Mac Users Identify Yourselves!

dwetzel · Jun 17, 2005

Count me in... twice I guess...

Powerbook G3 Lombard (bronze)
Old Mac Powerbook (pre-G3)

I used to have an LC III as well, but that's gone now.

HellHound · Jun 17, 2005

ex Mac user here.

Gave up on them about 6 years ago, by my guess. I throught I'd always have one around the house, but the whole house is PC now.

buzz · Jun 17, 2005

HellHound said:
ex Mac user here.

Gave up on them about 6 years ago, by my guess.

So, right when they were gettting good. Pity.

Redwald · Jun 24, 2005

Mac Linux user

You can count me, if I qualify. I run Debian GNU/Linux on my PowerMac B&W G3, my PowerMac Dual G4, and my iBook G3. My wife runs Debian GNU/Linux on her clamshell iBook G3, but she's not a gamer so I know she doesn't count.

Hmm. I hope this works -- the preview feature doesn't seem to work in Mozilla anymore, though it did when last I posted (long time ago).

[EDIT: Fix misplaced slash.]

buzz · Jun 24, 2005

Redwald said:
You can count me, if I qualify. I run Debian GNU/Linux on my PowerMac B&W G3, my PowerMac Dual G4, and my iBook G3. My wife runs Debian/GNU Linux on her clamshell iBook G3, but she's not a gamer so I know she doesn't count.

Out of curiosity, what's the appeal of running Linux on an Apple box as opposed to an Intel/AMD box? And why that and not MacOS X (which is BSD at its core)?

Redwald · Jun 25, 2005

buzz said:
Out of curiosity, what's the appeal of running Linux on an Apple box as opposed to an Intel/AMD box? And why that and not MacOS X (which is BSD at its core)?

There are a few reasons, but I admit they may not be applicable to everyone. First, I'm a GNU/Linux software developer as a career and a hobby; I've preferred Unix-style environments to MS-DOS or Windows ever since I was first exposed to the Unix shell (about 12 years ago now).

Secondly, running a non-x86-compatible machine architecture renders you invulnerable to the vast majority of "shellcode"-type pieces of malware -- that is, those that take advantage of a buffer overflow to provoke a stack smash in an existing benign application and commandeer it with (usually hand-coded) malicious machine language. x86 machine instructions are nothing but unexecutable garbage on other platforms like the PowerPC, UltraSPARC, DEC/Compaq/HP Alpha, IA-64, PA-RISC, MIPS, ARM, and so forth.

Thirdly, I'm a free software activist, and prefer to run only software which I have the freedom to examine, modify and share with others. That is why I prefer a free Unix operating system to something like MacOS X, and why I've found the GNU/Linux community a more hospitable place than the BSD world. Still, I have a lot of respect for the free BSDs (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD); they're pretty committed to free (if not copylefted) software licenses within their own projects, and OpenBSD's single-minded focus on improving computer security has yielded some greatly-improved software from which the broader Unix community has benefitted.

Finally, my wife runs Debian on her iBook because she got very tired of MacOS 9 crashing, and we didn't have a license to run MacOS X on it (besides, MacOS X is slow on my 600MHz iBook and would be torture on her 466MHz model). The MacOS-style "theme" of KDE 3.3 is a bit glitchy, but she's had no complaints about the stability, and that makes her pretty happy. She was rebooting MacOS all the time.

Hopefully my answer wasn't overkill.

niolo · Jun 25, 2005

Another Mac user here. 2x And recently converted my wife to an Apple laptop since tech support (me) is free. Now I am trying to get a projector hooked up for some gaming fun. I need to jury-rig some suspension thing.

Agamon · Jun 25, 2005

I want to buy my mom a Mac. I'm getting tired of troubleshooting her PC.

buzz · Jun 25, 2005

Redwald said:
Secondly, running a non-x86-compatible machine architecture renders you invulnerable to the vast majority of "shellcode"-type pieces of malware -- that is, those that take advantage of a buffer overflow to provoke a stack smash in an existing benign application and commandeer it with (usually hand-coded) malicious machine language. x86 machine instructions are nothing but unexecutable garbage on other platforms like the PowerPC, UltraSPARC, DEC/Compaq/HP Alpha, IA-64, PA-RISC, MIPS, ARM, and so forth.

Ah, I see. I wasn't aware of that; nifty! BUt how does this make you feel about the announced move to Intel CPUs?

Redwald said:
Still, I have a lot of respect for the free BSDs (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD); they're pretty committed to free (if not copylefted) software licenses within their own projects, and OpenBSD's single-minded focus on improving computer security has yielded some greatly-improved software from which the broader Unix community has benefitted.

FreeBSD was my first 'nix, and I run one of my company's sites on an OpenBSD box.

Redwald said:
Finally, my wife runs Debian on her iBook because she got very tired of MacOS 9 crashing, and we didn't have a license to run MacOS X on it (besides, MacOS X is slow on my 600MHz iBook and would be torture on her 466MHz model).

I can understand that. I use a B&W G3 with a G4 CPU upgrade, and even that didn't make MacOS X as sprightly as I'd prefer. Running X on any Mac with unsupported (i.e., QuartzExtreme-incapable) video hardware is best avoided.

Redwald said:
Hopefully my answer wasn't overkill.

Quite the contrary. Thanks!

Redwald · Jun 25, 2005

buzz said:
Ah, I see. I wasn't aware of that; nifty! BUt how does this make you feel about the announced move to Intel CPUs?

Well, I'm not thrilled with it. :\ Still, the importance of shellcode exploits should not be overestimated. Cross-site scripting exploits and JavaScript in general are also significant sources of security incidents, and these are almost always independent of machine architecture (sometimes they are OS-specific, though, which means everyone not running Wiindows is marginally safer).

With Apple abandoning the PowerPC and IBM having farmed off its consumer-grade x86 division to the Lenovo Group, I'm curious to see if Big Blue does something interesting with the POWER architecture (almost identical to PowerPC) that mere mortals can acquire.