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A Quick Look At Mac-On-Linux
Travis Emslander writes: "They have an article about Mac on Linux over at MaximumLinux.org. I didn't even know this project existed but it looks like you can run any MacOS app (not including MacOS X apps of course) on a PPC machine with it. I'm starting to wish I had a mac to try this stuff." Here are some more screenshots. I saw MoL demonstrated over a year ago (when OS X wasn't really an issue) and was amazed at how quickly it ran. Anyone out there using it on a day-to-day basis?
I am a Mac user, but this is how I see this might be important: one of the great things about Linux is the approach and attitude of the developers - the community, the very nature of open source, the difference from the 'closed' operating systems (including my beloved OS X). If you run Linux as your primary OS because using anything else seems like an intolerable sell-out, having the ability to emulate another OS that provides otherwise unavailable functionality is a way more viable solution that giving up your freedom just to be able to see Quicktime movies and run Photoshop. I don't feel like I have stated this very well - can someone that uses Linux add to this?
I thought "What Linux Stands For", was being able to put your own tools together, and use them for whatever you need to get done. Community or no community. Apparently, some people have/prefer Mac hardware, and would like to use Linux on it while still reaping the benefits of Mac compatibility. Who are you to tell them otherwise?
"You know why you do not see me styling wit my homies? Because I have no homies!!" -Mojo Jojo
I'm more comfortable in my Linux distribution of choice than I am in OS X. I know where everything is, I have absurd amounts of software already installed (including a toolchain I didn't have to register online to obtain), and I have little need for MacOS apps. I also prefer KDE over Aqua; Though I recognize Aqua has some bells and whistles that KDE and XFree86 lack, KDE and XFree86 have far more of the bells and whistles that I use and appreciate. I'm pretty much just happier with the software on the Linux side.
As for Mac-On-Linux, I could see using it for the occasional MacOS app... sometimes such functionality is handy. And really, if it works, why not have it around?
I've seen a lot of posts on this thread asking what "the niche" is for MOL, questioning whether Linux has any value in the Mac "market" because OS X is available, etc. My only reply, really, is that maybe those posters should stop thinking like Official Linux Salesmen and Market Strategists... if it's not your thing, fine, but trying to determine the "market" for everything (especially something that's so obviously built and supported by its "market"), as if you own a piece, is silly.
Well, many ms-supporters love to critize Linux for not running Microsoft Office. Infact the only reason why some bussinesses even use windows is because of MS Office, and fear of the unknown.
Well, finally this is a reality with MOL. The mac version of Office is very good and some would say that perhaps its even better then the Windows version. With MOl you can run linux, MS office, IE, java( not supported under linux on the mac),and even games like quake and UT, as well as photoshop. You literally have everythign you need with the satisfaction of knowning that you are not tied with Windows or paying Microsoft( unless you use Office).
Way to go hackers. I have seen MOL and I was very inpressed at its speed. Makes VMWARE look ancient and extrenely slugish. Believe me, when I say its not emulated but native. I wonder how they did it. My guess is they programmed MOL to reserve some memory addresses some and put in a layer to fool MacOS that another app is using the memory. This is to avoid conflicts. I also assume a layer is used on MOL as a data traffic controller but its not fully emulated. Probably only a layer to pass data through. Windows on the other hand likes to constantly monitor and send signals and data to hardware. Even if the computer is idle. NT does this. If you tried to trick windows on x86 linux this same MOL way, the windows kernel would panic when it couldn't send data on every cycle. I believe MacOSX uses something simular by constantly sending signals to the cpu and memory so it will probably never run natively without some emulation. Anyway keep up the good work and I will buy a G4 as my next linux box. Mol makes all the difference.
http://saveie6.com/
> Sorry, but you get paid for the end product, if you
... it would take years of work to make Linux competitive for those users, and why should the people who are making Linux want to do that when Apple is doing a good job of it already? This stuff will appear in Linux one day if the people who use and make Linux want to build it in, but it is not there now.
> do graphic arts, then gimp can do it for you
Why is it that it's never a graphic artist saying this?
> (just take a weekend of your own time and learn
> it, it's so close to photoshop now it aint funny)
It is so close to Photoshop in ways that a hobbyist can appreciate. GIMP is not on the cutting-edge of graphic design and publishing.
> as for webdesign if you dont code your html by
> hand then I am agast
That opinion is about five years out-of-date. These days you mock it up in Dreamweaver and then customize the code as required by hand or with another tool, and Dreamweaver leaves the hand-written code alone. I'd rather write scripts that automate Dreamweaver than write Web pages. The people who make Dreamweaver have researched a lot of common browser bugs and Dreamweaver takes steps to work around them. Why would I want to keep up with the lastest bug in IE just so I can code everything by hand instead of just the important stuff?
The first music sequencers only produced robotic music, and the first design-oriented HTML editors only produced crappy code. Both of these things have long since changed. If you get robotic music out of Cubase 5 and crappy code out of Dreamweaver 4, it is your own fault. The tools are advanced enough now that you have control over things.
> you can do everything (except non linear video
> editing) on linux that you do on your mac... so
> what's your excuse again?
Pro audio, QuickTime authoring, Flash authoring, DVD video authoring, easy drag-and-drop data CD and DVD burning (I make lots of big files, so a $6 4.7GB DVD-R that burns in 20 minutes with no effort to make it is very important), print graphics (no CMYK color in GIMP), and huge, huge, huge workflow advantages that come from common key shortcuts, application conventions, support for all common audio, video, and graphics formats, the best clipboard on a personal computer, scriptable/recordable GUI and high-level interapplication communication, PDF as a common format between all apps, drag-and-drop of one icon to "install" an app, or drag-and-drop to the Trash to "uninstall", amazing hardware support with drivers included in the OS so stuff just hot-plugs and you go (like a graphics tablet, or a precision mouse as a second mouse, or a whole USB/FireWire audio interface, camera/camcorder, or a hard disk).
All of this stuff saves me lots and lots of time and provides very important functionality and capabilities. A Mac is a very important tool in many industries
Coders and geeks can go ahead and make their own operating system that's optimized for coders and geeks. When Apple says that they make systems for "the rest of us", they mean people who aren't coders and geeks and can't make their own operating systems, or don't want to. Apple's customers are more interested in the fact that Mac OS X includes color-matching throughout the OS and hardware, and supports every type of font out of the box (including Windows-formatted TrueType fonts) than whether the compiler is free enough or whatever. That's for coders and geeks to worry about.
Really, Linux and Mac OS X both exist for different reasons, and they're quite complemetary. I use Mac desktops and notebooks, but my Web server is Linux. If you're doing something for which Linux is well-suited, and you have the expertise and time to set it up, it's a no-brainer. Especially when you are in a situation where you set it up once and replicate it on box after box after box with no licensing fees or associated paperwork (that is a huge advantage). It's not going to swap one-for-one with a Mac box for most users anytime soon, though.