Re: rd2.io/2017/01/macs-and-trucks/

Malleable, Modifiable, MacOS. Rob Rhyne, in his aforementioned essay:

My thinking goes like this: I can borrow someone else’s phone if I need to make a call, but I want my Mac if I need to do any sort of deep thinking. This feeling of personalization runs deep in a desktop operating system. It’s much more than wallpaper, or color schemes. My Mac is loaded with software and utilities that I have written custom for my specific use. I’m not talking about general software development, but scripting, and automation which ease my everyday tasks.

This level of customization is nigh impossible on iOS devices, by design. Might sound like I’m being facetious or setting up a strawman argument. In fact, I believe this capability for deep customization is the crux of the division between the iPad-only and Mac loyalist camps.

This last sentence clearly conveys what I’ve been struggling to articulate for a while. My argument against the every road ends with iOS conversation shouldn’t focus on functions iOS can’t perform, because that position loses ground with each passing year and software update. Rather, the more sound, sane, stance is to frame MacOS as the more malleable operating system; one that lets me tinker and customize my machine to my own thinking, instead of the other way around.

iOS is simpler, yes. Requires less maintenance, yes. Can — functionally — replace MacOS for many, yes. But for me, my Mac is irreplaceable and intertwined with a certain style of computing I love and can’t find anywhere else.

Monday, 9 January 2017