He might be right, but it sure as shit won’t be MacOS replacing it.
this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2023
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Silicon Valley has run on Macs for years and years. I think it's weird too, but there it is.
It's not too weird when you consider that macOS is a UNIX operating system. So you get many of the advantages of Linux/Unix through the terminal, with better app compatibility.
I've also heard macs are cheaper to maintain en masse than windows because of simpler tooling/group policy, which would be another a big reason it's everywhere in tech.
I linked to a study upthread that shows IBM saving a few hundred dollars each when deploying Macs vs. Windows. Interestingly, the study also pointed out that employees using Macs did better on performance reviews.
XNU is an abbreviation of X is Not Unix. MacOS borrows a lot from the Unix world, but itself is not actually a form of UNIX.
It’s easier to develop (web based) software on mac than windows. It makes a lot of sense from the development side because it’s unix based while still offering all the robust AD/Corpo management features that Linux still misses in a lot of cases.
I've developed web software for 25 years, on Linux, Windows and Mac and there is no difference other than what you are personally comfortable with.
If a dev told me it was 'easier' to develop web on a Mac, I'd know they were inexperienced or just wanted a company paid Mac.
Node alone is a massive pain in the ass on windows (then again it’s a pain everywhere), but specifically working in the terminal is much easier as someone familiar with UNIX terminals. Technically windows cmd is fine, but it doesn’t handle basically anything I need for day to day work.
I’ve developed on windows too and I generally try to do anything to avoid it. Consistently having issues installing packages makes dev harder imo. Python, Node, Multiple Java versions, adhoc sh scripting and a bunch of other things are just easier on unix.
It also depends on what you develop. Web based software isn't web based software. I develop web based software as well and close to half of that is spent in a terminal. With WSL2 it became bearable under Windows. But still not as nice as on a Unix based device.
I know folks that never leave their IDE for their job. And they probably don't care much about the underlying OS. But that isn't what my job looks like or that of the folks around me. So if someone told me it doesn't matter I know they've only seen a small bubble of what web development is or can be.
lol, this truly deserves an Ok Boomer whether you are one or not.
If a dev told me it was ‘easier’ to develop web on a Mac, I’d know they were inexperienced or just wanted a company paid Mac.
First of all, if they're a good developer and they want a Mac. Fuck me just give them one yeah? Chances are they'll look for a job somewhere else if you refuse, and you'll spend how many hours interviewing / inducting / training potential candidates, rejecting most of them, and for what, to save a few hundred bucks?
Anyway you're dead wrong about web development being the same on all three platforms. Docker in particular is a completely unique beast on all three, and Docker is currently the easiest way to do web development on all three platforms. It runs native on Linux, in WSL on Windows, and in a VM on a Mac.
Of the three, the Mac is by far the worst way to run Docker. But the Mac has other advantages, just to name one they have a proper debug environment for the iPhone version of Safari. I could name others, but the only one I'll mention is the Apple Silicon chipsets are really nice.
Another important thing that Macs have is support contracts. You're not going to deploy a thousand Linux machines if the vendor doesn't provide support for it, and a lot of vendors still don't support Linux
Not necessarily. You’d be surprised. It’s generally this: what will do task X for Y cost and be maintained for Z. That and the level of control and usability and user reception will be what decides this. Not mac vs pc elitism or marketing.
Yeah… we’ll see about that….
Macs have the advantage of having Unix under the hood while being supported by software vendors.
You see pics of college classrooms full of Macs. When they do startups they might very well choose Macs just because.
He's wrong about several points. He states that Apple dominates the mobile space, but it's not even close. Android owns almost 71% of the market while Apple has about 29%.
Windows is definitely positioned to be replaced in the enterprise, but it would much more likely be Linux than MacOS. Many enterprises already run Linux and/or Windows servers and with the only thing keeping most desktops on Windows is Office...which Microsoft has been pushing to the web, although unsuccessfully.
I have heard about the death of Windows in corporations for 20+ years. Windows 11 is garbage, but I'm not sure it's enough to get companies to switch.
MacOS only is used in some Silicon Valley companies, but that's a bubble. You'd be hard pressed to find it used in the rest of the business world anywhere.
MacOS only is used in some Silicon Valley companies, but that’s a bubble. You’d be hard pressed to find it used in the rest of the business world anywhere.
As a support/sales engineer for the last 20 years, the number of Macs I see both my coworkers and my customers using is huge. And this is across lots of different markets: Aerospace, finance, software, content creation, etc.
Macs are cheaper on a TCO basis than Windows machines, with IBM finding they save $273 - $543 per Mac they deploy, and they need less than half the number of support people for Macs compared to Windows.
Mac laptops are the best hardware, but the majority of business’ will always go the cheapest route. DOS won against macs before windows existed. With most programs going web based, a polished Linux distro would win today.
ChromeOS already owns the education segment. Expect most of future small time enterpreneurs to use some kind of web-based distro.
Mac laptops are the best hardware
That's just not true. For example Macs don't support touch input and none of them have cellular either.
the majority of business’ will always go the cheapest route.
In my experience most businesses care more about features than cost. Sure, if two products have an identical feature set they'll pick the cheaper one. But a direct comparison like that is pretty rare - mostly only limited to tower PCs.
With most programs going web based, a polished Linux distro would win today.
I'm seeing more and more Android tablets and iPads, never Linux. Whenever possible I try to encourage iPads... mostly because I've never actually encountered an Android tablet that works well.
He’s probably referring to apple dominating the enterprise mobile space in which case you are right it’s not even a competition. Apple completely dominates. The environment I currently manage uses 10 corporate android devices for a very specific function and every other corporate device is iOS. Even BYOD is 90% iPhones…
The competition says the other competition won't beat them
macOS? You gotta be kidding. Windows and Office is huge.
Just the entrenchment of Sharepoint and Outlook alone is enough to make switching to anything else a difficult prospect.
I’m on a mac for work. I use outlook for email and calendars and also have office installed
25 years ago the notion that Macs would replace Windows was laughable. Apple was on the verge of bankruptcy and had to recruit users to advocate for them.
But now most of the folks I work with have Macs and the ones who don’t use Linux. The only folks who use Windows are the accountants.
With most stuff being pushed to cloud based operations, it's possible. Backends still going to be all Linux and Windows Server.
If anything this might open up freedom of choice more for the end users. But I highly doubt corpos in charge would go that route. Most will just pick the cheaper option or the option that makes then look cool/is FotM.
As far as the posts relation to Apple being majority of the market for mobile devices... that's just false lol. Also the dudes kinda heavily invested in Jamf, a management suit for Apple devices, kinda a bit biased there.
I know they exist in other fields but I’ve been a full stack web developer for almost 20 years and I have no idea what Windows Servers are preferable for except Active Directory. I never encounter them in my work and the modern web doesn’t seem to use them at all, really. Is it all legacy stuff and AD or is there an amazing use case for Windows servers in 2023?
P.S. I am (or was) Windows certified.
As far as I know the main advantage is if something goes wrong, Microsoft's support team will help you fix the problem (if you pay for support).
Tons of software only runs on Windows. At home you can get around this with things like Proton, but in the Enterprise you need support contracts, which means you need Windows.
All that enterprise software is moving to "the cloud", where they can charge per user, computation time, allocated memory, or wharever is best for they.
Much of it isn't. Honestly, apart from our ticketing system, none of the software we use where I work is cloud based. Most of what we do is latency critical, and those workloads really can't be moved.
Most traditional applications are already cloud based and containerized. There’s so many options for the cloud management of endpoints that I don’t see many companies needing to stick with an enterprise Windows domain like they needed to do in the past. Sure there will be use cases - but for most small to mid size companies it’s a no brainer.
Is this guy exclusively attributing frontend desktop experience to "enterprise"? There's more to enterprise than Word, Excel and MS Teams my guy.
It's a great way to expose yourself as not knowing literally anything about how enterprise computing works. Oh really, Microsoft isn't going to dominate the corporate space in 10 years? So what's this hot new technology that's going to replace Active Directory, group policies, etc? Sure, a lot of software has been shifting towards platform agnostic and web apps, but as far as providing your employees with computers to work on, keeping them safe from malware, preventing employees from doing certain things on those computers, controlling who can access what...there is only one operating system that is the clear winner here. Not to mention the entire UNIX security model is severely limited. Being limited to 3 permissions for 3 different classes of users is not going to meet the demands of middle management people who obsess over what permissions they are willing to give employees.
Not to mention the entire UNIX security model is severely limited. Being limited to 3 permissions for 3 different classes of users
I was using FACLs on Unix systems twenty years ago, and they were not new then.
Here's a basic introduction to the situation on Linux.
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