! This is purely a promotional article, pretending to be a help article. Look at the unattributed quotes it uses. Pretty sure the part about anybody switching from anything to anything is made up. Sure people switch sometimes. Sure people are complaining about Apple products, what else is new? Way to capitalize on our sincere discussions of platform choices. If HN swallows this kind of marketing-masquerading-as-technical-advice article so easily, we're going to see a lot more of this writing pattern in the future. Which means more marketing noise. Please don't buy it so readily.

Semiapies 10y ago
Do you really think HN readers are so gullible as to not realize this, and that you are the only one to catch on?
- natch 10y ago
  I would never think that. But I was taken aback by many of the comments on this thread.
  - Semiapies 10y ago
    Which, the angry griping about how the distro makers want money, or the yammering about how Photoshop users should just cowboy up and submit patches to Gimp until they find it usable? As far as I can tell, the "gullibility" you think you're seeing is anyone responding in any way, even skeptically, that's not just covering their ears and going, "La la la, I can't hear your marketing!"
- Semiapies 10y ago
  Apparently, some readers do think exactly this of all other HN readers...
Klarbichu 10y ago
I'm not sure what the problem is. It's an interesting link to an interesting article about an interesting operating system. Perhaps you don't find it interesting, but as a developer, I like it.

jordache 10y ago

I would rather use BeOS

KKKKkkkk1 10y ago

The elephant in the room is that Elementary is infringing on Apple's copyright by imitating macOS design. Linux has great desktop environments (Unity, KDE, Gnome). Elementary's claim to fame is that it has good design (wink). If stealing others' GPL-licensed code is wrong, then so is this.

gvb 10y ago
You are confusing copyright[1] (covers written works, such as source code) with design patents[2] (covers look and feel). If Elementary is infringing on Apple's patents, that would be wrong. A cursory search of OSX design patents[3] turns up the Dock patent[4]. Whether Elementary infringes the patent is a legal matter (IANAL). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_patent [3] https://www.google.com/search?q=design+patent+osx&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=design+patent+osx&ie=utf-8&o... [4] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7,434,177.PN.&OS=PN/7,434,177&RS=PN/7,434,177 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=H...:

Jtsummers 10y ago

What's the gain of Elementary over other Linux distros? Is it really that much better than the start of the art anywhere else? Do the apps integrate, in some meaningful way, more easily with each other than with, say, a stock Gnome install on top of Red Hat? Is it as novel as Etoile? Or is it just a skin + conforming apps?

jjuel 10y ago

I am sticking with Mac because it just works. I have had quite a few non-Mac laptops previously. They rarely stay in good working condition for more than a couple of years. I currently have the late 2012 13" retina Pro and it has shown no signs of stopping. The only other one that has the sort of quality I see in a MacBook is Dell's XPS. The developer edition has me intrigued, but I really think this new MacBook with a Touchbar is going to be the future. The lack of ESC or function keys has no bearing on my development so that isn't an issue for me either.

matthewking 10y ago
I think the keyboard is tipping me over the edge on the new MacBook Pro's, its horrendous. There's no travel at all, the keys just immediately click. Interested to see what other people think about them as they start getting their hands on the new models, as a developer this is a very important aspect, and on top of the unwanted touchbar, the massive price hike, the lack of standard ports etc its all just a bit too much this time around.
- todd8 10y ago
  I typing this on my coffeeshop computer, a 12" MacBook, with the butterfly keys. I don't like them very much; my four year old MacBookPro Retina has much nicer keys and so does my Apple Magic Keyboard on my desktop system. I'm curious about the new MacBook Pro keys, they allude to second generation butterfly keys. Have you had a chance to try the newly released system's keyboard?
  - matthewking 10y ago
    Yes its the brand new keyboard that I was referring to, a friend got one from his workplace, space grey looks amazing and the larger trackpad is nice but as mentioned, keyboard is a no go. I really hope the reasoning for it wasn't to shave off a few more mm! I have the 2014 MBP so my comparison is skipping the first generation of butterfly keyboard that you mentioned, I've been told that its worse than that one too but I can't say myself.

throw2016 10y ago

I regularly use Windows, OSX and Linux and I think Ubuntu Unity in 16.04 is by far the most polished Linux desktop and for people switching to Linux that would be the best first experience. In many ways I even prefer Unity. OSX is becoming a bit stagnant and bloated of late. The Unity UI is fast, the effects are polished and not gimmicky, the launcher and search across apps and file is near instantaneous, driver detection and configuration is streamlined and everything looks well put together. Most Linux users have put up with some pretty awful apps, UIs and configs over the evolution of Linux and I am glad how far Ubuntu has come. Elementary is decent but at the moment both Gnome and Unity have moved ahead and offer a more consistent and professional user experience for first timers.

veidr 10y ago

My own burning hatred towards Apple runs a little hotter than most, and I have been seriously googling (and trying) alternatives since 2012. That was when my $9000 Mac Pro — which had been a great machine, and still was, except for the little detail about not having been updated since 2009 and thus being stuck with USB 2 (!!!) to say nothing of Thunderbolt and any kind of modern accoutrements — started to feel like a personal affront, a sneering fuck you directed at not just me, but everybody remotely like me. (Wow!!! Déjà vu bro!!) Nevertheless, I didn't switch then, and all of us complainers won't switch now either. Because the fucking OS. I've tried every iteration of Ubuttnu, CentOS, and FreeBSD since. Even OpenWhatever, before the goblins bought it. I have Thinkpads and Dell XPS "Developer Editions" and a drawer full of other crap like that. Executive summary: it's all garbage time. It's like going back 10+ years. Nothing works right, on any of them. Copy/paste, batteries, wireless networking, drag and drop, high-res displays, multilingual input, even like fucking word processing and email and image editors and terminal programs... it's all like Mac OS X Jaguar level. We can't give Apple the finger, even though we want to (and definitely after last week, we all want to) because there literally isn't an OS in the world that can touch Mac OS for general-purpose workstation/laptop use. (For niche and limited-purpose, yes, there are options.) Elementary OS is a fucking joke. Every OS mentioned disparagingly above is a better choice for almost any purpose. But those are still horrible. Apple's OS advantage is what lets them say "Fuck you peons, here's some 3 year old technology and a bag of dongles, that'll be $4000." But we're mostly all gonna buy the new shitty MacBook Hipster, or gut it out with our old ones, until a better fucking OS happens. And that won't be soon — it's not even remotely on the horizon.

tempodox 10y ago
I suspect the political-correctness dogs around here might bark at your wording, but I still think you've nailed it.
highace 10y ago
Windows? It's really not that bad.
- javajosh 10y ago

buckbova 10y ago

I currently use xfce[1] with docky[2] and it feels pretty good. Probably not as polished but I know it's stable. There were other distros in the past trying to copy macOS, pear os[3] was one of them. I remember Lindows[4] trying to market itself as a windows replacement. I can't believe they got sued and actually lost[5]! Xandros[6] was also in this space. They probably went BK. Every year is the year of Linux for the desktop but it's really not possible to capture this market. It'll have to come from someone like google. Why couldn't chrome os have been a legit linux distro instead of trying for a niche netbook market with a locked down OS? [1] http://xfce.org/ http://xfce.org/ [2] http://wiki.go-docky.com/index.php?title=Welcome_to_the_Docky_wiki http://wiki.go-docky.com/index.php?title=Welcome_to_the_Dock... [3] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=pear http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=pear [4] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=linspire http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=linspire [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Lindows.com,_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Lindows.com.... [6] http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=xandros http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=xandros

cooper12 10y ago
Wait from the article on Windows, it actually claims the opposite, saying that the court rejected Microsoft's claims and that it later settled with Lindows, paying for their trademark.
- buckbova 10y ago
  You're totally right. I guess I just mis-remembered it expecting the name change meant they lost.

nyxtom 10y ago

Still need to get better facetimehd support.

jezfromfuture 10y ago

Elementary doesn't seem to play nice with enterprise wpa2 wireless networks so I went back to OS X again

throwanem 10y ago

No Spotlight?

aoeuhtns 10y ago

Going by the comments here, I am surprised by how few people seem to use Linux on their laptop! Maybe selection bias due to the thread topic? Of course, not everything will work, but for me, they often fall into the nice-to-have category of features, not a must-have. Maybe my preferences are not shared widely. Been using Debian unstable and Xmonad for a long time, and it's hard to try and use anything else now. Most dev tools work natively ... no funky VMs to emulate, except Windows for Edge browser testing ... all works really well.

NuSkooler 10y ago

I've been using Elementary OS for a few years now. THIS is the Linux desktop for me & easily replaces Windows and/or OS X with the exception of serious gaming where you're likely be be running Windows no matter what.

vondur 10y ago

Elementary is one of the least stable Linux distros that are out there. I have a friend who's been running Debian forever using Afterstep as the WM, and it's rock solid. Granted, he does most of his work in the terminal using emacs. I've never had good luck with linux on the laptop, but I've had good luck using it on the desktop, so long as I stuck with Intel chipsets and Nvidia GPU's. The lack of apps is going to be an issue for most people though.

gotofritz 10y ago

I bought a MBP a few months ago because I was travelling to the UK and the low pound made it a no brainer (I saved 350€) but part of me was annoying at missing out on the latest version that was about to be released. It looks like I dodged a bullet; in 4-5 years, when I'll need an upgrade, all these issues will be solved, USB-C will either have become standard or gone firewire's way, the pointless emoji board will be quietly shelved, more RAM will be possible, etc