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OSX is an OS where you run VMs for Linux and Windows. I keep seeing people saying how great and fast it is to do stuff on their mac and run Windows for a few apps incl. mail client, office suites, some dev tools and many java apps (cause they're often not so nice on OSX)

Then I see them with the Linux VM for all the dev tools, the hack tools, and so forth, because, well, hacking them up to work in OSX is always a pain, and even using stuff like brew is often a pain (+ delay)

Well I dunno, I run Linux native and I get stuff done faster than the ones running Linux in a VM of course. I also have Linux VMs under Linux when necessary, with KSM and it's a lot faster and memory efficient than when running OSX native on the same hardware.

I install stuff in about <5s where it takes a VM to boot/resume in OSX, and about 5-10min to install from scratch when the app _supports_ OSX (ages if it doesn't but has more or less compliant sources)



Yeah, me too. I have a linux computer for most development, a Macbook when I want to mess around with iOS development, and a Thinkpad for .NET development. All of these are tax write-offs and since I use the linux computer (which twice as old as the other two, by the way) 90% of the time because it's simply easier to install development related stuff. Whenever I want to install a gem that uses native headers requiring a -dev package in OSX I just quit.


I'm the opposite. I like all of my OS X dev tools (navicat, textmate/macvim (I know, gvim...)/sublime text/github for os x/things), and it's a much more usable OS overall for me. The parts I don't like, compiling libraries, running servers, etc, I automate away with vagrant. I'm more productive with this setup than if I ran everything directly in Linux (I've tried).


Running a VM also lets you isolate your dev system and simulate your production server.


Your points are valid, but running VMs, and using unix tools are not all I do with my computer. For me, running OS X is a good compromise.

I used Linux exclusively for more than four years, and I miss many things about it, but I don't think I can go back, at least yet.




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