[ I told you future posts would bear things out. Didn’t have to wait long, didya? ]
I’m a console kid. My perfect dev environment is tmux on a linux framebuffer tty. (These days, it’s E16 or wmii since I have to have a goddamn web browser open to do web development.)
I do stop hacking code from time to time. While a lot of my extra-coding activities can be done in a Chrome instance, Linux still lacks in a lot of areas as a casual desktop environment. Most geeks seem to turn to OS X. “It’s a GUI built on top of Unix!” Yeah, one of the shittiest ‘unix’ environments on earth. Call me back when library randomization is done at run-time and not install-time.
Then there’s Windows.
Windows XP, Windows ME, Windows Vista, all garbage. Windows 7 gained stability but that UI is still death.
Windows 8 though… I know the post title covered this already but let’s deal with it again. I, sungo, really like Windows 8, especially the UI-formerly-known-as-Metro. You, the hater, can fuck off and die.
One of the biggest complaints about Windows 8 is “it’s different”. Yup. It totally destroyed the desktop metaphor you’re brainwashed to love. (Win8 obviously has a desktop mode but that’s not what smashes you in the face when you login.) I’m a Linux lover, a command line person. I rejected your idea of a “desktop” a very long time ago.
Let’s face it folks. Most of you love your desktop because you haven’t learned that there’s another directory on your hard drive. (This goes for you Mac people too.) How many icons are on your desktop? If it’s more than, say, 5 non-temporary icons, you’re using your computer wrong.
What if, instead of a sea of overlapping word document icons, your main screen displayed information about your social networks, calendar, email, flight status, your weight loss goals? What if your system was immediately useful from the moment the screen powered on? That’s Windows 8. I think of my Win8 desktop as a status dashboard for my life.
Development wise, if you’re an HTML5/Javascript standards-loving hacker, you should love Win8. C#, C++, etc are still available in Visual Studio but HTML5/Javscript is the preferred option. Not only does all your single-page-architecture, Socket.io hipster code work for desktop apps, but it translates, usually, seamlessly to Windows Phone 8. Does your OSX app “Just Work” on an iPhone?
So, while you’ll still see me with my Funtoo-based Sony VAIO Z laptop, you’ll just as often see me with a Dell XPS 12 running Win8. Oh yeah, and a Nokia 920 running Windows Phone 8.