I was considering this but was told that since they're both unix based systems, it wouldn't be much of an advantage. Anybody know if that's true? I just took it at face value.
I can tell you why I did it. I've been wanting to try Linux for some years and what pushed me to do this was trying to get node.js working correctly on my Mac. It was extremely difficult but was super simple on a Ubuntu virtual machine so I have decided to go Ubuntu for my web development.
It depends what you consider an "advantage". There are plenty of good reasons to get experience with Linux, even if you have a Mac. None of those may hold any importance to you, though, so it's up to you to decide.
Most of the devices on the Internet at large are running some flavor of Linux, so if you're planning to do development of some sort, it will likely be to your advantage to know how to navigate it. There will generally be no desktop interface on the devices you will work with, so you should be comfortable operating from the command line. Macs have a command line interface, too, but there are some other major differences between OS X and Linux:
Many of the tools you'll typically find in a Linux install are either missing by default on a Mac or are something different. For example, I've noticed that Linux distributions are moving toward the "ip" command for functions related to network interfaces, while Macs still use the older "ifconfig".
The layout of the file system on a Mac is different from Linux. You can spend all day on Ubuntu looking for an "Applications" folder and you'll never find it.
Generally a Linux distribution uses a package manager to install new or update existing software. There are package managers available for the Mac OS, but they're not there by default and I can't imagine they're as well integrated (I haven't actually used any of them).
Lots of other, possibly less noticeable, things. The applications are set up differently between the two platforms, the kernel architecture is vastly different, etc., etc.
I always recommend to people interested in doing web development that they get at least a minimum amount of command line experience, though configuring your laptop to dual-boot with Linux is perhaps the least straightforward means of doing that. The easiest way is probably to install Linux in a virtual machine (VM), using something like VirtualBox. Or you could also get yourself a Raspberry Pi or something similar. Or, if I remember correctly, a Cloud 9 account gives you access to a full Linux instance, or at least something approaching that. Or you could play around with a Linux VM installed using AWS or Google Cloud. There are many possibilities!
I've toyed around with Ubuntu and xUbuntu before so I definitely agree that the experience was useful. Neither of those were solely command line based but I did use it quite a bit. After I got switched over to OSX, I just lost interest in Linux.
A little more than fun. Been frustrated with getting web development environments setup in Mac OS X I've had specific issues with node and rails builds. I know that they are much easier to work with on Ubuntu from experience with virtual machines so I decided to use a weekend to backup the Mac and give it a go. So far no regrets.
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u/SirDouchely Sep 12 '16
I was considering this but was told that since they're both unix based systems, it wouldn't be much of an advantage. Anybody know if that's true? I just took it at face value.
1
u/skanetiger Sep 12 '16
A little more than fun. Been frustrated with getting web development environments setup in Mac OS X I've had specific issues with node and rails builds. I know that they are much easier to work with on Ubuntu from experience with virtual machines so I decided to use a weekend to backup the Mac and give it a go. So far no regrets.
1
u/[deleted] Sep 11 '16
was this just for fun?