Is A Mac Good For Software Development?

[@ArjanCodes]

💡 Get my FREE 7-step guide to help you consistently design great software: arjancodes.com/designguide.

[@JustinianH]

I use Linux because nothing beats the feeling of being a command away of ruining your entire system.

[@ArjanCodes]

Living on the edge!

[@nickeldan]

Same. However, I like how my Macbook interfaces with my iPhone so I run a Linux VM via VirtualBox whenever I'm doing development.

[@rallen7660]

If you're running as "root", you're doing it wrong. Even Windows doesn't allow that crap by default. Anymore.

[@Sjoerd1993]

@@rallen7660 I mean you can still ruin your system with a sudo command from a normal account, haven't tried it but you should still be able to run a sudo rm -rf /* if you use the no-preserve-root flag. But in the same token you can still remove system32 from Windows if you run explorer as administrator, so that's really nothing unique. This will be more difficult on MacOS as it has an immutable base image. Same is true for Fedora Silverblue by the way, which is pretty amazing once you get used to it. Basically undestructable.

[@sausix]

@@Sjoerd1993 --no-preserve-root has no effect on "rm -rf /*". It works for "rm -rf /" only.

[@kickthesky]

I bought a M1 Mac Mini about three months after they came out. It was my first Mac. I loved working on it and developing on it so much that last Christmas I bought myself a Xmas present and got the M1 Macbook Air as well. Love them so much. My work laptop from my company is a Windows machine and I HATE working on it. I use it as little as possible to get actual work done.

[@abdullahmufti]

Does it run the programs that you need and is there any performance issues. Thinking of getting mac for software and Web development. Would you recommend?

[@NotOnlyCode]

I've been using Mac since 2011 and I agree with most of your points regarding the issues - it is very expensive, and the M1/M2 architecture causes some troubles (I struggled a lot with Docker). Also there were the "dark ages" - the terrible keyboard and lack of ports that Apple pushed in 2016-2020, fortunately they fixed it now. I'm in the market for a new laptop and I must say I'm not even looking at other brands - the only dilemma I have is whether to pick 13" or 14" Macbook Pro this time. btw Arjan, a minor thing about the video - the led lights behind you on the left side are flickering, noticed that in another video as well. It might be fixed by setting camera to 25fps or 50fps to match it with the 50Hz frequency in Europe. Hope that helps!

[@David-124]

For me battery life is low priority - I'm mostly plugged in. Much higher priority is stability, power, value for money and maybe upgradability. Also after a few years, you should open it up to clean it - so that should be easy to do. I've recently replaced the thermal paste on my laptop's CPU, which has brought the running temperature right down - I don't know how straightforward that would be on a Mac. I've had a Mac in the past, but I'm not sure it is worth paying the Apple premium given the constraints.

[@jamess.2491]

Yeah if that is what you want then mac is not for you. My M1 Mbp is the best laptop I've ever had because I am constantly unplugged, the power is fantastic for what I want to do by myself (web development, some light software) but everything I need that is super intensive is done remotely on a server. Also I have my PC for gaming, etc so upgradability is not really a concern for me. Also live in the bay area so Apple's prices aren't very ridiculous here compared to how much we spend on everything else.

[@matheusmuller1591]

The major problem that keeps me from adopting the Mac for software development is the GPU, since I work with deep learning and machine learning applications. Nothing beats the NVIDIA RTX series in this regard so far…

[@luxemkingII]

Same here. It is costly to run everything on a cluster for our ML applications, so all the tests are run on our own machines before doing all the training and analysis on a cluster.

[@acatch22]

i also work in ml, so nvidia is the only choice. but ive been wondering, is an amd cpu a good option for ml dev. or are there some intel optimisations or other compatability issues with amd chips for ml?

[@somebrains5431]

@@acatch22 Amd is trying to catch up. Nvidia has poured resources into machine learning research and open source contributions for a long time. Right now, unless you’re working on really niche experiments and AMD gpu isn’t going to be a good choice.

[@Operaatoors]

I've been developing on Mac for last 10+ years, and only thing that is killing me is slower docker containers compared running the same thing (on less powerful hardware) on Linux. I accepted a challenge to teach in school programming, and, for sure, they have Windows computers. I took one for me to home to try WSL, and it was steep load of understanding all the bits and pieces, but managed to compile 6-7 step guide to get it working. Although, it wasn't smooth in class - each computer had their own issues, and currently, still networking (connecting to github etc, is pain). And thank you for lots of your videos helped a lot to get the vocabulary and correct words for patterns, and oop in general!

[@qmpeel]

I prefer Macbooks mainly because of battery (!) and keyboard. Previously had Dell and Lenovo laptops and it felt like I had to charge them few times a day. From time to time there are problems with ARM architecture, but it is better now.

[@martinspedding4210]

Battery I could understand but the keyboard is a piece of junk and I am talking about those from 2023. That and the dreadful Macos meant I went with a pc laptop as at work I could have had a Mac book. It was just too poor as a device. Very happy with my Dell

[@michaelthomson81]

An informative and balanced set of advice - very on brand for this channel! A brave topic to take on given the Mac / PC / Linux flamewars that are likely to evolve in the comments.

[@ArjanCodes]

Thank you Michael, glad you liked the video!

[@c_kemper]

We use macs for backend and front end dev. Also for infra as code… one note about brew; got rid of it as they are removing functionality 🤦🏻‍♂️ I recommend macports or even Nix Packages as a drop in replacement. Nix is also great for managing dotfiles…

[@ancillarity]

My gaming PC running on Windows 10 - with the Linux subsystem - serves as my workstation for coding. It's running Ubuntu so it's much more similar to the kind of OS I typically deal with (MacOS runs on Unix-like which actually has some differences to Linux, especially on the usage of GNU packages). Since it's a PC it's also more powerful, with GPU support for my deep learning needs. Finally, since I already have a gaming PC, it's economical to just use that instead of getting a Mac which can be pricy. Note: I do use Mac for work. Plus in the past I have developed on Windows before.

[@Hacker-at-Large]

I love my Macs, but I’m avoiding Apple Silicon until I’m sure I’ll be able to install Linux once Apple obsoletes the model I buy. I have a bunch of old Intel macs that are still running Linux more than fast enough.

[@atkinpaul]

For many years I found Macs very helpful. As soon as someone brought one out I knew I could write them off as a waste of space and concentrate on the people who were interested in getting things done. It's no longer the case though.

[@MichaelMossmanNZ]

Thank you Arjan for your helpful insights. I am a Mac newbie, coming from Linux. I've been developing an Android app in Kotlin, and now want to make it Multiplatform, so I bought a second-hand iMac with some reasonable specs. Now to learn a little Xcode / Swift ... wish me luck =)

[@adamexplores8863]

I use a macbook as my portable system. I use a windows desktop for major system.

[@truefirstmagic]

Short answer: yes Longer answer: I’ve been a professional software engineer since the 90’s, and have developed on Mac, Linux, and windows. Nothing beats the Mac for productivity as an engineer.

[@RyanHaydenMattoon]

My entire crew of over twenty develops on a Mac. Obviously there are reasons for that, but the most frustrating part of it for me is Xcode updates. 8GB download before got will work on my terminal. Drives me nuts every time.

[@riklaunim]

I would say for developers the key would be pricing on storage and RAM - usually we need a bunch of that while Apple is giving that at a high price + not upgradable with newer devices.

[@resatcanerbas3541]

I got the M1 pro 14 and the machine is quite nice. However, the most problematic case is that not all the Python packages are compatible. For example: psycopg, most famous package for postgres connection is failing ( they were trying to crowdfund the M1 version) . There are plenty more of that, which may limit your contribution to a project. Docker is still not good enough, and most of the people including me using the remote docker daemon to run containers. It is a great machine with portability and performance, and it is slightly cheap when you compare to the equivelants in the market

[@resatcanerbas3541]

Seems like they released the M1 compatible package 4 days ago :) the issue is still there tho, many packages are not pre-complied or not compatible at all

[@vladimirkraus1438]

I am a cross-platform desktop application programmer developing mostly with Qt/C++/Python combo. I have been working on all platforms for quite a long time. I started on Windows because majority of my projects were related to business apps with my clients being solely on Windows. Then Linux became my quite frequent working OS but recently I switched to macOS (MacBook Air M1) for my everyday work. So I think I can compare all three OS. What I love most about Mac: - keyboards - They are precise, nicely clicky, with very useful layout (what a relief after stupid modern DELLs with keys Home and End being on F11 and F12), I have very few typos overall. Great for productivity. - speed of M1 - Amazing! It builds my C++ software faster than my desktop computer! And it still stays cool, no screaming ventilator like on other notebooks... - battery life with M1 - I have never experienced anything like it on other platforms. What I hate most about Mac: - glossy displays - Working in bright light is terrible, all I see is my own reflection. - window and desktop management - It is nightmare; global menu bar for all applications at the top? I just hate it. - overall feeling of Apple desperately trying to "do things differently" just for vendor-lock-in situation for their users; not cool, Apple! - from a developer perspective: The pricing policy for App Store is a rip-off. I decided not to distribute my software on App Store. - Finder - That software is even more useless than File Explorer on Windows. ... but after a time of hesitation I somehow got used to my Mac. :) Btw. if you hate the fact that you need to extract files before opening them, you should maybe try the file manager for Win, Linux and macOS, which I created as a hobby project: HiFile, check hifile dot app. You can not only browse items in archives but you can directly view files (or images) or edit them. Opening the file extracts it to a temporary file and if you edit the file, if offers you automatic update of the archive. Just note that this project is still a work in progress, it still may have some flaws. :)

[@vladimirkraus1438]

PS: Speaking of flaws of this my file manager, I have just discovered, that opening of files directly from archive works, but function "Open with" does not. Well, this will be the first bug (let's call it missing feature) I am going to fix tomorrow... :)

[@3Toy]

Agree with your comparison. Where to find your project would like to try it. Do you know if there is a way or programs that can make desktop and window management for macs more like windows experience ?

[@Litehamer]

Hi . Great video thanks . I’m just about to start CS50 with a view to learn front end development skills. I have a very slow , very old widows desktop but want to make the most of my 2.5hr (each way) commute. Was going to get the Mac mini but now considering the Mac book air to exploit travel time for studying .

[@Litehamer]

@@efrainnavarrete9 I did and it’s perfect !! No idea how I’d run windows on though

[@nav1923]

@@Litehamer did you run into any problems, like programs that weren’t compatible?

[@azalpacir]

Another advantage with using Mac is mobile software development because you can run both ios and android virtual devices on it. Can’t run ios on windows :|

[@Firedog_Alpha]

Windows with WSL (2.0) is so good. Also using devcontainers means that you are functionally developing in Linux so I don't think there's much of an argument for any particular OS

[@ArjanCodes]

I haven't used WSL myself, but I agree that at this stage the OS you use is personal preference for a big part. You can get the job done on any of the major OSes (except maybe ChromeOS, but even then :) ).

[@catwhisperer911]

I have an M1 iMac and it is awesome. I have an older Mac laptop should I need it for portability but I can never see myself going back to laptop for full-time development. BTW the DS_Store files are generated by Finder and there is a command line option to turn it off altogether.

[@nikhilsinha2191]

i have purchased m1 air on emi and I will recommed it though not did app development

[@cauca5263]

I checked - everything is clean

[@markkuuss]

My previous employer gave us Apple MB Pros 15' and I enjoyed it for two years. I could work for hours without needing a mouse because the Pad is so comfy and optimized. Then after leaving my employer and using my personal Laptop which is a Windows...nothing feels the same anymore. Never coming back I guess so I'm buying one on my personal money

[@Joetorres3]

Run from macs with touch bar. They don't have the fn keys, used for debug, and you will accidently click in the touch bar a lot, muting sound, activating siri, etc.

[@ManuelSchulte007]

Using Linux as well... Developing Python backend apps that often have a db... There is no Oracle client for Apple's Mx processors! Docker works well in Mac but still I do prefer Linux. Shell text editor pico is a shame on MacOS, I much prefer nano or others and on Mac you need homebrew for that. I prefer Linux packaging systems over the Apple store.. often I have to install basic development libraries via homebrew to get them on Mac, which under Linux is most often packaged in the distro's repos. Linux repos can often be mirrored in a professional environment (banks, etc) where direct internet access is forbidden (and filtered) by SecOps. On Mac if you have to rely on homebrew, you're screwed... And contrary to you I'm used to keyboard shortcuts on PC rather than Mac... I've been using PC's for more than 30 years and those keyboard shortcuts on Mac's are really a pain in the ass for me! And indeed, as you say, screen management and the absence of proper keyboard shortcuts to handle that is a misery. Last, but not least that global menu on top... I hate that.

[@alexanderpoplawski577]

I use a M1 MacBook Air running 64 Bit Arm Ubuntu in a Parallels VM. There is an Arm version of the Oracle Instant client, which can be used with cx_Oracle. Even Docker runs better in the Ubuntu VM, than Docker desktop on MacOS. Canonical has released a M1 compatible version of Multipass to spin up a Linux server VM for free. For frontend development I can use MacOS Safari to connect to the web app on Ubuntu for testing, even with Browsersync.

[@somebrains5431]

I switch btw an M1 air and a Thinkpad. If I needed an Nvidia gpu, my gaming desktop can step in. It’s just gear, what you do with it is what’s important.

[@andrewgrant788]

You can still do development on an Intel Mac. The 2020 27” iMac for example. It’s great for running x86 Linux/Docker and of course Windows if you need it.

[@dirkschannel5817]

I work on a 10 years old HP Workstation with Debian. It's quite, its fast, I like it. It does the job for me. In addition I use a 16" MacBook Pro for my creative stuff. I like both. Back in the day I did lot in .NET. Bloated Windows installations drove me away from it. Just don't want to waste time cleaning the System after every update..

[@mrigor2000]

Hello @ArjanCodes, Thank you for the great video. Which external display do you use with MAC?

[@davidbohlin2305]

I like using macos because I got tired of spending more time trying to get Linux to behave and Windose is just bad

[@Bayo106]

facts. mac is the great middle ground

[@wickedgummybear3104]

Making Linux behave can get tiresome but once you have it running its ALOT smoother than windows (at least on a laptop) ..Windows is just bad.

[@fensom80]

I'm not a fan of Mac but I need one so I can also test React-native on iOS

[@aslkdjfzxcv9779]

osx on commodity hardware would be perfect.

[@Cookie-mv2hg]

Spotlight/ alfred is the BEST thing about mac, nothing else. Some python packages / software cannot run on arm-based machine, and it's gonna take a LONG while to configure those stuff, FYI.

[@alvynTC]

Windows did not changed. I have to use it for my work. We have latest DELL latitude models which are price compared to mac pros and the system is still doing what it wants and not what user (me) wants. It crashes and restarts regullary with power supply from DELL USB-C monitor (IT departments says "its known bug and you should use power brick and not power from monitor". It do updates by itself and restarts when I am on lunch break. Someone at Microsoft had and terrible idea that instead of working on internals of the system they had to update visuals of task bar (they just want to be fancy), so now, you cannot move task bar to from bottom placement because newly designed menus doesnot works on sides or top. All of old bugs and inconsitences are still there and they just added new on top. Sometimes you came to work and your bluetooth devices not working, you have no audio in teams, etc. So painful to work with Windows these days. On Mac or Linux, you have control. The Windows has control over you.

[@ask.officio]

Hi, I thought of getting macmini, but best option is to get account on macincloud macstadium, what is best for Apple software development?

[@smalltimer666]

I wish they would add a trackpoint and a good quality keyboard to their machines.

[@wvagner284]

A. MacBook Pro with Linux is great! I use Ubuntu.

[@TheBruceKeller]

To me, it barely even matters anymore. I guess the one good thing about Macs are the battery life; but with WSL2 and Terminal or Docker etc, you can easily pull up a Linux environment no problem in Windows and have things like VS Code integrated within that Linux environment. Can even use solutions to have a fully hybrid Windows/Linux environment. But I guess the MacBook is good for looking cool and 'in the know' if you're around a bunch of other devs or something lol. Plus integrating with the iPhone and iPad if you have those of course.

[@adrianvmois9426]

Aren’t M2 Air have the keyboard with black rubber in the space between buttons? Maybe this is the only significant improvement over Air M1, a more tactile keyboard.

[@lemuelejaracaduyac9627]

thank u helped me a lot

[@ArjanCodes]

Thanks so much Lemuel, glad the content is helpful!

[@openmarkand]

macOS is UNIX compliant but keep in mind that the POSIX compliance is far from complete and lacks many new features especially if you want to write C.

[@ManuelSchulte007]

Btw, nice video, very instructive! Cheers 😊

[@ArjanCodes]

Thanks Manuel, Glad you liked it!

[@rssyip]

This comment is not related to this particular video. Arjan, can you please create a playlist of all your shorts?

[@ArjanCodes]

If you go to my channel homepage, you can find the list of shorts there. Is there another advantage to creating a separate playlist?

[@hshhsjhahsvs7728]

Informative video. The audio sounds a bit 'blurry'.

[@ArjanCodes]

Thank you.

[@jamess.2491]

I've gotta say, as a primarily business-focused use case I would never use Windows full-time anymore. I still have a pretty powerful PC for gaming (and the occasional ML use-case) but Microsoft has poured so much bloat into that OS it's ridiculous. It's not even possible to setup a Windows machine without an internet connection now, and when you do there are automatically like 150 different trackers and basically authorized spyware that you have to manually disable individually. Not to mention the fact it takes like 12 clicks to change your default browser, I'm just fed up with MS bullshit. The good thing is that Apple's business model isn't focused around marketing your data, which is why I am fine with their prices -- anything less than what they charge would make them subsidize their costs by marketing data like every other tech company. This is also without even mentioning Unix compatibility and battery life...

[@ask.officio]

8 gb enough for Xcode and Swift and sometimes editing in Mac mini? Does it play nice for periods of time and does it slow down the system?

[@lmb_codes]

on the software side: hell yeah! windows is a pain for me, hardware: i would recommend at least the 32gb variant. i personally have been struggling (lag, spinning beachball) with my entry-level 14” (backend dev with 5+ containers running). i was wrong for believing the reviews saying “16gb is enough“

[@th_sajal]

What would be your recommendations for DL on Mac?

[@mikapeltokorpi7671]

What I have seen, M1 Mac can handle 90% of SW design tasks. But some libraries or frameworks are not supported. I will not use Apple products myself, but I can not say M1s are bad for the task. In Finland it is about 50%/50% between Windows and Mac and scraps for Linux. I am inching towards Linux from Windows. But there seem to be some QM issue in Apple production lines. Lot of Macs seem to have some HW quality issues couple of months after usage or (for older models) few weeks after warranty lapses.

[@incremental_failure]

That's a significant issue. ThinkPad quality is terrible but at least you can find replacement parts quite easily anywhere in the world and they're fairly easy to fix. I can't imagine going to a Mac store every time I have an issue and they tell me to buy a new one.

[@ruona2133]

Is the M1 good for DevOps??

[@guillaumelombardo9569]

Thanks !

[@ArjanCodes]

You’re welcome!

[@ericdraven7857]

Yes. I love my M1 MBP and when I tried using my windows laptop, it was just plain awful. I couldn’t even use VS Code eventually. So much better experience over all on a mac than anything else. I use windows only for gaming. It’s macOS than Linux and thats it for anything other than gaming.

[@martinspedding4210]

Thanks that did make me laugh. I assume you work for Apple marketing

[@Joel11111]

It’s also worth noting that there are some x86 instructions which cannot be translated to arm instructions via Rosetta. (I think these are AVX and/or AVX-512). If there is any software you need where these instructions are a hard requirement, an M1 Mac simply isn’t an option for you. I have run into these only rarely but they do exist.

[@cryptocsguy9282]

@Joel Bierman If i'm not mistaken AVX and AVX-512 are specific to Intel CPUs and not x86 and applications on consumer grade desktops and laptops are unlikely to ever use such instructions

[@TechnoRiff]

I'm currently evaluating a 14in Macbook Pro with 8/14 cores, 16g RAM, and 512g SSD. Has anyone wished that they could have gone with 32g or 64g of RAM in order to avoid any issues with swapping and high memory pressure?

[@haroldmiao7341]

Are the high performing GPU cores on M1Max useful for machine learning? Tensor flow is optimizing for apple silicon and PyTorch is also on the way

[@bonquaviusdingle5720]

I've trained some fairly big text classifiers on M1 (1.4 million document, 64 dimensions) but it will take several days. In reality you would only train a small proof of concept model, then use cloud instances to do a bigger version. Or fine tune a pretrained model locally on a smaller dataset.

[@sep69]

Thank you for this interesting video. I had a Mac Book Air for a year from an employer. Can't say I liked it very much. Battery life was awesome that's true. When I left the shit show I was happy to get back to my trusted Linux. But each to his own of course.

[@smalltimer666]

Why didn't you like it? I have been using linux for almost 15 years, but my employer is offering a macbook if I want one. I really like the hardware, but I wish it I could get rid of their infantile OS.

[@sep69]

@@smalltimer666 Because of exactly that. I found MacOs lacking in functionality and configurability. On Linux my toolbox is just way bigger. It has more desktop environments, virtualization options, can handle more filesystems and such. I found many tools on MacOs missing or having less functionality. There were packages available that were paid and I did buy some of those. Generally I just felt restricted and I constantly missed things. Is has some very nice things also like how you download app images and remove them by just moving the icon to the waste bin and stuff. But is wasn't for me.

[@ElwooD0777]

I do know that 256G is not enough for a storage for a cloud developer at all, the 512 model IS ok, but you will run into compromises. You've probably being pushed to buy the 1T version if you want to have this device for years, so the 1TB (and nothing more) is available, and this is the shame. From my POV - you will buy a new Mac just because there is no chance to upgrade your storage. This IS the one of reasons to not buy the Mac in their configurations for the moment. They will upgrade the chips, and this is awesome, but they never let you to upgrade the storage (and the RAM) which is basic.

[@rogue254]

As a beginner just go windows. As you get more experience and hopefully more money you can get mac

[@gr93cjs]

From a laptop perspective with all the battery benefits and value-money, it is. From the "iOS" development side, well... sadly it is the only option. I'm happy with Windows but at the end there are just tools, there's no time to biased an OS over another.

[@vikas416]

I had complaints about windows earlier. But with windows 10, and now 11, they have streamlined lot of stuff. Moreover, in terms of file management I find windows more intuitive than iOS

[@AlanRJones]

No mention of the Mac Studio only mini. Is this considered overkill for development? Thanks.

[@ArjanCodes]

Hi Alan, the minimum configuration for the M1 Studio is with the M1 Max chip, so you’re paying extra for chip capacity that you don’t need IMO, in particular in the form of video encoders and decoders. An M1 Pro mini would be nice though, who knows that will still come out.

[@em-wg7bj]

m2 macbook air is my go to rught now

[@jasonx7803]

I’ve done multilingual software dev with literally dozens of languages for years and dealing with multiple input methods on a Mac is just light years beyond windows or Linux. Even just dealing with Western European character sets is so much easier and more direct. No weird alt + numberpad codes, if I want an ñ it’s just ⌥ + n. Windows has come a long way since CJK support required another 700mb download just to enable (and you needed Pro to do it, WTF) but it’s nowhere near as seamless as the input selection on macs.

[@60beats44]

Thank you very much for this informative upload. You seem to be a highly skilled programmer. Having only recently moved from Windows to Mac, I am really happy with this decision. My MacBook Pro 16 is so quiet and reliable. I have a dream to develop a program that enables people to record flea market and eBay sales, something I am still doing on several Mac numbers sheets. I just don’t know how and where to start, not having a coding background. Thanks again.

[@user-wr4yl7tx3w]

How much RAM do you recommend for software developer? What if you use docker containers?

[@ArjanCodes]

I mention it near the end of the video: especially if you're using Docker containers, I'd recommend going for 16GB. The developer in my company has an M1 MacBook Air with 8GB and when he uses Docker images on that machine, there's a lot of swapping/slowdown.

[@incremental_failure]

32GB would be the goal nowadays. 16GB minimum.

[@ScreamSandwich]

Hey I tried to get the 7 Step Design guide but I „only“ get the Newsletter and no link to download the guide

[@ArjanCodes]

Send me an email ([e-mail]) and I’ll make sure you get the guide.

[@OrcusMaximus]

For me, the top consideration is how easy and fast can it launch xterms. The winner is Windows with Cygwin/X. CsshX on the Mac is OK, but less reliable and less functional than the full clusterssh running under Cygwin/X.

[@anweshbhattacharyya7763]

I use linux ❤️❤️❤️👌👌👍. It is best

[@ebeneZr]

Saying a Mac is good for software development is like saying you have to get the most expensive gym membership to get fit

[@OsvaldoGago]

For web front end not being able to test in Safari is not an option. I use Docker with my M1 without any issues as I use base distributions with AARCH support. Another reason is that, if you do some design, the Mac has excellent monitor quality.

[@randeepwalia1507]

what about being able to test in Internet Explorer?

[@OsvaldoGago]

@@randeepwalia1507 IE is deprecated and should not be used. Edge is the new Microsoft browser and you can use it on a Mac.

[@kayakMike1000]

Arjan may be a keyboard "hobbit," but he is Gandalf the White for software design! Thanks for all you do!

[@obsidiansiriusblackheart]

I prefer the Louis Rossmann take on Macs

[@RianY2K]

LINUX all the way

[@justshukri9407]

Yes Mac is good and smooth but I not recommend for .NET developer and Gamer ofc

[@RunForPeace-hk1cu]

I would disagree if you need 64GB of ram ... you must buy the M1Max 24c bare minimum configuration.

[@vitormanfredini1205]

shoudn't the percentages at 1:39 sum up to 100?

[@ArjanCodes]

Lots of developers use more than one IDE, so that means the sum is more than 100%.

[@aaroncronnelly]

It kinda depends for me, like in collage I use windows cos that’s what they run on the labs in there, but then at home even though i have a windows computer, I find myself always going to my MacBook, idk maybe I’m strange 😂

[@rallen7660]

Apple mostly just makes "appliances". I hear that the M1 is very attractive, it'll be great once they get Linux running natively on it. Except for the price. And the restriction on upgrades. And limited variety of hardware. Thinking about it, I could buy TWO top tier upgrade-able laptops pre-loaded with Linux for the price of ONE almost equivalent Mac. Guess I'm just not their target market.

[@piyh3962]

Used m1 airs are a steal on eBay. I can't go back from 14 hour real world battery live

[@rallen7660]

@@piyh3962 sorry, but call me a nasty old conservative, but I just can't buy anything from a company that knowingly uses slave labor to build their products. Might as well be powered by baby blood.

[@cetilly]

Oh boy, I have very strong opinions about this as someone that codes an equal amount of time on Mac and Windows systems. 1) The Docker issue is really frustrating. I have 32GB of RAM in my MacBook Pro and whenever I'm running Docker the machine is constantly running hot and the fans are always running. This becomes particularly problematic when I'm trying to share my screen during conference calls and I am plagued with latency and background noise. Super frustrating. 2) Then there is the issue of external monitor support. The resolution quality is total shit. The same monitors work perfectly when plugged into my Windows machine, but for whatever reason this MacBook Pro produces a really fuzzy display, so I can only use my external monitor for parking lot type tasks. Really pathetic. 3) This next issue has to do the with the Apple Magic Mouse--I hate it. One wrong move and it jacks up your display forcing you to have to reset your display. Very disruptive to your workflow when you are trying to work efficiently. 4) What is the issue with copy/pasting text containing double quotes, which is literally everything in JSON. For whatever reason, MacOS randomly changes the closing double quote to some weird variant of a double quote. Upon initial inspection you can't actually notice the difference. It isn't until your code fails and you need to do some debugging that you discover these weird "double quotes". Why does MacOS do this?! Its really stupid. Unfortunately there isn't an app like Notepad that will reliably remove any non-ASCII characters. 5) BUT! As a developer, the thing that annoys me the most is how Apple/MacOS uses inefficient and cumbersome keyboard shortcut combos. For example: command+z (undo), but redo is shift+command+z. Why?! First of all, it is less ergonomic to use the "command" key versus the "control" key, so why does MacOS use the "command" key? MacOS makes it worse by adding an additional key that you need to press! Hitting shfit+command+z is not easily done, and downright cumbersome. And what is the purpose of having the "fn" key in the lower left? That is such a dumb place for this key because it makes it even more challenging because it pushes the "command" key over to the right even more. At least on a Windows and Linux OS's you can use the pinky to press the "Ctrl" key (on both the left and right side of the keyboard) and literally get to any other key very easily. Which is exactly what developers want, which is easy of motion across the keyboard. 6) Lastly, deleting text. There is the one key in the upper right "delete" that deletes text going backwards. OK fine, we need to use a second key to delete text going forward. You'd expect Apple to be consistent and stick to using the "command" key, but no. Which key? The "fn" key! Why?????? What is the purpose of this esoteric combo? It should just be the "command" key and get rid of the worthless "fn" key. There are a LOT of other gripes I have with MacOS but these are my top complaints. I much prefer to work on Windows and Linux systems. But unfortunately I get clients that want me to use their hardware so I find myself using Macs. Thankfully that is starting to change and I'm seeing less Mac adoption these days. Thank god! -edit- 7) command+Tab right next to command+Q really pisses me off!! Again, another really stupid arrangement; if your finger accidentally hits the Q instead of the Tab, say goodbye to whatever you were doing.

[@ArjanCodes]

I agree with a lot of these points. Regarding point 4 though, you have some control over it. If you go to System Preferences -> Keyboard and then select the Text tab, you can disable a lot of the automatic formatting, including changing quote behavior!

[@cetilly]

@@ArjanCodes Whoa!!! After years of putting up with that hassle. Ugh! Thank you for that! I can’t wait to put it to the test.

[@pxnchx93]

How is an HDMI port not important for code development? This is where you would connect your external monitor, no?

[@ArjanCodes]

I never use the HDMI port. I have my laptop connected to my monitor via USB C and then it charges at the same time.

[@pxnchx93]

@@ArjanCodes you have it like that just because you prefer to charge at the same time? Or because your monitor doesn’t have HDMI?

[@ArjanCodes]

My monitor has HDMI, but I prefer using a single cable.

[@pxnchx93]

And the quality of the image is the same?

[@alexanderpoplawski577]

@@pxnchx93 It is a DisplayPort over USB-C connection, which is far superior to HDMI. Not all HDMI connections are compatible with 4k 60Hz. DisplayPort is designed for more than 4k resolutions. Remember, USB-C is just the connector type. It can handle more protocols, like Thunderbolt 3/4, DisplayPort, USB 3/4.

[@unperrier5998]

Nope. I tried Mac and came back to Linux. I can't cope with using the UI and the mouse for basic things and the worst is: the key combinations that are not uniform with the other two mainstream systems, namely Windows and Linux.

[@_.gray._]

That's a dangerous assumption, to say that Windows has gotten... better. I'd go Linux all the way if it weren't for compatibility with - well - everything.

[@davidbundgaard]

I prefer Linux, current assignment got me a Mac laptop and they basically install half of Linux without installing Linux and it is worst experience I had in a long time.

[@WhenYouAreStrange]

You can write code on anything... even a calculator!

[@ArjanCodes]

Haha, Thanks

[@arvindynr]

For web Application development Macs are the best. Many softwares vendors now have stopped releasing Windows version instead releasing WLS2(it sucks) whereas Linux & mac have native version.

[@ShashankRaj]

I use Windows for literally everything I could think of. I even tried dual booting and stuff but ended up going back to Windows.

[@Snookik]

I couldn't have made TickTick using XNA+C# on a Mac ;)

[@ArjanCodes]

Good point, haha :)

[@SernickTV]

i've thought that XNA is dead since few years

[@Chalisque]

I use all three of Windows, Mac and Linux. On Windows I use Cygwin and WSL and couldn't live without bash. On Mac, zsh grates, and the keyboard confuses my muscle memory. And they way it tries to protect you... like trying to have sex in a rubber glove: may make you safer but it insulates you from what's going on a tad too much. Some things mac I like, others I dislike. Same for Windows. Same for Linux.

[@Answerx32]

It's not good, it's fantastic

[@ArjanCodes]

Thanks Paul, happy you’re enjoying the content!

[@filipvabrousek6900]

It is not good, it is the best.

[@ArjanCodes]

Thank you Filip, glad you liked the video!

[@laptoplivegaming]

"I haven't used windows for a while, so things have probably improved" I hear as I uninstall candy crash saga Mcafee antivirus some other crap!. I am a Window guy but I admit there is lots of bloatware and crap, probably telemmetry too

[@alexanderpoplawski577]

It is always nagging to use the Edge browser, which is a PIA to configure a start page without advertisings.

[@ethereal_mantis5755]

I can't believe they're not upgradable 😢

[@randomdebris]

in my experience macOS is optimized to use one screen exclusively and is perfect for it… macOS can support multiple monitors but it's not what it's UI is designed for? Also full screen app on a virtual desktop is usually fine but trying fullscreen window is asking for trouble and it's heresy to even suggest it, this is not lacking in window management (9:25) it's a fundamentally different philosophy and design choice that apple makes here. How much storage? ( minimal 100GB + 50GB/user + twice the space you need for work ) is a good rule of thumb usually & try to keep >⅓ empty so the SSD will last longer.

[@ross-spencer]

Very interesting. I’ve never got on with Mac for some reason, primarily the UI I guess. I recommend System 76 Linux Machines. Battery life could be better though.

[@ArjanCodes]

Thank you Ross.

[@max1cp]

The reality is MacOS is 10 years behind Windows. Maybe 10 years ago, MacOS was good with some innovation. But today it's not a terrible, bloated, slow, and a messy OS. MacOS has the worst parts of Windows and Linux combined. BSD is not Linux. Windows supports everything and with WSL and WSA there's no reason to ever use a MacOS. And this comes from someone who uses Mac for work daily.

[@flylord42]

The way mac addresses windows is confusing. All of the toolbars don't stick on the windows, but instead are always at the top on a mac. This is really bad design out of the box.