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Ask HN: What's wrong or missing in your favorite OS?

4 points by jayphelps ↗ HN
Whether you're a Windows, Linux, or Mac person, most hackers are very opinionated about their preferred OS.

My question is what "feature" (or lack thereof) do you secretly hate about it? You know, that thing you won't admit in _____ vs. _____ arguments?

14 comments

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spooneybarger
Mac OS X: lack of a tiling window manager. at least 50% of my complaints would be solved by that one addition. 40% of my other issues would have to gut the Finder.
jayphelps
You and me both brother. Some things I just don't get in OS X. Like the "zoom" button's inconsistent functionality. Hilarious that OS X Lion is going to change this button to go literally fullscreen now (without toolbars, desktop, etc) which might be pretty annoying too but I guess we'll see.
spooneybarger
i like the zoom to max size for content much more than zoom to whole screen but i'm someone who never uses it anyway. i have divvy which makes my life a little more manageable.
mmorris
I agree about the maximize button - after a decade of arguing for the current implementation of it (rather than the make this window fullscreen version that Windows uses) they're now finally switching it (and, of course, talking about how fantastic it is).

Rumor has it they're finally making windows resizable from any corner, too.

Of course, I shouldn't be shocked any more since Apple (and Jobs specifically) constantly play that game. I love OS X with a passion, but I can't help but chuckle at this point when they do it.

roadnottaken
Mac OS X: lack of a remote-desktop solution.

(Able to connect TO a Mac, from any other computer via RDP).

I can go from Windows to Linux, Linux to Windows, and Mac to Windows/Linux... but no way to connect TO my OSX box except from another Mac. Why?

marssaxman
Does it have to be RDP? I regularly VNC into a headless Mac mini using nothing but the built in VNC client and server.
konad
OSX comes with remote desktop, it's in System preferences, sharing .., remote desktop (I think). I don't have osx available to get the exact words.

It's just VNC. It also has an SSH server in the same section so you can tunnel through securely.

roadnottaken
Wow, thanks. I can't believe I didn't know that. I've only had a Mac for a few months.... Thanks!!!
roadnottaken
FWIW, after trying VNC on OSX (via Linux and Win7) I have to give Microsoft credit for their RDP implementation. It kick's VNC's ass for speed and usability -- no contest.

Still, it's nice to know how to do this on Macs.

konad
The VNC implementation on OSX is particularly poor. It crashes and I have to manually restart it.

On Linux the VNC is an X client so one can have multiple instances running each exposing with their own graphical shell.

Does Windows RDP do that ? (I don't know).

TightVNC works the best with low speed networks, it uses JPEG encoding too.

BTW. is is also against the Windows EULA to use VNC server on it !

kgo
OSX: Only one global menubar really sucks for multi-monitor setups.
konad
Plan9 - no modern web browser or media player.
Staydecent
I really think neither OS X nor Windows has the upper hand on the other, so I'll offer my top gripe for each.

OSX: Window/File Management. I've been told it's the "mac way" to open a program to create a file. I'm reliant on the OS/Finder to do this. Also, just basic window management is confusing to me. Perhaps Lion is addressing this.

Windows: No terminal.