196

Bigger distinction: Kids with computers vs. kids with “smart” devices.

She must have had a Mac. Only Windows teaches both the knowledge and the fury to convince children to switch to Linux.

When I was 12 I installed Linux... and now I have autism. And I'm gay!

Personally, I guess that you learn more the more issues you have. MacOS is a more closed down ecosystem compared to Windows, malware is less popular and as hardware comes usually bundled with the OS, you shouldn't encounter as many driver or hardware issues in general.

As a kid I had so much trouble with incompatible software, viruses, adware, drivers, broken hardware etc. And as I had noone to ask, it tought me a lot about the fundamentals of IT and how to research such issues myself.

At risk of going off topic, I don’t like Twitter posts like this:

• Both users ‘verified,’ essentially paying for more engagement, but with no actual “verification” like community mods tagging users.

• In your face engagement metrics all over the posts, as if that’s all that matters. Not even a user “poll” like Lemmy/Reddit or Mastadon/Facebook.

• Hiding most replies other than the most algorithmically engaging ones.

• Posted as a screenshot, unfortunately necessary as they essentially broke Nitter and it’s nigh unusable unless logged in.

I don’t like that the Twitter format is kinda the center of the social media universe, and seemingly staying that way now that we basically voted to back it with the US govt.

Hey! 🙋 I'm an autistic person (diagnosed at age 3). I grew up using Mac computers mostly, because my father preferred them for his work. Although I would encounter Windows a lot when I was at school as well. However, I didn't really know how to use Windows until I started seeing videos on YouTube about it (such as this one). This was when I was around 10. So I started experimenting with different editions of it (Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows XP, etc.) via a pirated copy of Parallels Desktop. I also found out about Linux, and toyed with Ubuntu with a bit via Parallels. I found it fun, and thus considered the idea of installing Linux properly onto my Macbook. Unfortunately, the trackpad support wasn't there. So for my 11th birthday, I asked for a "Windows laptop", and immediately after getting it, I set up some dual-boot with Windows 10 and some fork of Ubuntu called "Pinguy OS". (I spent way too much time looking at DistroWatch.) Then, I distro-hopped for a bit until I finally settled on Void Linux when I was 13. I'm now 18 and am running Void full-time on my current laptop, it doesn't even have a Windows partition. :)

The weird thing is that the UNIX core of MacOS would lend itself really well to tinkering. It's a shame that Apple lobotomizes all the hardware they sell with locked down firmware...

I'm genuinely curious; is her hypothesis that macOS users are less tech literate? Because I definitely know much more computer science people that use macOS than Windows (of course most use Linux, but Windows is on third place).

I'm should bring that Ubuntu CD I had shipped to me as a kid to a therapist.

So here's a teacher's insight:

Mac:PC:Chromebook Rich---Poor

There is a very strong correlation between the wealth of the kids on my module, and the device they have.

Mac users really struggle to understand the concept of local files without being shown. PC users, alas, snort too much SharePoint these days to be considered healthy - trying to save a word document locally these days is like climbing a mountain blindfolded. As for the Chromebook kids, they do their best with what they have, and given how little compatibility those devices have with the software I teach, I'm proud of them.

I've been a dev for 7 years. I used a PC for the first 6 years and I switched to a mac the last year.

My experience with mac has been terrible. The file explorer is just horrible to navigate. It took me ages to find the way to go anywhere except the "favorite" folders. Compability with the remote linux-servers has been awful with broken keymappings and shortcuts. Using hardware from any other manifacturer is riddled with bugs. The machine is unable to adjust volume if the audio is passed through usb-c. And I routinely encounter bugs where I'm unable to interact with apps until I restart them. Everything which seemed to work by heuristics on a PC requires a lot of attention on my mac. I don't care if I get a floaty animation and bouncy icon if I minimize a window. I just want alt + tab to actually bring back the apps I select.

I am not getting a mac the next time.

My first memory with a computer was playing (more like trying to play) Microsoft flight simulator 1.0 on a Macintosh when I was around 8-9. The thing that looks like that:

I only started using Linux when installed dual boot Ubuntu on the family computer around 14-15.

Where're all the DOS kids at?! 5 hours and 66 comments, but not a single mention yet.

Never mind solving problems with Windows; shit gets real when the thing boots to aC:\> prompt and you need to know things like the difference between CGA/EGA/VGA/Hercules graphics modes and WTF an IRQ is just to install your games in the first place.

I've learned C++ when I was 10. Should I have myself checked?

I was brought up on a Commodore 64. I wrote my first program at the age of six using a guide from a computer magazine.

Make of that what you will.

"Disclusion" is a dentistry term.

https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/disclusion

She mean "excluded"

Imagine paying for a blue tick on Xitter.

Children use smartphones way more than "PC" computers today.

As an Old, I started with an Apple ][ and learned BASIC. We did get the classic B&W Macintosh computers when I was 12-13.

This schism exists in my household. Mrs. Warp Core had access to a Mac and went on to do non-computer things. I had a PC and went full-ASD/ADHD HAM on (what feels like) every iteration of commercial computer tech ever since.