It feels like someone is walking over to your desk and moving everything around, just to annoy you.
This is reinforced by the menu bar which is always at the top of the screen rather than attached to an application window.
Macos feels.... Half baked. I don't understand why apps should run after I close the window.
I'm also annoyed that I can't type the window I want when viewing all windows. If I open mission control, it takes 3 clicks on the dock to run the app. (Un-do mission control, focus the dock, run the app.)
That being said, I do like stage manager, I try to size my windows 90% so I can see the background windows.
It's even traceable all the way back to the user interface research at Xerox which Apple took and went with because it worked so well. Researchers such as Donald Norman also concluded that MDI interface were much worse at common actions such as drag-and-drop and standardised interface controls.
The closest they’ve gotten is iOS itself where apps sleep forever without your interaction.
In the very early days of macOS before becoming a Unix it was actually noticeable because for ordinary people they apps they would use would always be around, and it was still faster to swap in running apps than load a closed app from disk.
The benefits seem less obvious with modern hardware like SSD’s, but it is still a net benefit once you’re used to it.
A more official solution wouldn't come until MultiFinder in 1987, and that was originally limited to one foreground and one background application. Wikipedia says:
"When an application is activated, all of its windows are brought forward as a single layer. This approach is necessary for backward compatibility with many of the windowing data structures that were already documented."
"With the release of System 7 [in 1991], the MultiFinder extension was integrated with the operating system, and it remains so in Mac OS 8 and Mac OS 9. However, the integration into the OS does nothing to fix MultiFinder's inherent idiosyncrasies and disadvantages."
By the time that OS X came out in 2001, the menu bar being at the top of the screen, and switching with the current app, was fully entrenched. After all, OS X initially had no native apps, still emulating the old OS 9 environment, and Carbon (essentially recompiling a "classic" Mac OS 9 app with relatively minor changes) would be the dominant API for some time too. Indeed Carbon wasn't removed until macOS 10.15 Catalina in late 2019.
Because that's what Steve Jobs decided and he was never wrong. /s
The Apple philosophy always was "we know what's best for our users, it's our way or the highway, deal with it".
If there's something that can emulate that, and... Not be a hacky work around.. then I'm all ears
Distinguishing between processes (applications) and windows just makes sense.
For example say you download something in your browser, then you open a new window, then you close the original window. If windows = processes then closing the original window should cancel the download (because you killed that process), but we all know that would be nonsensical. So user intuition is that there is one main process and multiple windows.
Apple does allow for closing the window to kill the process. However only if there is one main window, such as the calculator app. If there’s multiple windows possible (such as in a text editor or web browser), then closing all windows does not quit the application because the user may want to close a window and then open a new window (e.g. open document or new document).
More ram than you anticipate is like extra lung capacity and working memory. Also an extra year or two out of the laptop. Combined with horsepower it can be an advantage.
Instant switching of apps or screens can have it's benefits, but needs to be managed.
Similar to having more tabs open than normal. Tools like Firefox Spaces are invaluable for switching between multiple client projects.
Waiting for apps to open/load/close can add up significantly throughout a day depending on the variety.
This is another idea that has been somewhat lost over time. I believe the way it works now is that you can choose to have your application close when it's last window is closed, or not. That seems a reasonable compromise, it's never been clear to me why you'd want an application like Word with no window to continue running.
I did kind of like the windows thg of dragging a window to the top to maximise, but that stuff is easy to replace with an app or two. General OS slowness and instability and clunky design not so much.
I can't tell whether you're talking about Windows or Mac here
Unless you work at an org that has all this stuff, like pretty much any org at scale that has compliance or security requirements. My work-issued MacBook has an AV that slows opening everything, forces updates and restarts and all that jazz.
I guess our org has chosen better management software, though, because it never results in restarts. The one exception is the requirement to keep the OS patched in order to log in to corporate systems.
The window position thing is really annoying though.
I remember some problem with programs hanging and/or slow to start because the phoning home functionality was having issues.
edit: yep, it does https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/391379/does-macos-...
Many of the solutions I've seen in the corp environment try to make up for this with some frankly janky solutions. Apple seems to be slowly improving that, but give it time.
But at the end of the day, the crappy performance hits I've seen on both kinds kf devices are generally shitty monitoring solutions and restrictions that neither support natively.
MacOS is just a bad OS. It's good if you only ever use the MacBook as a laptop, but the moment you hook it up to a useful setup, it becomes a drag.
Or do you think the rest of the world that has heaped praise on the Apple Silicon Macs has missed something you’ve seen?
The macbook is amazing when considered in isolation. Trying to use it in a workstation setting is definitely 'holding it wrong', which drives me nuts. Wasted potential and definitely undeserving of the 'Pro' moniker.
I have a M3 Pro MacBook Pro for work that I also swap between on the display using the single cable that I remove from one to plug into the other. The laptop travels with me to work where it plugs into a 16:9 4k 60hz monitor while it's open. I have the same clamshell issue as my personal laptop where I have to open it once after plugging it in, but otherwise it works pretty well.
I do however have to do some workspace rearranging when I go from clamshell->ultrawide to my work setup of open lid->16:9 monitor. But that's no a huge deal since I'm going from 1 screen to 2 screens.
I dock at home into a dual monitor setup.
I go to work and dock into a dual monitor setup.
I keep my MacBook open, not closed.
Pretty much all my coworkers do the same. All with Apple silicon MacBook pros. No idea what you’re talking about.
I believe you — I just think you need to do a deeper dive into your kit instead of assuming the rest of the world must be wrong about these machines.
If it isn't WindowServer losing its mind, it's some other buggy system daemon. Apple simply does not do stable versions of macOS any more.
For the majority of people that are really into computers, that means jack shit and it is basically just some nice thing you may want to have if you really have to use a laptop from time to time.
Most Apple laptops (especially the expensive ones) are used by executives and somewhat rich people who want to show off. I was an Apple technician in the past so I know very well how marketing really doesn't match the typical user, then you get irrelevant "praise".
As someone who actually cared about Apple products, I wish they didn't switch their whole computer lineup to Apple Silicon. They could have kept making standard computers at the same time, but it would have been hard justifying such outrageous markup on ram and storage.
(I switch between Windows and Mac throughout the day, so window tiling and Fancy Zones were things I missed)
I hear what you’re saying, but the vast majority of MacBook pros are probably never plugged into an external display. I know on Hacker News it’s a very different story, but for the general population, they don’t use external displays.
My replacement for it will be a Studio, whenever the M4 version comes out. I'll keep my current laptop as an "on the road" computer.
I do wish it was better, but I’ve also found tools to work around all of my issues .
* you didn't read the article
* You didn't read the comment your responding to
* You proceed to say : it works for me. You're using it wrong.
You're special, I'll give you that.
The arch of the CPU doesn't matter. I have the same issue on my M1 MacBook Pro 14"
I really don't care wherever windows does it worse or better either... so your other comment didn't add anything to the situation, really.
Furthermore: I didn't insult you as such. I simply stated the only options I could determine from your behavior. Literally, what other option is there? Your point is still "it works for me with my single monitor setup" as a response to "this doesn't work with a multi monitor setup".
'You're holding it wrong' is a classic. Nothing special about it.
Apple might be the only major manufacturer to not provide their own docking solution that work extremely well, beyond trying to do it with a display.
As soon as the "pro" moniker is used, 2, if not 3 monitors are completely normal. Extra wide monitors do not cut it. 3 24" 2k monitors at 2560x1440 can be far preferable to a single ultrawie that barely provides 2 monitors worth of pixels in the same space.
Lenovo, HP, Dell, Microsoft, all have it nailed. Used almost all of them before Apple.
The Matrox TripleHead2Go seems to remain relevant so many years after it's introduction, I used to run 3 monitors on my HP dock with one. Dynamite.
there was a button somewhere on the display settings that had the purpose of moving every app to the current active screen, that one saved the day.
I admit I do get annoyed that even in a mostly unchanging environment (same monitors plugged into the same ports forever), macOS forgets where windows are supposed to go.
Another thing is the OS's handling of plug in events. When you have just one monitor on and plug in another one, the main monitor blanks briefly, then both monitors turn on and you're good to go. Not too bad. But when you have two monitors on, and you plug in a third, it first blanks the secondary monitor, that comes back on, then it blanks both the secondary and main monitor, then they both come back on, and then the new monitor turns on. Super irritating.
I managed to get my system "working" without knowing about it.
I have a macbook and an external display, and I utilize "desktops" heavily.
Basically desktop: 1 = gmail/calendar | 2 = slack, messenger, imessage, etc. | 3 = chrome | 4 = terminal | 5 = vscode
In the dock you can right click an app, and Options, Assign to Desktop N.
Luckily, when I plug my macbook into the dock with monitor, I actually want it to be a static desktop, showing just the website I'm working on. And I want the monitor to switch through desktops that have my applications.
This basically just works with one caveat. When switching from plugged in to unplugged, the macbook screen becomes desktop 1, and all the desktops shift over by one. So I just rearranged everything to be +1 (i.e. gmail/calendar are actually always desktop 2), and everything works seamlessly.
Maybe some applications have custom window position management and fail at multiple displays? I haven't noticed any.
The only third party tool that I use to help with window management is BetterSnapTool. It restores some basic missing functionality that comes built in in Windows, most importantly the ability to maximize windows and snap them to the left and right half of the screen, plus a few other things.
FWIW I am by far at my most productive with a 43" 4K display in front of me with a sidecar 23" arranged vertically for long vertical documents. I do wish that 43" was an 8K to double the DPI though.
Finder fucking sucks, it doesn't remember which sort order I've set for which folder and I constantly have to change it between alphabetical and created date, mostly for the file open dialog (alphabet for vscode folder open, created date for slack or browser file upload).
For all of Apple's bluster they're really only as good as any other company when it comes to the "it just works" experience, often worse.
I agree and it's confounding. For me it's even worse: when plugging back into my home office after some work on the road, it doesn't remember the window positions associated with that setup, and I have to reorganize my dozens of windows away from the laptop screen again.
I've solved this through a 3rd-party tool, DisplayMaid https://funk-isoft.com/display-maid.html (which I found from a prior HN discussion)
It's particularly frustrating since Apple's most popular Mac product is their Macbooks, which have a rich docking and display ecosystem, so you'd think dynamically changing the desktop configuration would be solidly handled! But no.