Someone recently wrote regarding MacOS X:
I'd actually recommend any linux fan to try one out. It's like linux, but better.
and someone else replied:
My experience of using and working with Mac OS X gave me the impression of it being a very very big hack :)
Neither of these are true, and I'd just like to set the record straight.
To present my credentials, I've been using Linux since pre-v1 days and MacOS X for about six months, both mostly on laptops. (I still have what I believe is the first ThinkPad running Linux in the corner of my office, a 33MHz 486 job.) I migrated to the Mac for the longer battery life, the video editing software, and the relative ease of driving data projectors -- I present most of my lectures this way.
MacOS X is based around a Mach kernel with outer layers from 4.4bsd. So it's as much of a Unix box as Linux, and there's no hackery involved at all. I'm pleased to be able to report that the system is even more solid then Linux: one apparent system hang in six months, and when I read Apple's documentation carefully, I realized that it wasn't actually hung. (Hint: don't plug in a USB mouse while the machine is suspended.)
The native GUI stuff, Aqua, is based around display PDF. People who've been around long enough to remember NeWS and its display PostScript engine will probably be experiencing a warm glow at this point, as it was a better windowing system than X in almost every respect. But it's not the first time the better solution has lost out.
The latest MacOS release does support X and it works fairly well, though cutting and pasting between X and non-X windows is painful. Most of the stuff I know and love is available on the Net if it's not in MacOS; however, it's fair to say that the range of free software is much less than Debian or Gentoo. There's also a community of Unix- and X-oriented people who respond to pleas for help and advice.
It's not difficult to compile most things up from source if it's not available in compiled form. The only thing I've failed with is lush (lush.sf.net). Compiling things that use OpenGL is a bit messy, as one has to use "frameworks" and link against the Objective C run-time; but once the incantation has been discovered, it's just a question of bunging it in a Makefile.
So, MacOS isn't Linux but it is Unix. People who are terminal-oriented can migrate to it with little trouble. It's a good platform for people who spend a lot of time on the move as the battery life is good, >3 hours on a machine roughly equivalent to a 2GHz Intel processor, yet weighing about 2Kg.
I'm much happier with my AlBook12 than I was with a Sony Picturebook, a Fujitsu-Siemens P-2020, and various IBM and (ugh) Dell laptops.
..Adrian