
Ask HN: Switching from OS X to Linux - 0942v8653
I&#x27;m switching from OS X to Linux because I&#x27;m tired of having to have a kernel extension to remap keys and a stupid &quot;window manager&quot; just so I can hit Caps Lock+Up to make a window fill the screen. But more importantly, I&#x27;m tired of every feature and option being taken away from me. OS X is just going downhill, so it&#x27;s probably a good idea to switch as soon as possible.<p>There are a few things that I&#x27;d want in my new Linux distro:<p>- I&#x27;d <i>really</i> love to keep my OS X-style keybindings. It&#x27;s really frustrating for me to be on Windows and try to paste the system clipboard into a command line. What is it again? Shift-Insert or Control-Insert? And how do I open a new terminal window? Alt-F2?<p>- The above also goes for Emacs text editing bindings (OS X comes with C-p, C-n, C-k, C-o, C-v, etc.). I want them around too.<p>So being able to rebind keys is really important to me.<p>I&#x27;m also looking to replace a couple apps:<p>- iTerm2. I was sure this wouldn&#x27;t be a problem, but after looking more into it, apparently ... it is. I&#x27;ve heard that some emulators can&#x27;t even wrap text properly. I&#x27;d also like if it could support profile switching via escape code and other nice things like that.<p>- Alfred. Not so much for searching for applications, more for having a mini-&quot;command line&quot; that I can use from anywhere.<p>Another thing is compatibility. Of course if that was my highest priority, I&#x27;d go with Ubuntu and Unity. It seems like more and more things are starting to say &quot;Linux&quot; when they mean &quot;stock Ubuntu&quot;. I cannot stand Unity, so I&#x27;m thinking Linux Mint. I&#x27;m also giving Elementary OS a try in a VM right now, so we&#x27;ll see how that goes.
======
mntmn
Good! I switched to Debian Linux on my Retina MBP about 4 months ago fulltime
and after a few weeks of twiddling and fiddling it's super fun, fast and nice.
I'm really enjoying it.

I normalized all the keyboard shortcuts using several methods, the most
important one is to switch Cmd and Ctrl keys. I documented that here:
[http://mntmn.com/Hipster%20Linux#keyboard-cmd-ctrl-
copypaste...](http://mntmn.com/Hipster%20Linux#keyboard-cmd-ctrl-copypaste-
normalization)

I use Terminator for Terminal and set up Ctrl-C und Ctrl-V for copy and paste
shortcuts. Terminator will smartly handle Ctrl-C as a signal when there is no
selection.

I use XFCE with a custom HiDPI theme and app switcher works with Cmd-Tab. I
bound Cmd-Space to Application Finder which gives me a Spotlight-like
launching experience. For fulltext search I can recommend recoll.

I use Ergoemacs which gives me CUA-like shortcuts in Emacs, too.

Feel free to drop me an email (lukas at mnt dot mn) if you need more tips.
Almost everything can be made to work.

~~~
rohansingh
Did you do anything for trackpad gestures? My last attempt using Linux on a
MBP (~3 years ago) was abandoned because I couldn't get over not being able to
do three-finger swipes, etc.

~~~
lsaferite
I bought an MBP just to run Linux on it a few years back. The WiFi wouldn't
work and the gesture support sucked. I love Linux SO much more than OSX or Win
so it was a huge disappointment. The WiFi issues have been solved, but the
gesture support on OSX is still amazingly superior.

------
NateDad
Ubuntu 14.04 Trusty Tahr is where you want to be. It Just Works, plus there's
a huge and awesome community to help out if you have questions. I haven't
tried the derivatives, like Mint or Elementary, but I've heard good things.
Note that even though Ubuntu is based on Debian, you do _not_ want Debian...
It's release cycle is a lot slower, the UI is much less polished, and you'll
be stuck with versions of software that are really really out of date.

A note on the name and version - 14.04 means released in April 2014, and the
names go up alphabetically per release (T U V etc).

~~~
cheald
Fedora's another solid option; it's much more bleeding edge than the Ubuntu
LTS releases, but it upgrades cleanly and tends to be very developer-friendly.

~~~
yellowapple
Fedora's also a buggy mess at least 99% of the time. It's not something I
would readily recommend to even an experienced user, let alone one new to
GNU/Linux, unless they're prepared to use an operating system which is in no
way meant to be stable.

~~~
cheald
This is true if you're running pre-releases, but what kinds of issues have you
had elsewhere?

I've been running Fedora for over a decade, and while it suffers from being
bleeding edge sometimes, I don't think I've ever had stability issues or
things I'd describe as a buggy mess.

~~~
yellowapple
I've only used "stable" Fedora releases (i.e. the ones officially released,
named funny names, etc.). I think the most recent I used was whatever one came
right before Spherical Cow (or maybe Beefy Miracle; my mind has done a good
job of suppressing Fedora from my memory, which I'm thankful for, lest I be
diagnosed with PTSD); whatever it was right when Fedora had switched over to
systemd.

Fedora would throw kernel panics on seemingly-minor things. Things like
starting Xfce instead of GNOME3, for example. Things like running for more
than 15 minutes. Silly cases. The hardware was not the problem; it handled
Slackware (a non-systemd distro) and openSUSE (a systemd distro) quite
alright. Because it handled openSUSE alright, I knew it wasn't systemd itself
either (though that certainly didn't _help_ ).

Fast forward a year or so, and I'm investigating using Fedora in order to
leverage FreeIPA to authenticate against an Active Directory environment. Fine
and dandy for all of three days, after which Fedora magically forgot all my
network settings without any explicable rhyme or reason. Switched back over to
openSUSE (which also has AD integration features - and much more polished
ones, so I found), and everything worked fine for several months (after which
I ended up finding a better job anyway).

To put this in perspective, I've found everything from Debian Sid to Arch to
Slackware-current to openSUSE Factory significantly more stable than Fedora.
I've also found RHEL and CentOS to be significantly more stable than Fedora.
By some god-forsaken Beefy Antimiracle, Fedora somehow manages to fail even
harder than Softlanding Linux System (which - if you know your distro history
- was so awful as to cause Pat Volkerding and Ian Murdock to create Slackware
and Debian (respectively) in a desperate bid to give people good reason to
_not_ use Softlanding Linux System). That's absolutely depressing that an
ancient and horribly-designed distro from 1993 running on my ancient Compaq
Presario 1210 runs better than a supposedly-modern distro like Fedora.

------
aceperry
Gnome Terminal is the shit. It's totally awesome and other terms seem to copy
it, like xfce's terminal. It wraps text just fine for me, has profile
switching and lots of other features.

Funny you mention that OS X is taking away options and features. That's how I
feel about the Gnome team's approach to their desktop. But Gnome has a lot of
small programs and widgets that I find useful. Even though I use stock Ubuntu
and Unity on my main desktop, I use Xubuntu on all of my other machines. I'm
using ubuntu and variants mainly because of the simple and comprehensive
package management system. The variants are really cool too.

I'm not a fan of the Unity desktop either, but I find that once you get used
to it, it's tolerable. It's like a useable version of Windows 8, more of a
touch centric interface than a desktop interface. Fortunately all of the other
Ubuntu variants have real menus. And the variants have a high degree of
compatibility with stock Ubuntu so you can install and use things that are
made for stock Ubuntu.

~~~
to3m
GNOME Terminal is missing any way of saving the scrollback buffer to a file or
to the clipboard, which is a backwards step from iTerm2. But other than that,
it is pretty similar.

One substantial difference though (which threw me at first...) as that it's
much more reliant on keyboard shortcuts than iTerm2 is. There are a fair few
things it can do that don't have any clickable UI. So the man page is worth
examining, as is the Keybindings tab of the Preferences dialog - there are a
few things you mightn't discover otherwise.

------
bitshepherd
After over a decade of fiddling, twiddling, tweaking, breaking, fixing and
generally trying to use Linux on a desktop, I gave up and went the opposite
direction, and I couldn't be happier.

I no longer actively fight my package manager because it decides that my
kernel needs to be broken at this very moment (looking at you, openSUSE). I
don't have to deal with the twiddling that one must do to get a working laptop
setup. Drivers just work. Suspend/resume just works out of the box. Best of
all, I can get shit done without fighting with the OS.

When I ran Linux as my desktop of choice, I floated between most distros with
a pulse, trying out the ecosystem to find something that suited me. RPM, DEB,
source, you name it I ran it. I avoided the forks of forks, sticking to mostly
popular projects. In doing so, I learned that I really dislike KDE and Gnome,
and I'm not too crazy about Xfce. I've tried the minimalistic approach
(starting as far back as blackbox days) and something felt not quite right,
like there was always something missing, and no amount of fiddling, tweaking
or twiddling could rectify it.

I guess my point, if there is a point to this, is that your mileage will vary
with Linux. Caveat emptor and all that.

~~~
toadi
I'm like you. I started using linux round the time the kernel hit version 1.
It was ok because when I was young I could not afford a recent computer and
linux worked best on my hardware :)

First years of my proffesional life I installed linux on all my laptops.
Broken kernels, not working hibernate/sleep, battery life that sucked,...
Every time I bought a new laptop some new tinkering followed.

I always laughed with macbook fanboys paying for their overpriced hardware. I
switched and couldn't be more happier. Hardware is ok, OSX has a good terminal
and as long as I can access this I'm happy. Decent and nice looking
applications (I don't mind paying developers a good price for this) which are
not on windows or linux. There are points of complaint but the overal
experience of the mac and osx is still positive.

~~~
gpinkham
I suspect a lot of this is per user.. I too have been using linux since the
early days (slackware 1.1 which was kernel .99 or something like that). . I
used linux on desktops and servers.. had tons of issues in the early and
middle years with laptops.. but these last 4 or so years I have been running
Ubuntu on a bunch of laptops with no sleep issues.. no battery issues.. no
tinkering.. except to get the 3rd screen working with my lenovo.. then again
never got that working with either of my macbooks.. so individual mileage may
vary.. personally I like Linux.. but I'll probably have to go back to Mac
simply for Office.. too many office docs come my way that don't work in
Libreoffice..

------
vijucat
> I'm tired of having to have a kernel extension to remap keys and a stupid
> "window manager" just so I can hit Caps Lock+Up to make a window fill the
> screen.

I'm using Karabiner + Seil for this. I suppose Seil is the kernel extension
you mention? Is Karabiner technically a "window manager" or did you have
another app in mind?

If this is the only source of your complaints, honestly, I believe you'll have
a lot more to complain about Linux.

I understand your frustration at Apple's walled garden, though. It is...dis-
empowering.

~~~
ioxenus
there's also ControllerMate which certainly has a kernel extension.

~~~
0942v8653
I used to use ControllerMate, but it just wasn't as good. Now I use Karabiner,
but doesn't anyone else think it's a bit absurd to have to get a kernel
extension just to remap keys?

~~~
rys
Software comes in many shapes and forms. That it has to be a kernel extension
in this instance seems a bit of an odd thing to complain about.

I'd be much more concerned if Karabiner couldn't exist in a future OS X. That
you can have it, use it and have it work well is more important than the
mechanics of how it works underneath.

------
wishiknew
I switched a few weeks ago because I was tired of OS X, too. I tried every
distribution out there and the one I've kept is Debian Jessie. Debian is great
in that it's a simple and stable Gnome experience. Linux can be much more
dangerous than OS X in terms of applications crashing badly, so I like the
fact that I have an OS that I have thoroughly tested, fixed, and that won't
move much in years. And I can get both that and a few up to date packages
thanks to package pinning.

Alfred is _the_ tool that I was afraid I couldn't have. I tried a few
solutions but they just didn't do it for me. Gnome's default search bar is
hard to customize and the various launchers out there either installed huge
libraries or weren't hidpi enabled. I ended up writing my own launcher. When I
hit Win+Space, a terminal opens and runs a script of mine who relies on the
fuzzy finder fzf by junegunn. I use it to open files, search the web, log me
into websites automatically with KeePassX, handle the music that's being
played, etc.

I actually wrote an article on this but I haven't had the time to create the
blog I wanted to put it on. If you're interested, give me your email and I'll
send it to you with the code I actually use.

~~~
yaantc
I have no experience with OS X and Alfred, but from what you describe it looks
like krunner for the KDE desktop environment.

krunner is a mini-CLI you can open with alt-F2 by default (customizable of
course). It allows searching apps or the web, opening web sites, search files,
controlling music being played, or whatever really as it's extensible through
plugins.

If using KDE is acceptable to you, you can learn more here:
[https://userbase.kde.org/Plasma/Krunner](https://userbase.kde.org/Plasma/Krunner)

~~~
lectrick
Alfred is awesome [http://www.alfredapp.com/](http://www.alfredapp.com/)

It is based on an idea from an older launcher called Quicksilver
[http://qsapp.com/](http://qsapp.com/)

These types of apps have existed in OS X for a long time. I'm kind of
surprised that Linux doesn't have an equivalent yet, as pretty much any open-
source dev who uses a Mac laptop knows about the above apps.

~~~
wooger
They have existed on Linux for just as long, it's just you Mac folks haven't
heard of them as there's more choice, and all the major desktops have this
functionality built in, at least as far as app launching goes - just press the
windows key and start typing works in Unity & Gnome at least.

Less chance for market dominance from any one tool.

The coolest, ultra minimal yet featureful one is dmenu, which I haven't seen
mentioned yet. Gnome-do, Kupfer are also good.

~~~
lectrick
Nice.

In doing a bit of Googling of dmenu I found this

[http://alternativeto.net/software/dmenu/?platform=mac](http://alternativeto.net/software/dmenu/?platform=mac)

Which may be helpful for others as a general way to find alternatives for a
given piece of software on other platforms.

------
fapjacks
You're absolutely right about Linux Mint. You can think of it like a curated
Ubuntu. I'd recommend going with the Cinnamon UI. I've been using this
combination for a few years now. About once or twice a year, I fire up a few
other distros on one of my spare laptops at the house just to see where
they're at. Mint is just a step ahead of the rest.

For your "mini-command-line" utility, I'd recommend picking up Guake terminal,
and using the very easy hotkey mapper to map opening the terminal to something
dead easy, like LeftAlt+Space. Guake is totally configurable, but with those
simple hotkeys, you'll get a terminal. When you're ready to switch back, hit
the hotkeys again and it will hide the terminal (keeping your session live).
It supports multiple terminal tabs, which you can also switch between with a
configurable hotkey (I use Ctrl+Shift+o and Ctrl+Shift+p to move left and
right, respectively). Of course the display is ultimately configurable, too,
so you can have it docked basically anywhere, transparent if you'd like, or as
big or as small as you'd like. Highly recommended.

~~~
collyw
I am typing this on Mint just now.

The Cinnamon UI is nice to look at, and doesn't seem to be aimed at tablet
users (this does my head in - I am sure 90% of people work at a desktops all
day, not a tablet). But I found it would randomly start hogging the CPU and I
never worked out why.

I am on XFCE now, and its fast and stable (though doesn't look quite a
pretty).

------
dakoon2003
Try Elementary OS, its based off ubuntu and is almost a dead ringer for OSX.
It has the window management you are looking for as well as a couple of apps.
Try Synapse as a replacement for Alfred.

~~~
cheald
The recent kerfluffle in which the ElementaryOS team changed their download
page to try to hide the "free" option and said "We want users to understand
that they're pretty much cheating the system when they choose not to pay for
software" makes me _super_ hesitant to even try it. I'm not sure I want to be
using a Linux distro produced by people who think that free-as-in-beer is a
bug.

~~~
yellowapple
To be honest, I don't see that as _too_ much of a problem; Ardour, for
example, is free-as-in-speech and _technically_ free-as-in-beer (since you
don't have to buy Ardour to get the source code and compile it yourself, and
it is indeed available as a package for most distros), but still only provides
binary downloads via the website to users who pay for them. There are also
plenty of distros - like RHEL and SUSE - that are only officially available in
their paid-for versions (though both of those have corresponding free-as-in-
beer development/testing versions - Fedora and openSUSE, respectively - and
CentOS also exists as a theoretically-drop-in RHEL replacement).

Software has to be monetized somehow. SUSE and RHEL and Oracle Linux are
monetized by subscriptions to support contracts. Slackware is monetized by
sales of double-sided DVDs. Ubuntu is monetized by a mix of support contracts
and begging for donations on the download page. OpenBSD is monetized by a a
mix of donations and merchandise sales (including install CD packs and
t-shirts and such). I'm not one to believe that ElementaryOS is any more or
less sinful than any of those examples.

~~~
cheald
I don't have any problem with monetizing FOSS - I think it's awesome, in fact.
I have a ton of respect for RedHat and their business model. Ardour's model is
great, too - the product is free, but we'll sell you convenience. It's
entirely possible to have a saleable product coexist with a FOSS license.

My issue with the eOS team wasn't that they said "we want to make money for
this", but that they accused their users of being cheats for not paying them
for the software, the vast majority of which they didn't write or maintain. I
want OSS devs making money. Heck, I want the eOS guys making money, if they're
making a product that people like and want to see continued. But their tack
was pretty amazingly hypocritical.

------
bigpeopleareold
I made the switch. YMMV. However, with all the bumps I went through, I'd
rather have the minor issues I have now and then instead of going back to OS
X. I switched for the same reasons, but the lynchpin was the constant issues
installing native rubygems with the Xcode toolchain. It was always an issue I
was dealing with.

My laptop runs Ubuntu 14.04. I don't care about the window manager much, other
than the occasional lazy file-browse and notifications, since I am mostly in
Emacs/Terminal/browser and use Synapse to switch applications.

My work computer is a Mac, but do most work in an Ubuntu VM. Since I am
writing lots of JavaScript, I should feel compelled to a random test now in
then within Safari and IE (in another VM). The company paid for the computer,
otherwise I would not spend the money on one.

I like XFCE terminal, but I don't have a compelling reason why. I use multi-
term in Emacs and screen within that for development.

The only long term problem is that printing has always been flaky. But, I have
little to print, so it doesn't bother me. I just use my wife's Mac if I need
to print something.

I do miss the Emacs-style keybindings in OS X. But, I imagine that things can
be configured. I never did; I just dealt with it (even though I like Emacs
keybindings better :))

Again, YMMV. I'd commit to working it in a VM first.

------
rwbaskette
I have not had luck finding an equal to iTerm2 on Linux. While there are many
to choose from, few combine all the features (color support, themes, layouts,
configurable hot-keys for navigating panes, etc.) in one package.

The one thing I miss the most is having nearly border-less panes for differing
font sizes. To my knowledge, that can't be done on tmux or screen.

I'd welcome any suggestion of a terminal with the features of iTerm2.

~~~
lorenzfx
Or give a tiling window manager [0] a try. My favorite is i3 [1].

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager)

[1] [http://i3wm.org/](http://i3wm.org/)

~~~
neilellis
+1 i3 is pretty darn good. Would be great if it was a _little_ more user
friendly though :-)

~~~
greggyb
I'm just curious what parts you find not quite user friendly enough?

~~~
neilellis
Oh it would be nice to have reminders for keyboard shortcuts, in status bar
when you press the meta key etc. Since you're relying on a lot of memorising -
that would be a huge asset.

------
meesterdude
Here here! I recently did this - well, I moved to a linux VM. Somewhat.

First, I did not move everything; I only moved my dev enviroment. I have
things bound to OS X and I can't say goodbye just yet entirely. But with
everything in a VM I have a nice walled garden that i know will work, and I
can update OSX with less hesitation as most of my time is spent in the safe
world of the VM.

It also makes it easy for me to copy it over to my laptop (I'm on an iMac) and
continue what I was working on from there; or to just reboot into windows and
play some PC games. And being able to do branching at a machine level can come
in handy too.

Anyway. To answer your questions about distros. I started with centos but it
does not appear to be a great desktop OS, and chrome doesn't even support it.
But I also noticed the font renderings in the browser were notably crappier,
and ubuntu has a package to make that not suck so much.

So, I went with linux mint. I do NOT like the fact that the firefox it comes
with prevents you from using google as your search engine (at all) because
mint wants a cut of google's profits; so you simply can't use it. That still
gets under my skin. But you can download Firefox directly and get around that,
which is what I did.

But basically, anything ubuntu based. as much as I otherwise dislike ubuntu,
it'll equate to the least tinkering required.

Otherwise my apps haven't really changed - everything I used regularly in OSX
is in linux.

Some of the copy/paste behavior is nutty, but I haven't looked into tuning
that yet to be honest.

But otherwise, I'm pretty happy with the move and the solution. If OSX gets
worse I can move more into the VM.

~~~
beecup
Are you using a remote VM or are you running it local? I'm using a decent
MacBook Pro (2014) with 8GB of RAM, but running an Ubuntu with VirtualBox is
performant enough to work in it. Or are you just ssh'ing into your VM ?

~~~
meesterdude
Running it in a local virtualbox VM. I have a 4-core imac with 16 GB of ram
and throw all 4 cores at it and a good portion of the RAM. Going with a fixed
disk size instead of dynamic gave a notable performance increase, too.

------
bketelsen
I switched from OS X to Linux a few months back, and I'm never going back. I
thought like you did originally, that I needed something "standard" like
Ubuntu, but found Ubuntu does too many things and installs too many things.
Instead I'm now using Arch Linux and i3 Window Manager. It's a long stretch
from the beautiful Mac UI that I used for the past 15 years, but as a
programmer I can't stress enough how awesome it is not to move my hands off
the keyboard for 95% of the operations I do. Almost no mousing required at
all. It got even better when I hacked in a few Gnome bits (gnome-session &
gnome-keyring) so I could have a more comfortable experience. Nothing will
replace the well-written apps you expect on your Mac, but generally if you can
live with working-but-uglier apps on Linux you'll be fine. And given that
unless you specifically develop apps for Macs, you're probably deploying on
Linux anyway, you'll enjoy developing closer to the production metal.

~~~
0942v8653
Thank you for the comment! I've installed Arch Linux and i3 in VirtualBox and
it is really fast. I don't mind the looks really—in fact, I like them much
better than the flashy animations of OS X. It all feels much more focused.

I'm wondering, though, what terminal emulator do you use? I tried terminator
first because it seemed the most featureful, but its central feature seems to
be duplicating a lot of functionality that i3 already has. A few people have
suggested gnome-terminal, which I like.

~~~
bketelsen
I've used LilyTerm, Terminator, and a few others. I've been using gnome-
terminal for maybe a month now, and haven't found a reason to change.

------
edcastro
I say Fedora, it's the easiest Mac (EFI) install that always works and it's
packages are constantly upgraded, closest to a rolling-release you can get
without having to work some magic.

I use it on a MBP2011 and it runs flawslelly, I currently setup my computers
with Ansible. If you want as a rough guide you can check out what I did
specifically for the MBP on my Ansible playbook here:

[https://github.com/edgard/fedora-
install/tree/master/roles/m...](https://github.com/edgard/fedora-
install/tree/master/roles/macbook)

Also, give it a look at the common-workstation role where I setup some
defaults for my desktop computers like font rendering, apps and so on:

[https://github.com/edgard/fedora-
install/tree/master/roles/c...](https://github.com/edgard/fedora-
install/tree/master/roles/common-workstation)

------
coldpie
I'm a big fan of XFCE for your DE/WM. It allows you to set loads of keyboard
shortcuts for various WM activities like launching programs, switching
workspaces, moving/resizing windows. As far as non-WM activities, look
elsewhere in this thread for program recommendations.

The only Linux distro I can stand is Arch Linux. It will require you to become
a sysadmin (comfortable with a shell, editing a few config files here and
there, and following instructions from the wiki), but you sound comfortable
with that. Arch will never break beyond recovery for you. It's a very simple
distro that doesn't try to "do everything" on your behalf. Other distros like
Ubuntu, Mint, and Fedora all seem to have a significant chance of self-
destructing when I update them. Arch just keeps working. I've been using it
exclusively for over 7 years.

~~~
trey-jones
My experience with Arch and updates is exactly opposite. Specifically, if I
boot up a computer with Arch on it that has been sitting in a corner for a
month or so, updating is almost guaranteed to break everything. I think this
is just because of frequency of Arch updates. If you update every day, then
it's probably no big deal. But then I find the same is true for other distros
(go too long without updating software, updates break things). Personally I
use Debian more than anything else, and that's mostly because I'm most
comfortable and familiar with it.

Personally I use OSX (still Mavericks, for now) for development, but almost
all of the code that I write gets executed in Linux VMs (often through
Vagrant). For me, this eliminates most of the headaches that come from
developing using open source technologies in a non-free environment. I'm sure
it creates some headaches of its own, but I find it works well for me.

~~~
deong
Arch is arguably worse than most about this, because their rolling
repositories dump versions after a couple of updates are available. So if you
wait too long to update, it can't even figure out how to get started, because
it no longer has the slightest idea what the packages you have installed even
mean.

Don't get me wrong, I like Arch a lot, and I've been using it as my main Linux
distribution for the past five years at least. But if don't do a full "pacman
-Su" at least once a week, it's absolutely going to shit the bed at some
point.

~~~
coldpie
I guess I'm kind of surprised that people are OK with updating infrequently.
Don't your distros distribute security updates? How long do you wait before
applying them?

~~~
adultSwim
I just want to use my computer. I don't want to just constantly administer it
instead.

I usually don't want new features. I'd often rather have what's already there
fully working. The lack of finished software available (e.g. TeX) is
astounding.

------
Iridiumkoivu
Sounds like you want Debian or Debian-based distribution. I recommend you'd
try vanilla Debian first because it gives you only what you want when you want
it. No extra BS.

If you did like older OS X (10.6) you'd probably want to at least try
Elementary OS which is essentially a Ubuntu on steroids and without the
Canonical's BS trying to attain the polish of OS X. I would stay away from
Mint as much as possible because it's not well optimised distribution in my
opinion.

Even if you choose Ubuntu, you can always replace the complete desktop with
something else. For example you can have Ubuntu without Unity. In fact many
people do run Ubuntu with Gnome 3, KDE 4, Enlightenment e17, XFCE, CDE, or
something else.

If Linux isn't your thing you probably might want to also check out what
FreeBSD (or PC-BSD) camp has to offer. It might be little bit more familiar
for you. And if you really want, you could run Darwin with XNU kernel and have
a free and open source system which is made out of the same blocks that form
the core of the OS X.

iTerm is pretty handy on OS X. There are lots of terminal applications out
there for GNU/Linux. E.g. Gnome Terminal is pretty damn good and does wrap the
text. But that doesn't mean it's the only one out there.

As for Alfred... there are several different similar "Quicksilver"
replacements. I'd suggest that you check Gnome-Do. But again it's not the only
one out there. You might also find it funny and useful to use something like
Guake Terminal which is Quake's console stylish terminal that you can access
by pressing tilde.

I'm giving you Gnome programs but KDE has its own completely equivalent
programs too.

If you're new to GNU/Linux you probably want to start with KDE or XFCE.
(Disclaimer: I'm using XFCE because it's flexible and small.) You probably
might find the kind of polish OS X offers in Gnome 3 but it requires quite a
bit of tuning to "feel good" as a DE.

------
v4n4d1s
Try one of the ubuntu flavours. [http://www.ubuntu.com/about/about-
ubuntu/flavours](http://www.ubuntu.com/about/about-ubuntu/flavours) I'm
currently working with Xubuntu. I have no idea about replacements for your
applications.

~~~
ptaffs
I notice Bodhi Linux have recently released 3.0, I'd been using an older
release. I'm a sysadmin command-line person, I like bash and a good terminal.
Bodhi had visually appealing features, separating them from the Windows95 feel
most other desktop Linux has. I switched to XUbuntu recently as while Bodhi
and Enlightenment and Terminology are slick, they were missing critical
features like copy/paste between applications and some functions needed a
mouse. For their challenging the dull GUI status quo, i applaud them. I have
recently been satisfied, like you, with Xubuntu and I am not using any jazzy
or alternative terminal emulator.

------
tehwalrus
After a MacBook air crash, I ended up on Debian/XFCE. This was more out of
necessity than choice, as I could only afford a laptop with very limited
resources.

I would recommend Fedora (what I'm using at work), if you like stable/reliable
packages (Debian also wins here), especially if you're not requiring the
latest and greatest everything.

In terms of UI, I really like what Elementary OS did, but they don't update
their packages with any frequency (the current release is over a year old.)
XFCE gives the customisability / get-out-of-my-way feeling that I sometimes
want on OS X, but be warned that no Linux UI can match apple hardware and
software for gestures.

In all, it's a minefield. Format a separate /home, and be ready to jump
distros a few times to start with.

------
eligundry
I use Manjaro[0] because it's got all the advantages of Arch (rolling release
and AUR for pretty much any package you'd need) with none of the setup time. I
use the XFCE version, which, if you weren't aware, is one of the most stable
DEs ever. I've yet to have it crash on me in the three years I've been using
it. Also, all the keyboard shortcuts are modifiable, so you shouldn't have any
problems with it.

To replace Alfred, I use Synapse[1]. It doesn't have as many features as
Alfred, but it does allow for shell commands to be run from it.

iTerm2 is the gold standard when it comes to terminal emulators. TBH, no
console really comes close to it. In my experience, the only one that is even
comparable is Konsole, which is for KDE. Installing it on a non KDE DE
requires a lot of other KDE packages and looks like garbage in it, so I
wouldn't recommend do that. I find that Terminator[2] is perfect for my needs
when paired with Tmux.

[0] [https://manjaro.github.io/](https://manjaro.github.io/) [1]
[https://launchpad.net/synapse-project](https://launchpad.net/synapse-project)
[2]
[http://gnometerminator.blogspot.com/p/introduction.html](http://gnometerminator.blogspot.com/p/introduction.html)

~~~
collyw
Thumbs up for Manjaro from me.

Its a bit more faff to set up than Ubuntu, but has way less error messages and
problems. Likewise I have been "downgrading" my desktop since Ubuntu started
with Unity. Reached XFCE, and I am pretty happy with that these days.

------
brudgers
I switched from Windows to Linux increasingly over the last 18 months. I'm
currently running Ubuntu Studio 14.10. Studio is an "official flavor" of
Ubuntu:

    
    
       + based on XFCE rather than Unity.
       + packaged with audio, video, and graphics applications.
       + defaults to a low-latency kernel.
    

My reasons:

\+ I don't think there's anything wrong with Unity, I just don't fancy it.
Ubuntu on the other hand is really well supported and there's even
StackExchange's AskUbuntu for support.

\+ All those creative apps are stuff that I think are cool, but I probably
would not download most of them left to my own devices and I would curse
profusely while trying to configure them.

\+ The default to low-latency kernel is something that I had to work around
until I installed and ran Grub-Customizer [1].

What I like about Linux is that it doesn't keep changing, and that it's
relatively easy to find expertise in regards to settings...the expert signal
to amateur noise ration is higher than with Windows [and probably OSX].

[1]: [https://launchpad.net/grub-customizer](https://launchpad.net/grub-
customizer)

------
AnduA
I'm currently using Ubuntu 14.04 at work and 14.10 on my personal laptop. For
a few months I've been using it exclusively at home, without having the need
to dual-boot Windows. Even though I've wanted to get a MacBook Pro for the
last couple of years, I've started to change my mind because Ubuntu simply
rocks. First of all, it's really fast. My personal laptop is 5 years old and
Ubuntu seems to be more reliable and a lot faster than Windows. Moreover, I've
seen benchmarks suggesting that for some applications it's also faster than OS
X.

I've tried out different desktop environments but I'm sticking with Unity for
now. It's really simple to use and clean. I do most of my work in the terminal
anyways. If you guys want to make Unity look better, I suggest trying out the
Numix themes and icon packs. They change Unity almost completely and make it
look a lot stylish. It also works in Gnome3.

In what regards terminal emulators, I recommend Terminator. I use it because
it allows arranging terminals in grids, which comes in handy especially at
work. It is based on Gnome Terminal.

------
bigger_cheese
I switched from Linux to OS X around 2004/2005 and switched back again late
2011-ish. I use Fedora with Cinnamon DE currently.

I loathed the OS X interface I really only used it because the Macbok Pro was
a really good piece of hardware (I still think the MBP's trackpad was the best
I've used on a laptop) and OS X was "Unix enough" for me to put up with the
short commings - adding an app store icon to the dock after an update (without
asking me) was the straw that finally made me quit - My laptop is not a phone
Apple.

Linux's strength and it's weakness is the myriad of choice it offers, there's
enough flexability on offer such that you can usually get it setup how you'd
like it, the downside is you may need to spend time configuring it to get it
into this state.

Things like your terminal request - all I can say is don't feel obligated to
use the distro defaults try a few different terminals until you find one your
happy with. That's a good rule of thumb for all things linux - just because
the distro defaults one way it doesn't mean you are obligated to adopt those
defaults.

------
lettergram
I really enjoy Gnome on Arch. I have a lot of experience with Linux (i.e. most
of my life), but it's been getting significantly harder to destroy your system
by updating. Just make sure you do everything through the repo.

I chose Arch because it is _usually_ on the ball with new kernels. Ubuntu and
Debian (I found) had many issues with newer hard ward, though any hardware a
year or two old was usually supported.

------
parski
Being an OS X user myself I would lie if I said the thought hadn't hit me to
switch to another Unix or Unix-like OS. Most notable candidates for me were:

Elementary OS Looks great and Ubuntu based so there's a thriving community
around it. Sort of.

Crunchbang Linux Looks interesting. Didn't look into it much more than just
click around on their website.

FreeBSD My weapon of choice for servers. I bed it'd make a mean desktop but
there'd surely be a lot of work to set things up.

When I'm on Linux desktops the things I miss the most are Safari, Xcode,
Alfred and Adobe Photoshop. Not to mention the polish. The things I miss in OS
X are a proper volume manager (like the one in Windows where you can control
the volume of individual applications or mute them), case sensitive file
system (I know you can set this but I don't because of legacy script
compatability) and an out of the box package manager/port tree. Yeah I use
brew but the volume thing is driving me nuts having gone from Windows.

~~~
ixwt
> Crunchbang Linux looks interesting...

I thought I should point out the core developer of Crunchbang linux has ceased
development[0].

0)
[http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=416493#p41649...](http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=416493#p416493)

~~~
parski
This is true. There is also this:

[https://crunchbangplusplus.org](https://crunchbangplusplus.org)

Hopefully the OS is more stable than it's development.

------
psychometry
I'm in the same boat, but I'm worried I won't find a music library manager as
robust as iTunes. Most I've found don't have support for things like smart
playlists and shuffle by groupings.

------
trebla
You can even change the unconfigurable lxterminal from lubuntu to use OS X
keybindings. Run apt-get source lxterminal. Then change the bindings in
src/lxterminal.h (change <CTRL><SHIFT>C to <ALT>C and the same change for V,
for paste). Then run apt-source --commit to commit your change locally and
finally dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc to build your modified lxterminal.

Edit. And change other keybindings in .config/openbox/lubuntu-rc.xml. For
instance change keybind key="C-Left" for GoToDesktop left to get the same
binding as in OS X.

------
ppurka
For a terminal, you can give terminology a try:
[https://www.enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/terminology](https://www.enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/terminology)

~~~
kenny_r
Wow, I had never heard of this but it's really cool. It comes with a couple of
commands that are really impressive.

tycat can put an image inline in your terminal. tyls gives you an inline
folder view with thumbnails that you can click and preview.

Feels like a thoroughly modern terminal emulator.

------
kfnic
As an Alfred replacement check out Kupfer[1], it's got a number of plugins to
interact with different applications I use. It's actually the reason I went
searching for and found Alfred to replace the functionality on my Mac.

I haven't used iTerm on OS X, but Terminator[2] might be worth checking out as
a Linux replacement.

1\. [http://engla.github.io/kupfer/](http://engla.github.io/kupfer/)

2\.
[http://gnometerminator.blogspot.com/](http://gnometerminator.blogspot.com/)

------
Iridiumkoivu
I want to add that if person wants a very OS X like desktop for GNU/Linux then
Étoilé DE is very much the thing.

[http://etoileos.com/etoile/](http://etoileos.com/etoile/)

Only downside is that it isn't very mature yet. And in fact is in a need of
developers. Alternative to Étoilé is the Window Maker with GNUStep and
GWorkspace but it isn't everybody's cup of tea.

[http://www.gnu.org/software/gnustep/](http://www.gnu.org/software/gnustep/)

------
dethstar
I use open box and I have

custom key bindings. Anything that I want.

About alfred: I have this script from crunchbang that uses dmenu and then
displays and allows you to search for a binary to run. Also just alt+f3 in
most DEs will open a dialog that you can run binaries/scripts in your path
with.

If what you want is something more along the lines of a terminal where you can
see the output, there's extensions for most DEs where a terminal will be
opened on certain key combination and place it somewhere and hide it
immediately when you're done with it.

------
gp7
I installed Linux Mint on a laptop a couple weeks ago and I used it about 8?
hours over all before it had a kernel panic that screwed up its boot sequence
(my diagnosis got as far as MDM or upstart itself being the culprit but I
wasn't exactly gonna continue using it). I went to Arch instead--the setup
time might look a bit tedious but I think it's invaluable in demystifying how
to make linux behave the way you want it, rather than trying to prod a distro
into something workable for you

------
amirouche
Unity isn't the only Dekstop in Ubuntu you have most if not all known WM &
Desktop available. KDE is the prefered Desktop for its polish and lot
settings, but never used it myself. I use GNOME3, it works. It has extensions
written in JS and a two "Alfred" like GUI CLI (one with search and another
without).

emacs: you can probably import OS X version settings.

iTerm2: I don't have that problem in gnome's terminal that said it's kind of
limited, screen & tmux are much more powerful.

~~~
terhechte
with "emacs" OP refers to an OSX feature where every text field / input box in
every app / dialog of the system supports the basic emacs bindings. So whether
you're in Safari, Chrome, Numbers, Office, TextEdit, Photodesk, or any other
app, the basic emacs movements commands always work (apparently the original
NeXT hackers were big emacs fans).

I'm running various Linux distributions in a VM from time to time, and this is
something I really miss. I'm not sure if Elementary OS maybe has this though,
never tested it.

~~~
zurn
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-key-theme "Emacs"

Yeah, the fact that there isn't UI for this basic pref says a lot about the
relationship between desktop environments and "power users"...

(source: [http://askubuntu.com/questions/181532/emacs-keybindings-
in-u...](http://askubuntu.com/questions/181532/emacs-keybindings-in-
ubuntu-12-04))

~~~
0942v8653
I just tried that in Elementary and it doesn't work :(

I'm sure I'll find a way, but I'm starting to realize that the Cocoa Text
System is pretty great compared to what other OSes have.

~~~
tomjakubowski
What didn't work about it? I have this in my .gtkrc-2.0:

    
    
        gtk-key-theme-name="Emacs"
    

And this in ~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini:

    
    
        [Settings]
        gtk-key-theme-name = Emacs
    

If those settings appear in both places, after restarting a GTK+ application
the bindings should just work. They actually work better than in OS X because
you're free to use the Alt/Meta shortcuts to skip words without reaching for
the cursor keys.

There are a couple of GTK+ applications that annoyingly override the
shortcuts, like Pidgin for example (which binds C-w to "close window").

------
dz0ny
Gnome3 is also nice
[http://i.imgur.com/8ZxohmT.png](http://i.imgur.com/8ZxohmT.png) :)

[x] - I yet to have see terminal emulator shipped with ubuntu that doesn't
wrap text

[x] - Gnome 3 has Alfred like search over files, apps, windows... also mutate
([https://github.com/qdore/Mutate](https://github.com/qdore/Mutate))

~~~
jkaunisv1
What are you using to browse HN? I would love to have a "fold" option for
browsing comment threads.

~~~
dz0ny
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hn-special-an-
addi...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hn-special-an-addition-
to/cchaceegbflphbdpfocjalgjhjoahiia?utm_source=chrome-app-launcher-info-
dialog)

------
rey12rey
For compatibility, I use Ubuntu but without Unity. I've switched Unity out for
i3wm[0]. I've set up Terminator[1] to handle multiple profiles and to handle
Copy and Paste better.

[0]: [https://i3wm.org/](https://i3wm.org/) [1]:
[https://launchpad.net/terminator](https://launchpad.net/terminator)

------
timbit42
I recommend Xubuntu. It's Ubuntu but with XFCE instead of the 1GB of RAM
sucking Unity UI.

I recently switched to Xubuntu from Linux Mint XFCE. The Linux Mint distros
are a bit nicer, but they do not support dist-upgrade so you have to do a
complete reinstall when you want to upgrade to the next version. Xubuntu
supports dist-upgrade.

~~~
clebio
I second Xubuntu. Out of the box, it works great, looks good, and Ubuntu has
very good hardware support these days (trackpads with multi-finger scrolling
works, for instance).

Kubuntu is ok, but sometimes terribly laggy (like when logging in).

------
fit2rule
For a terminal on Linux: use terminator..

[http://gnometerminator.blogspot.co.at/p/introduction.html](http://gnometerminator.blogspot.co.at/p/introduction.html)

Alfred: use Kupfer on Linux.

Linux Mint: gets my vote! Also consider one of the non-Unity versions of
Ubuntu.. I love my UbuntuStudio rig.

------
rgoomar
Try Manjaro. It's my favorite distro and has amazing driver compatibility out
of the box. It's also based on Arch Linux so there are rolling updates and no
need to worry about release cycles breaking your machine. It's essentially the
"Ubuntu" of Arch Linux

------
dreid3
Currently dual booting Ubuntu and Windows at home to get my feet wet with
Linux. At work I use a Mac and the closest thing I've found to Quicksilver or
Alfred is Mutate.

[https://github.com/qdore/Mutate](https://github.com/qdore/Mutate)

------
coding4all
A Linux OSX clone => [http://elementary.io/](http://elementary.io/) . You can
also find a new distro by using
[http://distrowatch.com/](http://distrowatch.com/)

------
gprasanth
So I wanted to warn you about the sad state of Linux Wi-Fi [1], but Alas! That
link is rotten!

[1] -
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8075880](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8075880)

------
lorenzfx
While I never used Alfred, it sounds like rofi[0] might be for you (if you
like the minimalistic design).

[0]
[https://davedavenport.github.io/rofi/](https://davedavenport.github.io/rofi/)

------
bryanlarsen
I'm not sure how well it compares to iTerm2, but check out terminator.

~~~
phireal
My personal favourite terminal on Linux is yakuake (global hotkey for bringing
the window to the foreground is really useful).

~~~
andion
On the same line you have Tilda
[https://github.com/lanoxx/tilda](https://github.com/lanoxx/tilda)

I used the three of them and always ended using Tilda. Be sure to install
1.2.2 (from the gh repo) so you can even use Solarized colors (the one on the
ubuntu was 1.2.1 last time I checked).

Xfce's default terminal emulator also has this hotkey feature now.

------
gpinkham
personally I prefer Linux on a Lenovo hands down.. (calm down fan boys.. it's
a personal preference). But the Mac has some nice things.. I do like the UI of
the Mac better than Unity.. though I hate the menu bar only showing on one
screen.. always had to tinker with the Mac to get that on multiple screens..
the biggest thing I need from the Mac isn't really Apple's.. Its M$ Office..
Every day at work I get a spreadsheet or a word doc that just doesn't quite
work in Libreoffice..

------
vkjv
I use Mint 17 Mate Edition--Mate is the fork of Gnome 2. It just works and
gives me a familiar interface.

You might want to check out guake as a terminal and gnome do as a quicksilver
replacement.

------
owly
Good discussion! I just started using Elementary on an old spare system to try
it out and I like it so far. Going to try all the cool utilities people have
recommended. Thanks!

------
rnhmjoj
About iTerm, I have found this one:
[http://finalterm.org](http://finalterm.org) I have never tried it but it
seems great.

~~~
wwarren
"Final Term is in heavy development and neither stable nor feature complete!"

~~~
rnhmjoj
I know. I shared at least to keep an eye on the project.

------
benwaffle
gnome-terminal has text wrapping

[https://github.com/emgram769/lighthouse](https://github.com/emgram769/lighthouse)
is like alfred

------
swah
Please, linux users, mention your experience with high-res displays since many
of us would like to move to a 4k display in the near future.

~~~
zumtar
I'm not running a 4K display on my laptop but a QHD+ HiDPI display (with a
resolution of 3200x1800).

I've settled on Debian Jessie(testing) with the Cinnamon desktop environment
and Opera Beta as my web-browser, it all works perfectly and the clarity is
wonderful and couldn't imagine ever using a non-HiDPI screen again.

------
_ZeD_
regarding the terminal, ATM I just use terminology [0] on one machine and
yakuake [1] on the other one I usually use.

[0]
[https://www.enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/terminology](https://www.enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/terminology)
[1] [https://yakuake.kde.org/](https://yakuake.kde.org/)

------
swah
Could anyone that did Youtube videos for a living live with only Linux? Is
there a very good solution for recording your screen?

~~~
MattGrommes
I've made a number of Minecraft videos on linux using ffmpeg and editing using
Kdenlive. If you google for linux screen recording there's a bunch of good
options, including much friendlier options than a long ffmpeg command.

------
harkyns_castle
Mint has been my choice. I'm not 100% happy with it, but its the best I've
found so far for a desktop experience.

~~~
harkyns_castle
Edit: Even had a few Steam games transfer over, which was cool. I've had some
issues with Java support, but most people wouldn't care about that, and fairly
random, as in the Toolbar support. I don't particularly trust who owns the
distro, and if someone pointed me at a better one, that is wholly open source,
would change in a flash, but I've liked it so far.

~~~
harkyns_castle
Ubuntu lost me with me the abortive Unity interface, and sending my queries
back to base.

------
contingencies
OSX => Gentoo, iTerm2 => _gnome-terminal_ , Alfred => _mlocate_ / window-
manager command shortcut.

------
johnward
Can anyone explain why OSX apps don't have a maximize button? The full screen
button is just terrible.

~~~
spike021
Hold 'alt' when you click the green full-screen button and it'll maximize.

~~~
johnward
It still doesn't actually maximize, at least for chrome. It just expands
vertically not horizontally. I also don't understand why fullscreen is the
default. I've never once, ever, actually wanted something to go full screen.

------
yellowapple
> I'd really love to keep my OS X-style keybindings. It's really frustrating
> for me to be on Windows and try to paste the system clipboard into a command
> line. What is it again? Shift-Insert or Control-Insert? And how do I open a
> new terminal window? Alt-F2?

That should be possible, but it's probably going to require quite a bit of
manual fiddling in order to get things to work with the Command key instead of
Control for CUA-style bindings. KDE makes this pretty easy, though somewhat
tedious through the GUI; all the keyboard shortcuts are managed through the
"Shortcuts and Gestures" section of KDE's System Settings.

> The above also goes for Emacs text editing bindings (OS X comes with C-p,
> C-n, C-k, C-o, C-v, etc.). I want them around too.

Should also be possible through the above-mentioned settings system if you're
using KDE. Can't speak for other desktop environments, alas.

> iTerm2. I was sure this wouldn't be a problem, but after looking more into
> it, apparently ... it is. I've heard that some emulators can't even wrap
> text properly. I'd also like if it could support profile switching via
> escape code and other nice things like that.

Konsole (also with KDE) should work nicely for your purposes, though maybe I'm
misunderstanding what you're referring to about text wrapping and profile
switching (the behavior between iTerm and Konsole regarding text wrapping
seems to be identical from what I can tell by a cursory side-by-side check,
and Konsole does support multiple profiles).

> Alfred. Not so much for searching for applications, more for having a
> mini-"command line" that I can use from anywhere.

This depends on what functionality from Alfred you're hoping to still have.
KDE's search functionality is pretty comprehensive if that's what you're
looking for. It'll also launch programs, even if they're not applications
which show up in KDE's menus (i.e. if you type in `xterm`, you'll get a "Run
xterm" option that'll - you guessed it - launch xterm).

> Another thing is compatibility. Of course if that was my highest priority,
> I'd go with Ubuntu and Unity. It seems like more and more things are
> starting to say "Linux" when they mean "stock Ubuntu". I cannot stand Unity,
> so I'm thinking Linux Mint. I'm also giving Elementary OS a try in a VM
> right now, so we'll see how that goes.

Given the above, it sounds like (to me) KDE's going to be a pretty good fit
for you. Not only can you customize it to your heart's content to match what
you're used to with OS X (and then some), but it's also one of the more full-
featured desktop environments.

My normal go-tos for KDE-based distros are openSUSE and Slackware. If you're
new to GNU/Linux, openSUSE would be better, but if you already have some
server-side GNU/Linux experience (or are very comfortable with the internals
of Unix-like operating systems - which seems to be the case if you're dabbling
in trying to tweak a Unix as opinionated as OS X), Slackware would be a fun
choice (and an excellent learning experience; the common adage - "if you use a
Linux distro, you'll learn that distro; if you use Slackware, you'll learn
Linux" \- is pretty true in a lot of cases).

That said, if compatibility with Ubuntu is your priority, I would recommend
Kubuntu, which is literally Ubuntu with KDE instead of Unity. That was my
daily driver for awhile before I switched to openSUSE and Slackware, and it
worked well.

There's also PC-BSD if you'd rather go with a BSD instead of a Linux. It's
definitely the best choice for a desktop-oriented BSD, and it ships with KDE
(if I remember right). I haven't tried using it in a long time, though (I
usually stick to OpenBSD for my own BSD needs).

------
yramagicman
I'm a Mac user who half switched to Linux. I have a linux desktop and a
Macbook pro running Yosemite. My transition was not terribly difficult. I use
ZSH and all the terminal emulators I've tried (Stock Crunchbang, Ubuntu, LXDE
on Ras-pi and xfce terminals, along with xterm, and my current favorite urxvt)
support emacs keybindings. I'm pretty sure thats a per shell thing though, as
I switched ZSH to Vi keybindings with no problem. If you don't use TMUX or
Screen, it's not hard to get the normal copy and paste bindings working in any
of the emulators I mentioned. With the exception of xterm and urxvt, ctrl-c
and ctrl-v usually just work. In xterm and urxvt, you have a little bit of
work to do to configure the keybindings, but once that's done, it just works.
I like urxvt so much that I'm actually looking to replace iterm2 with
something like it. x11.app will run urxvt, but since x is it's own windowing
system, it doesn't work with my window management on OS X. Bummer.

When I use a desktop environment my favorite desktop environment is xfce,
although I do like Elementary OS. However, normally I'm not running a DE. I
started my Linux journey dual booting Ubuntu 12.04 and Crunchbang. Eventually,
due to some dumb mistake with apt while trying to install a package on
Crunchbang (#!), I reinstalled #! and wiped out Ubuntu. (I to have a hatred
for Unity) Eventually, I discovered the Awesome window manager. I haven't
looked back since. Awesome is completely configurable in Lua, so any key
binding you want is possible. I have super+enter (super is the windows key on
my keyboard) set to open a terminal, super+w bound to open my browser, and
several other keyboard shortcuts like that. Also, Awesome 3+ has a task runner
like Alfred built in. I have it bound to Ctrl+space.

I'm still using Awesome, but now I'm on Arch. I didn't like how slow Debian
stable (the base for #!) updated, so I switched to Manjaro and loved it, but I
ran into a problem where I couldn't install a library for some software I
wanted. (I probably just didn't have the right repositories configured, but
I'll never know.) I'd been considering Arch for a while, so I did a practice
install in VirtualBox. It wasn't terribly difficult with the tutorial I found
on Youtube. After getting everything working in Virtualbox. I did the install
on my computer.

I think I've installed Arch on my machine twice now. One of those times I used
pacman to generate a list of the packages I had on one install, saved it to a
thumb drive, then wrote a python script to parse the list and install the
software I was missing. I set the script lose and got in the shower. When I
got out, everything was installed.

Last thing, the Arch wiki is an invaluable resource for all things Linux.
Sure, the package management commands are wrong, but the configuration
instructions for things aren't. Even if the files are in a different place,
the Arch wiki gives you enough info that you should be able to run find or
grep in one of the parent directories and find what you're looking for.

[https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Main_page](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Main_page)

------
mrits
See you in a few weeks.

------
wantab
Based on your complaints, it sounds to me like OSX would be perfect for you.

