Ask HN: I'm about to switch from windows to mac – what do I need to know?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21721499

by teddyuk • 7 years ago

2 5 7 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Hi,

Ive been using windows for years to a really low level (debugging user dumps etc.) but i'm thinking of getting a mac book pro and i've never really used a mac before.

My thinking is that I need a reliable laptop and want to get better with *nix like command line tools generally (I do use wsl but as windows is there always fall back to findstr/attrib etc).

I will mainly be running:

- chrome (azure, aws etc.) - vs code - pycharm - intellij

Am I crazy or does this make sense? I will use things like office but don't care about macros etc.

Just looking for encouragement really :)

Ted

jki275• 7 years ago

The tools you specify are already readily available on a Mac.

Office 2016+ I believe runs macros, earlier versions did not.

MS even has Visual Studio available for Mac now, mainly to support C# / .net development (GTK Gui).

You'll find iterm2 to be the best terminal available for Mac, it's a tool I use every day all day long.

Xcode is a phenomenal OSX native IDE, focused mostly on Swift / Objective C, C, and C++ though.

I run multiple Linux VMs using virtual box, just because I have to build things to run on embedded systems and some of the tools are difficult to setup on OSX. I think they can be, but at times it's easier to just push the easy button and build on Linux. I do nearly all my development with Xcode though, but I'm focused almost exclusively on C/C++ and sometimes Swift if I want a Gui layer for something I'm writing.

You'll want to install Homebrew, that will give you tons of tools that you're used to using on Linux.

Hexfiend is my goto hex editor.

Anaconda of course will give you all the python functionality you want.

Smartgit is a good Gui git tool.

I still use TextWrangler, it's deprecated (not 64 bit), and replaced with Bbedit which requires a subscription. This makes me sad and I'm working on switching to TextMate at the moment, but I have used TextWrangler for many years. Probably TextMate will be a reasonable replacement I suppose.

Karabiner is nice for remapping keys.

Caffeine is a handy utility to keep your screen awake.

I'm sure others will have additional suggestions. Play with it, don't be afraid to spend a few dollars on tools that will make your life easier -- everything I mentioned above is free but there are other things out there.

I love doing development on a Mac, there's no reason to be afraid of it.

teddyuk2• 7 years ago

Thanks it is just it is quite a big investment so have been putting it off.

mtmail• 7 years ago

On a new installation have a look at https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask There's packages for all the popular GUI apps. I made myself a script and it will install 20 desktop apps in one go without a single click (confirming terms of service or otherwise).

stephenr• 7 years ago

While it isn't 100% clear what sort of development you do (I assume nothing/little windows specific as you didn't mention Visual Studio "proper"), but I would suggest it's an entirely reasonable thing to do.

My only real advice would be hardware-wise, get as much memory as you can practically afford. The internal SSD can be augmented with a TB3 or USB-C external with equivalent speeds and/or lower speeds for greater GB/$ ratio, but the memory you buy it with is the memory it will die with.

I used a 2011 MBP as my main/sole machine almost every day for close to 7 years, in no small part due to an aftermarket upgrade to max out the memory at 16GB.

teddyuk2• 7 years ago

I used to do a lot of c/c++ mfc/atl but haven't used a visual studio c compiler for years.

Mainly python, c# etc.

Got it on the ram

Ask HN: I'm about to switch from windows to mac – what do I need to know?

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