People on MACs need to have 1 proprietary application that is only partially works on MACs (& Linux). So that will make the MAC people happy. On Linux I have a Windows VM in case I need to use that feature.

So it’s interesting to see a person who’s apparently neutral write it that way.

Works great, particularly for 32 bit x86 apps it's a lot faster than running Crossover.

Nowadays it‘s pretty good. I was surprised how good it is, because I remembered it from the early Windows 10 days when the performance was atrocious.

Parallels comes into play if you want your Windows VM to have GPU acceleration. If you don't care about that you can just use UTM for free to run the Windows ARM VM on your M1/M2 MacBook.

[1]: https://www.xda-developers.com/qualcomm-exclusivity-deal-mic...

> These licensing problems haven't technically stopped people from running the Arm version of Windows on other hardware, including Apple Silicon Macs

> Microsoft is formally blessing Parallels as a way to run the Professional and Enterprise versions of Windows 11 on Apple Silicon Macs

Original source: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/options-for-usin...

> Parallels® Desktop version 18 is an authorized solution

In other words, you could (unofficially) do this before, but now it's allowed according to the terms of your license.

It looks like Parallels has the same restrictions that you'd get from running Win11 ARM inside the UTM hypervisor on M1/M2 Macs (like I currently do): No WSL/WSA and no virtualization based security or sandboxes.

It does use Hyper-V if I remember correctly.

You should be able to run WSL1 inside an aarch64 windows vm however.

From what I gather from people with far more experience than me: if you need a "Linux-compliant" environment you're better-off with WSL2 than macOS.

[0]: https://github.com/lima-vm/lima

I'd willing to bet some pocket money that most people claiming that don't know what they're talking about

Unless you need, I dunno, DBUS? Or are specifically building stuff for Ubuntu/Red hat etc

Although if you have windows it also tends to run there too.

WSL2 is just running a Linux in a VM. You can do that with VirtualBox and other hypervisors. You can also spin up a Kubernetes runtime that supports Apple's Hypervisor Framework.

https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/bash shows version 5.2.15.

https://packages.ubuntu.com/kinetic/bash (well http://changelogs.ubuntu.com/changelogs/pool/main/b/bash/bas...) shows 5.2.1+debian/ubuntu patches.

From GPLv3 onwards, Apple has had to leave installation of newer versions of tools to users, legally, our publish their own proprietary IP, Stallman’s objective some would say.

That’s simply FUD. Apple seemed to be able to use GPLv2 without any consequences, and GPLv3 has all the same properties in that regard. The real reason is likely this:

https://meta.ath0.com/2012/02/05/apples-great-gpl-purge/

[…]

Anyway, the message is pretty obvious: Apple won’t ship anything that’s licensed under GPL v3 on OS X. Now, why is that?

There are two big changes in GPL v3. The first is that it explicitly prohibits patent lawsuits against people for actually using the GPL-licensed software you ship. The second is that it carefully prevents TiVoization, locking down hardware so that people can’t actually run the software they want.

So, which of those things are they planning for OS X, eh?

I’m also intrigued to see how far they are prepared to go with this. They already annoyed and inconvenienced a lot of people with the Samba and GCC removal. Having wooed so many developers to the Mac in the last decade, are they really prepared to throw away all that goodwill by shipping obsolete tools and making it a pain in the ass to upgrade them?

Possibly to your assertion, it's what we engineers were at some point internally trained by legal was the concern.

Perhaps legal decided the fiasco wasn't worth a protracted court battle, and PR digressions, and foisted the option of re-implementing missing modernized functionality on homebrew/macports, on purpose?

If Apple merely wanted to save on work and dump it all on third-party ports, why not remove packages outright or, for a period of time, make them available as official add-ons? Why, in that case, keep ancient versions as part of the OS? Why remove something as widely used as Samba, which as I recall garnered some criticism at the time? It seems likely to me that Apple has some other reason than that to remove all GPL-licensed packages.

I'm also a Rails dev and I do all my dev work on an M1 mac and don't even have Docker installed, though I've heard it has improved a lot recently.

> is windows better?

In terms of UI yes, provided you don't need a functioning search feature. Windows 10 also finally added support for virtual desktops and scrolling in unfocused windows. Though unfortunately Windows 10 was such an unpleasant experience for me overall that I don't see myself using it in the foreseeable future.

Microsoft even have PowerToys for free to improve your already good experience.

> to improve your already good experience.

The whole reason I stopped using Windows 10 is because it was not a good experience, to put it very mildly. But I likely was an untypically bad case, judging from Windows still being on the market.

Snap/Windows Management in macOS is a pain.

Using Brew as a package manager isn't exactly a wonderful experience.

The taskbar feels pretty ugly and dated - that little dot, and then having both the top and bottom bar in play just feels outdated.

Even having to use Parallels is a bit of a pain - build a hypervisor into the OS.

I'm the furthest thing from a designer, and I understand that Apple went with a different UI paradigm. It's just starting to feel a bit left behind. It's still my daily driver though.

This is because most of MS designers are using Macs.

Even the version of Spaces from OS X 10.5 Leopard (circa 2007) is better, and various *nix DEs had better virtual desktops since the mid-late 90s onward. That makes Windows harder to use for me than lack of snapping on macOS does, particularly with how Windows makes me feel like I need to maximize most windows which drives a greater need for good virtual desktops.

As for PSH: use fish and don't look back. :)

Could you elaborate?

  brew install --cask powershell

The last thing that can be said about Windows is consistency

https://ntdotdev.wordpress.com/2021/02/06/state-of-the-windo...

https://i.imgur.com/fMC5ayA.png

But so is current versions of bash, csh, sh, zsh, fish, etc etc ad infinitum in Macports.

Windows Subsystem for Linux for native linux CLI. I've appreciated Mac being Unix-like, but the small differences end up being quite annoying. Much nicer to use an environment that's close to 1:1 with your servers

Personally I use a Mac for the hardware, and that's about it.

Mac is a Unix. Darwin is a BSD. It has its own PID1, launchctl, instead of systemd.

It's not* a Linux-like (Kernel ABI is different) but if you work with Macports, you can make your userspace a clone of Linux. There's very little that I can't get for Macports that is on Linux (not GUI stuff).

You can get plenty of the equivalent "native linux CLI". Macports for native, lima or minikube to run linux containers. Virtualbox et al for running linux VMs.

This is a personal anecdote, but I also feel like the quality and robustness of Mac OS has declined compared to the direction of Windows or Linux over the last few OS upgrades.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windowsins...

As for full-blown Visual Studio, there is an ARM version now with most (but not all) workloads available. YMMV if you rely on those unavailable workloads or if you have x86/x64 DLLs in your project, but this has improved substantially I believe with Windows 11 ARM now supporting 64-bit/x64 translation (whereas Windows 10 ARM only supported 32-bit/x86 officially outside of Insider previews).

I haven't spent much time with it myself but a lot of my colleagues swear by it even on Windows.

[1] https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/options-for-usin...

Which, if you are buying Windows for this purpose, I'd strongly recommend just buying a retail package. If you buy in the Microsoft Store, it will be tied to your Microsoft Account which isn't really desirable, as retail keys are transferrable between computers [1] whereas OEM keys and MSA-purchased keys aren't.

[1] Many people don't know this - don't buy the OEM version of Windows for $20 cheaper. It will be tied to your unique hardware - but retail keys won't. Upgrade your workstation three years from now? If you have a retail key, you can wipe Windows from your old PC and activate on the new one, completely within the license, with no need to purchase again.

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/transf...

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/transf...

So, I will admit that it is possible. It's just really hit-or-miss and complicated, which can easily be avoided by just buying a retail package from somewhere with a code inside.

Not only that, but with the OEM version you won't actually have a valid license. Yes, Windows will activate and none will be the wiser, but legally speaking, you still won't have a license.

And at that point you might as well run a KMS emulator for $0.

Of course if you're alternative is to remain on your current Mac then you could just as well upgrade to the new one anyways and leave the old one dedicated towards Windows based gaming.

Kids…

I don't think it really makes much sense now though... no particularly good reason not to just get a Dell XPS or something in that ballpark for your Linux or Windows needs and avoid the hassle.

The sheer absurdity of running Linux tools on WSL inside Parallels inside a Mac host might be worth something, too. (Or actually, can you even do that, with two levels of virtualization? I seem to remember this is an issue, maybe specifically on the new ARM chips.)

https://www.cultofmac.com/788405/m2-macbook-air-runs-windows...

If she could run that in Arm Windows in a window on a Mac I'm sure she would.

By what measure? Is the verge expecting x86 windows?

I'm not a huge gamer but I feel like I might actually need to buy a Windows PC to play several games at some point. The list is growing. Right now I'd love to play HiFi Rush, but there's no possible way on an M1 Mac at the moment.

I expect killing their relationships with every game company in the world will make their VR headset efforts rather painful.

https://blog.ryujinx.org/the-impossible-port-macos/

I wouldn't say it's poor performing, definitely not rust, c or c++ capable, but you can write performant code through various tools, processes and optimisations, or bind to libs written in other languages e.g. rust, c++ to have them handle with that must be incredibly performant. Unity is a good example .net C# and C++ working together to deliver a performant solution.

Let me reiterate that I meant that it was previously low performing. I've developed in .Net since 2009 but only last few years have brought significant improvements in performance.

I own a switch (or rather I suppose I should say my kids do) so I don’t need to emulate it, but I do wonder what it would be like to play BotW on a 5k screen. I know it wouldn’t run in 5k, but maybe there are mods or ways to crank up the settings? It would be fun to explore some time.

That's why they don't have one on the market.

VR/AR is not mobile gaming and its not PC gaming. It's a new method of interaction, especially AR. Gaming will be just one aspect of it.

I suspect a whole new genre. Pokemon Go on steroids.

Interesting that the canonical example is a game! :)

That VR headset is going to be a lot more like an iPhone or iPad than a Mac and there's no shortage of games on iOS; they'll be just fine.

Apple is all about user experience, until it comes to gaming. Their gaming ecosystem is trash. It's like going to a Vegas casino without the free food and entertainment.

This is likely due to only one layer of translation being done in MacOS, as opposed to the two of Wine.

I really hope this leads to performance enhancements with windows clients on parallels

They are moving their business customers onto the cloud. Microsoft Windows 365 is what they want people on. Monthly subscriptions and streamed remote desktop.

They want people using their apps, Office 365 is already available on MacOS.

Microsoft was founded 40+ years ago. It's changed over that time. So has Apple.

So has the entire IT market.

I suggest you all totally forget about it too