Linux developers defecting to Mac OS X?
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Jun 14, 2005 at 2:17am
Lots of Java developers are eyeing the Mac and Mac OS X very favorably. However, there’s an even more potent and contentious schism brewing in the computing universe, Roger Voss, a developer who uses Java for middle-ware and C# .NET for rich client enterprise distributed software.
“Lots of folks that have been fairly bullish for Linux are defecting to Mac OS X,” he told Macsimum News. “We still see Linux as quite good as a server operating system, but we’ve become completely disillusioned with Linux as ever becoming a viable desktop OS worthy of standing toe-to-toe with Windows. There’s simply no disputing that Mac OS X is clearly the superior graphical user interface (GUI) OS that has some Unix-inspired heritage underneath the hood. The Linux GUIs are not even in the same league.”
Voss has advocated that his company’s server support team move their production Java server software from Windows to 64-bit Linux servers. They’re in process of phasing that in this year.
“So in many respects I’m okay with Linux,” Voss says. “It’s just the desktop GUI that I have a beef with. A lot of the Linux stalwarts aren’t too keen to hear this kind of talk, and naturally some of them get angry. These folks tend to be the free software political ideologues that view the use of computers and computer software as a political statement. The rest of us folk just want a great computing experience that we can enjoy and benefit by.”
He says that the story of Java developers preferring Mac OS X is a bit old by now, while Linux fans verses Mac OS X is just really getting heated up in earnest.
“Frankly the Linux zealots are stewing from a bad case of jealousy and envy,” Voss says. “The fact that a proprietary GUI OS is so vastly superior to any open-software/free-software GUI attempts is a reality they can’t cope with very gracefully.”
You can read his complete “Linux GUI verses Mac GUI” comments here.
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Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
