Couldn't have said this better myself. I have just started working on a Mac and I love the looks, but Linux is still more flexible and powerful than a Mac. apt-get is too hard to beat. Hopefully, in the near term when compiz matures well, we will get beautiful looking software on Linux also. (It's hard to beat Apple with the beauty of its hardware.)
Re:The REAL reason we use Linux
by ichverstehe on Saturday March 15, 2008 @08:35PM
(#137811)
Welcome to the amazing world of OS X. Try MacPorts. Beats the hell out of Fink.
I am still using Debian on my second computer and on my servers, though.
Hm. I tried it out, but it looks like it does not install binaries directly? I am not much of a fan of the gentoo-esque compiling; mostly because it does not help me "get things done" quickly. I am waiting forever for the ports to compile now.
Edit: and now it has failed saying some checksum mismatch for a dependency. That's what I miss about apt-get: in my two years of experience with it, it has never - not once - failed. How does one beat that?
Re:The REAL reason we use Linux
by ichverstehe on Saturday March 15, 2008 @10:44PM
(#137899)
MacPorts is more inspired of BSD-style ports than Gentoo, I think. Had problems with both, though.
I have a feeling that all of these reasons are the effect, and all of the reasons in the article are the cause. That is, hacker software is developed for linux first because it's those idealistic 18-year-olds developing it. More generally, your other points point to perfectionism and passion, two things the people who do things "for fun" generally have in greater supply.
Re:The REAL reason we use Linux
by kajecounterhack on Saturday March 15, 2008 @10:52PM
(#137906)
I agree. Also, I use linux because Compiz-Fusion Effects > Vista Flip3D.
- All hacker's software is developed for Linux first, and then ported to other platforms later.
- GNU tools, proper command line, various file systems.
- Linux window management beats the hell out of Windows, and slightly better than Mac OS X in my opinion. Gnome is slowly shaping up into a premier desktop.
- Linux offers font rendering that is vastly superior to Microsoft's and Apple's despite their stupid patents. This is a matter of taste, of course, but you can tweak it to render exactly what you prefer. Windows is unusable on high-DPI LCDs.
- There is more software for Linux. Yes, in absolute numbers Windows probably wins, but if you account for junkware, Linux wins easily.
- It is easier to install and remove software on Linux, especially on Debian-based distros.
- There are many Linuxes. If Canonical/Ubuntu start driving me crazy I can always go back to Debian.
Mac OS X scores many points for being a proper UNIX too, but they're more commercialialized that I can digest: too many software comanies who'd be happy to charge you for a stupid screen saver. Even TextMate is not free and not open sourced. Pathetic.