Yeah, I found it very application specific. MySql Workbench for example is a mess. 1/2 the app scales, the other 1/2 does not. The problem is that I don't want to have to spend time constantly tweaking DPI settings.
I've been using a HiDPI ThinkPad T550 for almost one and a half year with Linux. One of the greatest annoyances is having displays with varying DPI (internal HiDPI+External StdDPI), I have simply settled on dedicating the internal monitor for the browser where I have zoom set and using other monitors for everything else. Whereas this just work on macOS, resolution independence with various DPI monitors is a great experience with no headaches.
Another thing is if you lug your computer around a lot, I often go from one 3-monitor setup at work to another at home however this always messes up my window placement and I haven't seem to found any DE/WM which handles this cleanly in a convenient way even near the experience on macOS.
This experience have made me realise that even though Linux is workable as a developer OS today it is nowhere near as convenient and seamless as macOS.
> Another thing is if you lug your computer around a lot, I often go from one 3-monitor setup at work to another at home however this always messes up my window placement and I haven't seem to found any DE/WM which handles this cleanly in a convenient way even near the experience on macOS.
Have you tried a tiling WM like i3? If you unplug and replug monitors you're just changing what workspaces are displayed where. The experience is identical if you have one or many monitors.
It seems that if you have a GTK3 desktop (I've tried elementaryOS, GNOME 3 apparently works well as well) most of the developer related things will work well at 2.0 scale - like Mac does it. At least I've tested out Sublime Text, Chrome, Terminal apps, GVim and other included GTK3 apps.