[Gllug] Linux workstation admin simpler than OS X

[James Laver]

On 1 Aug 2009, at 01:15, Alan Marsh wrote:

> I've been using OS X as my main workstation and laptop for 5 years  
> now and CentOS for most of my server work. Prior to that I worked  
> mainly with Fedora. Over time I've setup most of the web development  
> infrastructure I need on OS X but I still find system administration  
> a real pain in OS X. So much is hidden within OS X-specific apps  
> like 'dscl' and 'launchctl', then there's the need to have an /opt  
> subsystem to get GNU stuff installed properly. It just feels like a  
> kludge all the time compared with Linux. Added to this, with each OS  
> X release so much of what's under the hood changes. I can no longer  
> open ports by number in firewall provided by System Preferences in  
> Leopard and have had a hell of a time getting Dovecot to run  
> locally. With Linux it's simple.
>
> I've been thinking of switching all of my work back to Linux as this  
> G5 and Powerbook G4 are getting old. The price of Apple hardware is  
> ridiculously expensive, considering the current recessionary trends,  
> and my pocket won't stretch to £1400 for a 15" Macbook Pro or £2000  
> for a Mac Pro when I can get Fedora on a decent laptop for £600 and  
> a powerful workstation for not much more.
>
> Anyone else find OSX system administration clunky after living with  
> Linux?

No. I don't feel a need to administrate my local machine and beyond  
that, what do I need other than an ssh client.

For development, however, you may find the setup I have more  
preferable, I run vmware fusion with debian inside it and have it  
export via NFS and mount that onto osx. I then get whatever OSX tools  
I want to interact with it and still get apache / postgres / whatever  
in debian.

That works ideally for me, and I used to top it up with macports as  
well but this time round i've given up on them. They're useful if you  
like that sort of thing.

And if you still don't want it, I wouldn't mind a cheap powerbook ;)

--James
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