There's so many posts on here that say fuck apple or Microsoft only real programmers or computer users run Linux. Maybe step back and reflect why these companies got big. Maybe the programmers in their development teams are actually good. Maybe variety and competition and different focuses is good for us and consumers.

To put it in perspective I have a Mac mini as my grocery, MacBook air as my laptop, gaming rig where I do passional programming projects and media management, and then a Linux box acting as my file server.

A true artist can work with any medium on any canvas!

My only problem with Microsoft, in my early years, was the way they treat standards to try and make them as proprietary as possible , and now with windows 10 and the spying trend .

@skonteam How can you say that when Microsoft are the reason we can now run different types of OS on different hardware? Companies were trying to lock everything down in the 80's, but Microsoft changed all that by creating an OS that could run anywhere.

Honestly I could argue this for hours and have done many times already on here.

@drRoss Indeed, if it wasn't also for microsoft back then, we would all be ranting on IBM and its proprietary stuff :)

Microsoft and Apple got to where they are by cutting the throats of all the companies below them and using shady business tactics. Even if that weren't true (which it is) it's also partially because normal users car more about a pretty ui than actual functionality and performance. If you consider yourself a programmer then you should care about the ui being a little weaker. As a programmer you could only care about funtionality an performance. If you really cared about the programs you write and the customers you sell them to, you'd use the better operating system so that you can make a higher quality product. Them being big companies has nothing to do with their products, it has to do with the way they market them. Have you seen windows 10? It's an atrocity!

@SlipperyKoala The operating system doesn't make your program instantly better because you consider it 'superior'. What an absurd statement.

@SlipperyKoala Actually, usability might have something to do with their success. Users care more about that than performance, because having to google for "ho do I do X" takes more time, than using an OS that uses 2% instead of 0,1% CPU power during idle.

Complaining about users who care about a pretty UI will *not* help your market share. Getting your act together and creating a well designed UI will.

@drRoss what are you talking about? That's exactly what it means. If my OS runs more performantly than yours then it follows that my program would run more performantly than on your poorly optimized OS. That's such a basic concept, how is it not clear to you?

@Grumpy I don't deny that their UI helped them sell their OS, I actually stated that in my comment. I was simply stating that the way they marketed made a major difference in their sales. Also, linux is free, so there was no need to market it, all that went to it did so because they saw its potential.

I will admit, I shouldn't have said performance is the only thing that matters, it's really dependant on what the purpose of your program is. But I won't yield on the fact that it's the most important thing. You should implement performance first and then UI should be added on top of the already performant system. Also, it's not a 0.1%cpu difference. It's more like a 10-15% difference.

And I am educated on UI's importance. I've taken multiple UI classes in Uni.

Way to go @DoctorDalek! I can't tell if you're rant is sincere or if you're trolling. #WellPlayed

I really like the windows environment. Linux is a great tool and I use that as well.

Either way. I have a subservient machine that does my will. It's great!

I think there's more people bitching about people bitching that people actually bitching.

@SlipperyKoala even if what you are saying is true - it ironically reflects one of the biggest issues about programs and performance. I don't make a mobile app to the standards of Samsung G7 performance, if I want to market it to the G4 as well.

Developing and testing should be for handling the lowest market specifications that will be used.

So that 1.9% CPU difference someone mentioned between Linux and Windows may stop sales on Windows. Meaning you failed to sell to the market for the sake of performance in development.

Same applies to UX. Practicing on a Windows, you can expect what your customers will stumble into and accommodate for pre-release.

That said, I think it comes down to preference and familiarity.

I use both Windows (7) at work and Linux at home and at work. Both have its pros and cons. I have a C# background (used to be Windows only), but now i am happily coding on both platforms (C#, Java, Python, you name it. Just use the right tool for the right task. And please stop those religious discussions about X is better than Y. Those discussions are already causing troubles enough in the world 😊

@SlipperyKoala qoute: "You should implement performance first and then UI should be added on top of the already performant system."

And that is precisely why you are outselled by the likes of Apple and MS. And by anyone else who starts with the user experience and then goes on to deal with the techie stuff.

The time the user spends struggling with a UI only geeks can comprehend, costs so much more than what you gain from shaving off a few CPU cycles. Just try selling a character based application (e.g. the Alpine mail client) to a non-Linux user, and you might get the point.

@Grumpy to start, user experience and user interface are not the same. Those are not interchangeable terms.

Secondly, if you want to make a system that users want to use, you have to make it fast enough for them to want it. User interface should be implemented after you have a base system. That's why it's called an interface, it's a way for users to talk to the system in a way that both parties understand.

If we lived in a world full of people with your thoughts on this matter, we wouldn't patch bugs, we wouldn't look for optimizations to the problems. If people thought like that, we'd all just say "f*** it, I don't care if the users can't use it because it runs too slow. At least it looks pretty."

I agree UI is important, but you don't start with it. You put it on top of a product. That way it can be replaced with a better one if users don't like it. All the while, you don't need to change the underlying system if it's already optimized.

I'm done with this post. Have a nice day.

@SlipperyKoala Could you please tell us what kind of systems you develop, where performance still is an issue? Video editing and maybe 3D modelling if the model is complex enough, are the only things I can think of, of the top of my head, where the computer < 5 years old still has to struggle.

And do you have any links to benchmarks that show noticeable differences between OS:es in this respect?

Since you're talking about performance, you must have based you choices on real life benchmarks, so you should be able to present them to us.

@SlipperyKoala Which is better:

A calculator that is slower but has an accurate interface or a calculator that's faster with an inaccurate interface?