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I have been a Mac user since the classic mac days. I waited in line for the first iPhone. macOS/iOS 26 are bad enough that I've begun switching to Linux. I pre

I have been a Mac user since the classic mac days. I waited in line for the first iPhone. macOS/iOS 26 are bad enough that I've begun switching to Linux. I preordered a Clicks Communicator and Pebble Round 2. Switching from a Macbook Pro M4 to an Asus ROG Flow Z13 with Debian. macOS 26.3 updated clang and broke my emscripten workflow. I tried to unrar a file but the version of unrar provided in homebrew is deprecated because it's no longer signed/blessed. I ended up SFTPing the file to a Linux box, extracting, and bringing it back. My son wanted to try a Java minecraft app on his iPhone, but it required insane workarounds to enable JIT to get acceptable performance. This isn't a technical limitation, it's put in place specifically to protect Apple's walled garden, and their precious services revenue. Despite the thousands of dollars spent on these devices, I don't feel like we own them. We can't run code without the platform owner's permission. We are at the mercy of the platform owner, that has been making increasingly worse decisions. I'm really enjoying trying the available alternatives. My hope is that enough of us get fed up, and develop a thriving ecosystem in the open source world. I'll certainly be contributing back the things I build.

pjmlp 7mo ago
I used to be on Year of Linux Desktop camp a few years ago with M$ on my email signatures and all, nowadays I rather take Windows and macOS, leaving GNU/Linux for Raspberry PI and servers, even with all the ongoing warts than the endless count of distros on Distrowatch, there is always that pain point that takes weekends to sort out, e.g. having a BRIX UEFI booting the desired distro, like I had to last year. > My son wanted to try a Java minecraft app on his iPhone, but it required insane workarounds to enable JIT to get acceptable performance. This isn't a technical limitation, it's put in place specifically to protect Apple's walled garden, and their precious services revenue. This would also not work properly in Android, because it is Android Java, not standard Java.
- 7jjjjjjj 7mo ago
  The Minecraft JE launchers for android don't use Android's JVM, they include a version of OpenJDK and that's what's used to run the game.
  - pjmlp 7mo ago
    Exactly because Android Java isn't Java proper, it is Google's J++. Even after they dumped Apache Harmony for OpenJDK, they only cherry pick what they feel like from OpenJDK, relatively easy to check, comparing the AOSP source code with OpenJDK. Then there is the whole history of what ART can do, versus the native JVM bytecodes, where some features are lost in translation, e.g. lambdas aren't nested classes, they make use of invokedynamic. Additionally they are in no hurries to update Java baseline version, other than when Kotlin starts losing access to more recent Java libraries at Maven Central.
flohofwoe 7mo ago
> macOS 26.3 updated clang and broke my emscripten workflow. This is actually strange since Emscripten comes with its own Clang toolchain and shouldn't use anything from the system's toolchain (I'm also on 26.3 and haven't seen any behaviour changes in my dev setup). FWIW, I'm also not a fan of the UI changes in Tahoe, but I mostly just move between the terminal (via Ghostty), VSCode and Chrome, so for the most part I'm blissfully unaware of the UI wreckage ;)
ElijahLynn 7mo ago
Gonna say that the switch from X11 to Wayland that was pretty much forced this year across many distributions, broke a ton of things too (screenshot programs, keyboard shortcuts), however, all the code is open source, and there are workarounds and source code available but it still sucks. Basic keyboard shortcuts are still broke with the Wayland migration. e.g. Copyq has this janky workaround for a shortcut to register with the xdg-portal (that works until reboot, then stops), Warp terminal claims there is no support, Flameshot was impossible to configure, have to use the built in Gnome shortcut tool now. The whole ecosystem got wrecked. I have been so irritated by this that I've been considering switching TO the mac ecosystem, BUT this thread is good on my eyes and makes me disinterested now.
- lioeters 7mo ago
  > been considering switching TO the mac As a previous Mac(intosh) user of many years, before you switch back, I'd recommend trying Pop OS and its new COSMIC desktop env based on Wayland. It's still has some rough edges, not as polished as macOS was, but free from Apple's enshittification, and free in terms of open source. It's everything I wished Macintosh would have matured into, but that ship has sailed years ago. Some people run NixOS with COSMIC DE, I'm considering that for my next machine. Also, Pop OS is based on Ubuntu, which you might also try. I've installed it for several non-technical friends and family, and they haven't had a single issue with it, migrating from Windows or Mac.
  - freetonik 7mo ago
    Another alternative is ElementaryOS, with its desktop environment resembling macOS.
- benoau 7mo ago
  It's been a very frustrating year, I made the mistake of upgrading Pop OS 22.04 that I'd been using for years that was a rough couple of weeks! Toshy still works to give me Mac keyboard shortcuts I might never let go of, but I still haven't figured out the keyboard shortcut to switch between open instances of the same program which drives me insane!
- 7mo ago
stockresearcher 7mo ago
From an outsider just going by what you wrote: you are trading a $2000+ year-old computer for a new $2000+ computer because you are annoyed about some temporary problems (yes, they are temporary). Apple marketers are just going to think that in another year you’re going to get annoyed by some Linux thing (yes, there will be something annoying) and buy a brand new $2000+ Mac. These kind of posts get a lot of upvotes, but they do nothing to change corporate behavior.
- sivers 7mo ago
  No, the difference is trajectory and trust. We all predict the future, consciously or not. We invest our time and effort into a system that we think has a good future. Tahoe made me lose trust in Apple's software, and see its trajectory as a bad one that I didn't want to invest any more time into.
  - chipotle_coyote 7mo ago
    While I understand that, I can't help but compare this to Mac hardware rather than software. There was a years-long stretch when it seemed like they'd really seriously lost the plot: the butterfly keyboard, the Touch Bar, the "trashcan" Mac, heat issues across the line. There was a real case to be made for abandoning Macs based on hardware issues alone (and I'm sure some folks did, and hopefully they're happy for it). Then came Apple Silicon. And at least in my eyes, Apple hardware is the best it's been in a really long time. There are some definite trainwrecks in the current state of Liquid Glass (especially on the Mac), and there have been other dubious choices and mounting bugs made over the last few years. But I've used both Windows 11 and a recent Linux distribution (Fedora, via Asahi Linux, running KDE Plasma), and while I like the latter it's just not enough to make me give up what I like on the Mac in terms of Mac-only applications and little life-bettering affordances I've internalized over the years I've been here. Yes, if the trajectory they're on now in software continues, I'll have to re-evaluate that -- but their hardware took a real turn for the better after Jony Ive and some of his deputies left. Alan Dye and some of his deputies left earlier this year, and I'm not going to count the new team out before giving them a chance to prove themselves.
sivers 7mo ago
“I don't feel like we own them.” ← Well-put! I was 100% Apple: Mac Mini on the desktop, Macbook Air laptop, iPhone, and two iPads. Then came Tahoe. I hated it so badly and it wouldn't let me change the things I hated. I noticed a subtle sneer as I worked, having to use this stupid computer that wouldn't let me adjust it to my liking anymore. Then I noticed I wasn't working as much as I used to because I just viscerally hated having to work in that Tahoe environment. At first I did the thing of erasing the entire computer and doing a USB install just go back to the previous. But then like you said: “I don't feel like we own them.” I didn't trust Apple to not keep making it worse. So I switched. Got a Linux desktop, and a Framework laptop. Sooooo nice!! Snappy-fast Linux just the way I want it. While I was at it, got my first Android phone and installed GrapheneOS on Google Pixel. Sooooo nice! So quiet, doing only what I want. Even got my first Android tablet to replace the iPad. (OnePlus Pad 3.) It's great too. I'm loving the whole Android ecosystem, when made nerdy like Linux. So yeah I'm 100% off Apple now and will never go back. That's how bad Tahoe is.
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
- wilkystyle 7mo ago
  I am currently all-in on the Apple ecosystem and have been for almost 13 years now. But quality of life in Apple land has steadily been getting worse, so I have been considering making the sort of change you describe, but not quite ready to make that leap yet. What would you say was the hardest part of the transition for you?
  - port11 7mo ago
    I’m firmly anti-Tahoe and haven’t updated, and I’ve started to find Apple despicable. But… Anyone saying they had no trouble migrating away is either lying or delusional. Just off the top of my head: external accessory issues when Linux wakes up from sleep; trackpad quality; battery life; full-disk encryption is still spotty if you, for example, want to use ZFS; boot-level security can be a nightmare to setup (although Evil Maids aren’t a concern for me); systemd things that don’t work and don’t report they’re not working; inconsistent shortcuts for basic things. Man, I like the ideals behind BSD and Linux, but we gotta stop pretending that basic UX stuff is done and fixed, when we know perfectly well that it’s been broken for a decade (running Linux servers or desktop-on-the-side since 2015).
Erlangen 7mo ago
I delayed upgrade to IPadOS 26.3 til reddit users shared on /r/ipad that its performance was on par with older version now. However, once I upgrade, the performance issues and bugs are noticeable instantly. For example, 1. switching between different browser tabs has a sub-second delay(est 200ms) 2. a tab in system settings menu takes 200ms to load 3. maximizing a video doesn't always work(sometimes it leaves a big white space on top) 4. double tabbing a keyboard key often triggers zooming into the browser page I couldn't believe these issues haven't been fixed after 3 subversions.
dotancohen 7mo ago
> Clicks Communicator Thank you for introducing me to this! If the keyboard is suitable for Hebrew input I will pursue this. I've tried all manner of external and on screen keyboards, but this looks like it might be a winner.
thomk 7mo ago
How did you solve the Minecraft issue?
- mrbuttons454 7mo ago
  He found a sideloadable JIT server + VPN setup. It seems super sketchy honestly, and it's a shame that people have to go through this to enable a feature that should just be available. There is no legitimate reason to block access to JIT.
  - ranger_danger 7mo ago
    > There is no legitimate reason to block access to JIT. Source:
    - mrbuttons454 7mo ago
      Show me the reasons why you can't safely deploy JIT. If it's a security concern, properly sandbox it.
hedgehog 7mo ago
Mac user since the 90s, 10.14 Mojave seemed like the last release I liked and where the apps I used still worked correctly (or at all). Ironically Apple has already broken most of the apps I cared about, and for the rest LLM tools give enough leverage that I may be able to cobble together replacements for the rest.
thepryz 7mo ago
I'm with you here. Mac user since my father brought home a Mac SE, even briefly worked for Apple. Every new version of Mac OS is worse. Basic things like Finder or Disk Utility are barely usable to say nothing of the poor UX decisions.

pjmlp 7mo ago

I used to be on Year of Linux Desktop camp a few years ago with M$ on my email signatures and all, nowadays I rather take Windows and macOS, leaving GNU/Linux for Raspberry PI and servers, even with all the ongoing warts than the endless count of distros on Distrowatch, there is always that pain point that takes weekends to sort out, e.g. having a BRIX UEFI booting the desired distro, like I had to last year. > My son wanted to try a Java minecraft app on his iPhone, but it required insane workarounds to enable JIT to get acceptable performance. This isn't a technical limitation, it's put in place specifically to protect Apple's walled garden, and their precious services revenue. This would also not work properly in Android, because it is Android Java, not standard Java.

7jjjjjjj 7mo ago
The Minecraft JE launchers for android don't use Android's JVM, they include a version of OpenJDK and that's what's used to run the game.
- pjmlp 7mo ago
  Exactly because Android Java isn't Java proper, it is Google's J++. Even after they dumped Apache Harmony for OpenJDK, they only cherry pick what they feel like from OpenJDK, relatively easy to check, comparing the AOSP source code with OpenJDK. Then there is the whole history of what ART can do, versus the native JVM bytecodes, where some features are lost in translation, e.g. lambdas aren't nested classes, they make use of invokedynamic. Additionally they are in no hurries to update Java baseline version, other than when Kotlin starts losing access to more recent Java libraries at Maven Central.

flohofwoe 7mo ago

> macOS 26.3 updated clang and broke my emscripten workflow. This is actually strange since Emscripten comes with its own Clang toolchain and shouldn't use anything from the system's toolchain (I'm also on 26.3 and haven't seen any behaviour changes in my dev setup). FWIW, I'm also not a fan of the UI changes in Tahoe, but I mostly just move between the terminal (via Ghostty), VSCode and Chrome, so for the most part I'm blissfully unaware of the UI wreckage ;)

ElijahLynn 7mo ago

Gonna say that the switch from X11 to Wayland that was pretty much forced this year across many distributions, broke a ton of things too (screenshot programs, keyboard shortcuts), however, all the code is open source, and there are workarounds and source code available but it still sucks. Basic keyboard shortcuts are still broke with the Wayland migration. e.g. Copyq has this janky workaround for a shortcut to register with the xdg-portal (that works until reboot, then stops), Warp terminal claims there is no support, Flameshot was impossible to configure, have to use the built in Gnome shortcut tool now. The whole ecosystem got wrecked. I have been so irritated by this that I've been considering switching TO the mac ecosystem, BUT this thread is good on my eyes and makes me disinterested now.

lioeters 7mo ago
> been considering switching TO the mac As a previous Mac(intosh) user of many years, before you switch back, I'd recommend trying Pop OS and its new COSMIC desktop env based on Wayland. It's still has some rough edges, not as polished as macOS was, but free from Apple's enshittification, and free in terms of open source. It's everything I wished Macintosh would have matured into, but that ship has sailed years ago. Some people run NixOS with COSMIC DE, I'm considering that for my next machine. Also, Pop OS is based on Ubuntu, which you might also try. I've installed it for several non-technical friends and family, and they haven't had a single issue with it, migrating from Windows or Mac.
- freetonik 7mo ago
  Another alternative is ElementaryOS, with its desktop environment resembling macOS.
benoau 7mo ago
It's been a very frustrating year, I made the mistake of upgrading Pop OS 22.04 that I'd been using for years that was a rough couple of weeks! Toshy still works to give me Mac keyboard shortcuts I might never let go of, but I still haven't figured out the keyboard shortcut to switch between open instances of the same program which drives me insane!
7mo ago

stockresearcher 7mo ago

From an outsider just going by what you wrote: you are trading a $2000+ year-old computer for a new $2000+ computer because you are annoyed about some temporary problems (yes, they are temporary). Apple marketers are just going to think that in another year you’re going to get annoyed by some Linux thing (yes, there will be something annoying) and buy a brand new $2000+ Mac. These kind of posts get a lot of upvotes, but they do nothing to change corporate behavior.

sivers 7mo ago
No, the difference is trajectory and trust. We all predict the future, consciously or not. We invest our time and effort into a system that we think has a good future. Tahoe made me lose trust in Apple's software, and see its trajectory as a bad one that I didn't want to invest any more time into.
- chipotle_coyote 7mo ago
  While I understand that, I can't help but compare this to Mac hardware rather than software. There was a years-long stretch when it seemed like they'd really seriously lost the plot: the butterfly keyboard, the Touch Bar, the "trashcan" Mac, heat issues across the line. There was a real case to be made for abandoning Macs based on hardware issues alone (and I'm sure some folks did, and hopefully they're happy for it). Then came Apple Silicon. And at least in my eyes, Apple hardware is the best it's been in a really long time. There are some definite trainwrecks in the current state of Liquid Glass (especially on the Mac), and there have been other dubious choices and mounting bugs made over the last few years. But I've used both Windows 11 and a recent Linux distribution (Fedora, via Asahi Linux, running KDE Plasma), and while I like the latter it's just not enough to make me give up what I like on the Mac in terms of Mac-only applications and little life-bettering affordances I've internalized over the years I've been here. Yes, if the trajectory they're on now in software continues, I'll have to re-evaluate that -- but their hardware took a real turn for the better after Jony Ive and some of his deputies left. Alan Dye and some of his deputies left earlier this year, and I'm not going to count the new team out before giving them a chance to prove themselves.

sivers 7mo ago

“I don't feel like we own them.” ← Well-put! I was 100% Apple: Mac Mini on the desktop, Macbook Air laptop, iPhone, and two iPads. Then came Tahoe. I hated it so badly and it wouldn't let me change the things I hated. I noticed a subtle sneer as I worked, having to use this stupid computer that wouldn't let me adjust it to my liking anymore. Then I noticed I wasn't working as much as I used to because I just viscerally hated having to work in that Tahoe environment. At first I did the thing of erasing the entire computer and doing a USB install just go back to the previous. But then like you said: “I don't feel like we own them.” I didn't trust Apple to not keep making it worse. So I switched. Got a Linux desktop, and a Framework laptop. Sooooo nice!! Snappy-fast Linux just the way I want it. While I was at it, got my first Android phone and installed GrapheneOS on Google Pixel. Sooooo nice! So quiet, doing only what I want. Even got my first Android tablet to replace the iPad. (OnePlus Pad 3.) It's great too. I'm loving the whole Android ecosystem, when made nerdy like Linux. So yeah I'm 100% off Apple now and will never go back. That's how bad Tahoe is.

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
wilkystyle 7mo ago
I am currently all-in on the Apple ecosystem and have been for almost 13 years now. But quality of life in Apple land has steadily been getting worse, so I have been considering making the sort of change you describe, but not quite ready to make that leap yet. What would you say was the hardest part of the transition for you?
- port11 7mo ago
  I’m firmly anti-Tahoe and haven’t updated, and I’ve started to find Apple despicable. But… Anyone saying they had no trouble migrating away is either lying or delusional. Just off the top of my head: external accessory issues when Linux wakes up from sleep; trackpad quality; battery life; full-disk encryption is still spotty if you, for example, want to use ZFS; boot-level security can be a nightmare to setup (although Evil Maids aren’t a concern for me); systemd things that don’t work and don’t report they’re not working; inconsistent shortcuts for basic things. Man, I like the ideals behind BSD and Linux, but we gotta stop pretending that basic UX stuff is done and fixed, when we know perfectly well that it’s been broken for a decade (running Linux servers or desktop-on-the-side since 2015).

Erlangen 7mo ago

I delayed upgrade to IPadOS 26.3 til reddit users shared on /r/ipad that its performance was on par with older version now. However, once I upgrade, the performance issues and bugs are noticeable instantly. For example, 1. switching between different browser tabs has a sub-second delay(est 200ms) 2. a tab in system settings menu takes 200ms to load 3. maximizing a video doesn't always work(sometimes it leaves a big white space on top) 4. double tabbing a keyboard key often triggers zooming into the browser page I couldn't believe these issues haven't been fixed after 3 subversions.

dotancohen 7mo ago

> Clicks Communicator Thank you for introducing me to this! If the keyboard is suitable for Hebrew input I will pursue this. I've tried all manner of external and on screen keyboards, but this looks like it might be a winner.

thomk 7mo ago

How did you solve the Minecraft issue?

mrbuttons454 7mo ago
He found a sideloadable JIT server + VPN setup. It seems super sketchy honestly, and it's a shame that people have to go through this to enable a feature that should just be available. There is no legitimate reason to block access to JIT.
- ranger_danger 7mo ago
  > There is no legitimate reason to block access to JIT. Source:
  - mrbuttons454 7mo ago
    Show me the reasons why you can't safely deploy JIT. If it's a security concern, properly sandbox it.

hedgehog 7mo ago

Mac user since the 90s, 10.14 Mojave seemed like the last release I liked and where the apps I used still worked correctly (or at all). Ironically Apple has already broken most of the apps I cared about, and for the rest LLM tools give enough leverage that I may be able to cobble together replacements for the rest.

thepryz 7mo ago

I'm with you here. Mac user since my father brought home a Mac SE, even briefly worked for Apple. Every new version of Mac OS is worse. Basic things like Finder or Disk Utility are barely usable to say nothing of the poor UX decisions.