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Comment by chm | Hacker News Reader

I understand your point about having to give an honest shot at Windows - I bought a Win10 license some months ago. It's fine.

Until I wanted Emacs.

Until I wanted to uninstall software.

Until I wanted to setup a VM in VirtualBox (set up a Win2k12 Server VM tonight, and it simply failed to boot 3 consecutive times, then booted up in a "repair" mode, and then failed to boot again, just to boot up again after the 5-6th try. Wonderful).

Until I wanted a damned clock that keeps time (always have to manually stop/start automatic time in the options).

I really want to like Windows but I can't. It feels like it's going out of its way to annoy me. Booting up a fresh Debian install feels so much better... I just feel like I have to understand how things work much more. Linux is a sharp tool, and Windows feels like a clunky bicycle.

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The only actual _windows_ problem of those you listed is that uninstalling software is a hassle. That said, it isn't a walk in the park on Mac either.

Can't use Emacs on Windows? Use any other editor. Can't setup VM in VirtualBox? A VirtualBox (maybe) problem

If you go on Windows expecting the same environment as OSX or whatever OS you're on, you're going to have a bad time. Booting up a fresh Debian install feels better because you know what to do already.

Booting up a fresh Debian install for anyone else is likely to be an almost impossible undertaking without reading some kind of guide, if you're wanting to setup a proper dev environment.

There are problems in any platform you chose, you're probably just subconsciously sidestepping those in your process of setting up, while the Windows ones stick out to you.

Example problems I notice on Mac that are fine on Windows; Docker is extremely slow, I need to run it inside a Linux VM for any kind of proper developing Window management is horrible Installing software

Now, I'm no advocate for any OS, I love running Arch Linux with i3wm, I love OSX and I love Windows. I don't see any reason at all to hate any OS, I can setup my dev environment on practically any platform I could want with little or no difference. The only things that change are the things around my environment, the simplicity of i3wm, the task bar on OSX etc.

In my opinion Linux is the outlier here, which provides the greatest change in environment, not a bad one mind you, just a difference. Mac and Windows are mostly interchangable, I can switch betweem them with little overhead.

> Can't use Emacs on Windows? Use any other editor.

But... to Emacs users, there is no "any other" editor :)

// That being said, it's possible to run a native Windows build of Emacs, I remember doing that at some point. It wasn't overly nice though, and you have to delve into the whole msys/mingw/cygwin thing.

Stackoverflow answer for how to run Emacs on Windows' WSL.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/39182483/how-to-use-x-win...

It's like they don't even try. After a lifetime of looking down at Windows users, most Mac users go into Windows looking for reasons to validate the way they already feel towards it (irrational hatred) and don't allow themselves to like anything about it. They hit a couple of bumps in the road and quit in frustration and use those as excuses for their decision to retreat back into their comfort zone.

Don't be that guy.

I am proud to say that I can fully configure a dev environment and work on any major OS out there. Linux (Debian and Redhat based), OSX, and Windows.

Currently, I'm glad I'm no longer bound to OSX (deprecated OS, overpriced hardware) or limited to Linux (no gaming and no adobe suite). I'm on a constantly evolving OS ran by a forward thinking company on hardware upgradable through the next decade. It can only get better from here. I got no worries.

> Can't use Emacs on Windows? Use any other editor.

I dont understand what you are trying to say there.

My point was that not having Emacs in Windows is a non problem because the editor market is oversaturated. It's not like the Adobe suite where any other product is almost a downgrade, so running a system that can't run Adobe products would be a liability.

Not being able to run Emacs as a reason not to use Windows is like saying; Damn! PulseAudio doesn't work on Windows, guess I'm back to Ubuntu.

I am not the biggest fan of emacs but for what it is it is more on par with people saying "I dont move to Linux because it does not run Adobe products".

There is no alternative for emacs if gimp does not count as alternative for photoshop.

If that's true, then not being able to run Adobe software in Linux is not a reason to not use Linux.

Alright, I was feeling quite whiny yesterday. My opinion of Windows is not that bad - I bought a license, which is enough said :)

I don't prefer OS X over OpenBSD or Debian. What I like is that I can mostly just hop from one to the other without doing a context-switch. Things (mostly) work as I expect them to from one box to the other. That's not true for me on Windows (but that is to be expected).

I learned about computers on Windows, from 95 to Vista (briefly touched it and then left for Unix). I used to memorize countless contextual menus and options and paths between each, so that I would see how to solve a problem when it arose and could diagnose it without access to a computer. I still do not have the same ease with Unix.

What I have gained by using Unix is real knowledge about how computers actually work, not only how the OS itself is built. And in my anecdotal experience, typical users of Windows (at work, college and friends) unequivocally understand and know less about computers than typical users of Linux do. That is true of Mac users in general but the effect is less pronounced than with Windows - most Mac users that I know have a basic understanding of the command line.

But take this for what it is: personal experience.

I run Emacs on Windows just fine. Cygwin Emacs + Cygwin Xserver works pretty well. Ubuntu on Bash on Windows is better by some measures though. You might like that one.

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