Insane behaviour. Much as I hate Windows, for a “generous offer” I’d make it work.
if you had 2 or more options on the table, one that forces you to go to work in a Tuxedo and one that doesn’t, would you still claim it’s insane to turn down the Tuxedo offer?
If I’m being given the Tuxedo, I’m gonna make that look spiffy every day.
That said, Windows is in no way a Tuxedo.
I really do not know what wearing a Tuxedo daily means to you… to me it means torture but it looks like you liked the idea so my example may not have been as clear as I wanted it to be
Windows is more of a “your socks must be damp at all times while on the clock” policy.
Not exactly going to prevent you from getting your work done, but unpleasant, and you’ll be miserable the whole time.
Yeah, but if I’m paid for my time that’s only my time, being miserable requires extra payment.
The problem is that the second option also requires you to go to work in a tuxedo.
Only a small niche of companies allow you to not work in a tuxedo.
So complaining about tuxedos at a job (in this universe) is just dumb.
The problem is that the second option also requires you to go to work in a tuxedo.
I get the point you are trying to make but this is just a strawman here… you are changing the parameters of the case and attacking your own invention.
Only a small niche of companies allow you to not work in a tuxedo.
I disagree, it is not a small niche. It certainly is not the majority but it is not that small for the scenario in this, most likely fake, email. Anecdotally I can add I have been working (also a programmer) on Linux for the past 18 years and none of the companies I worked for supported it, they just did not care if I used it as my base OS, everything they cared about is under their control so as long as I could comply to those, they were fine with it
You’d have to get two offers, accept one of them, start getting onboarded by the company you accepted, learn about the OS policy, without the second offer having expired. Maybe your experiences are different but based on mine that’s completely unrealistic.
Or maybe the second offer came in after having accepted the first one. That seems a lot more realistic, though extremely dependent on timing. But the most realistic scenario is, OP already had a job. But honestly if OP wasn’t just karma farming I’d expect them to have included the full story. So I’m pretty inclined to think this whole thing is bullshit.
Well, first of all, let’s be clear that most likely this post is completely fake and just as true as a meme would be. We agree on that.
But yes, I have been in that position myself, you get 2 offers within a week (which is not unheard of since, when looking for jobs, one usually blast CVs everywhere).
As you point out, the second option is looking for a job while having one… you can go all the way and then pull back noticing you are going from whatever you have to worse
I’d expect them to have included the full story.
- there is no reason for anyone to do that
- the “story”, if true, does not necessarily have to come from the applicant
- it may very well be bullshit, but the hints you chose to focus on are absolutely irrelevant
extremely based, I have no idea how any dev at my company tolerates windows.
in addition to how extremely slow and incapable the OS is in general,we have to submit tickets to run software because everything is installed through random .exes.
Install Linux subsystem for Windows and you’re golden.
Hahahahaha! No. WSL is in no way a good substitute for a real Linux system. It’s better than nothing, but that’s about it.
Lmao.
,we have to submit tickets to run software because everything is installed through random .exes.
You have to do that because your IT department doesn’t trust you. There’s no difference in danger between a dev with system access installing an exe or a DMG.
You have to do that because your IT department doesn’t trust you.
Nor should they.
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they can’t expect an actual efficient developer to use winshite, using Linux puts most people up to the ‘10x’ they want anyways.
Does the policy prevent you from installing a virtual machine? Or you could install docker and do everything via ssh into your container.
As long the company is ok I’m ok.
I’m not planning to input personal info on the work provided laptop anyway.
Yeah. Work laptop strictly stays work. Even when I have to travel for work I use my own computer to log into my United Airlines and Hilton stuff.
God you must make a ton of money
Lmao, I was going to reply seriously until I realized what com we are in. That’s some good bait.
Why would you not be very clear about this right at the start of the interview process so you’re not wasting everybody’s (including your own) time? If this is one of your absolute show-stoppers, then say so up front and we can either work with IT to get you what you want, or decline and move on to the next candidate.
You have a lot more negotiating power once they give you an offer because of the sunk cost.
They didn’t even attempt to negotiate. They rescinded their acceptance as soon as “IT specialist” told them they only officially support Windows.
That happened to me prior, and I actually told them “hey, I really want this position, but you can’t expect me to do it properly on the same hardware/software you give the data entry employees.”
They gave me a budget to buy whatever hardware I want and told me I can install anything I want but I cannot reach you the sysadmin for any support outside of roles/permissions.
They didn’t even attempt to negotiate.
you’re seeing a snapshot of an entire interaction between multiple people. you can’t be sure there was zero negotiations.
besides, you can’t even be sure any of this is even real.
keep your unfettered outrage bottled up for something else, because this ain’t the one for you.
I’m commenting on the context given, I don’t intend to waste energy seeking more context on this story…
Yeah seems like it could be ragebait.
Are you talking to the employer or the applicant, because it works both ways?
Windows is the PC operating system used by almost every organization. If you aren’t willing to work with it, you really need to be clear about that up front.
It’s like trying to get a job as a mechanic at an auto shop and telling them after the interview you refuse to work on Toyotas.
I’ve worked in all sizes of companies, in various industries and 3 different European countries.
In my experience it very much depends on the industry the company in, the division one is working in and the size of the company.
Engineering types in an Engineering/Tech company using Linux isn’t at all unusual in smaller and mid-sized companies. Sales types or accounting, definitelly are using Window. Creatives tend to use Macs, mainly because the Adobe suite runs perfectly in it and the hardware is superior to PC hardware - designer types almost literally salivate at things like 4K monitors.
Real startups (so, not mature Tech companies that try and still be startups) will definitelly have their devs running whatever they want, whist for example big financial institutions will have everybody on Windows, except perhaps top-level management if they’re quirky and prefer Mac for some reason or other.
Then to this add that the kind of professional who not only prefers Linux but can actually say “bye, bye” if they don’t get it is almost certainly be a pretty senior Techie (say, a Senior Designer Developer) and even now those are pretty hard to find for a permanent employment position (you can’t replace those with AI or outsourcing, not even close, and in the path to such seniority many devs who keep on progressing eventually step into management instead of staying on the Technical career track) - outside a large company (were the hiring manager doesn’t have the pull to make it happen), it a pretty good idea to let them use whatever OS they want in their work machine, even if it has to be with the proviso that they won’t be getting any support for it from the IT Support group (which, trust me, they will be fine with).
If a hiring manager has the pull for it and there are no regulatory reasons to make it be otherwise, it’s pretty dumb not to let a rare resource like a really senior dev use whatever the fuck they want on their work PC if that’s going to allow you hire/keep that person.
In my company, everybody is on Linux and if you want a Mac you need to make your case. 0 Windows laptop.
Your company is an outlier.
Yes. Doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Everybody is complaining about AI, Windows, whatever and nobody accepts to work for a smaller company because you earn less.
Either take the money and stfu or take the loss and work where your heart is.
Nobody said outliers don’t exist.
What we are saying is that the majority (like 80% or something) are run entirely on Windows. No matter what the Linux fanboys want to believe.
This is clearly in a field where that’s not true
“I only work on carbureted engines.”
Fair point, and taken. Interviews are a two-way street: the candidate should ask about everything that matters to them, and the company should ask about everything important they want.
To avoid situations like this, it’s best not to assume anything unless you ask first. Windows is the de facto standard in business, yes, but not everywhere and not in every industry.
If your work OS matters to you enough that you will pass on the job if you can’t pick, then you should ask. I would not want to hire someone who will be miserable in the job. And as a middle manager I probably don’t have enough pull to make an exception just for this guy anyway.
Rock stars play by their own rules and they will get whatever they ask for. For the rest of us, we just have to take what we’re issued.
I don’t have the luxury of turning down jobs for windows, but I do draw the line at using it on my own systems. They want me to use it, they have to provide the hardware.
This reads as not only privileged and out of touch, but you couldn’t tell from the job requirements and interviews that it was a Windows shop?
Google products are acceptible though? 🤨
Sorry for the potato resolution
I use WSL at work, I pin max RAM and only leave one CPU running for the host OS. It’s still a nightmare. This upcoming week I’m finally deploying Redhat IDM so that myself and others can use their smartcards and the ancient AD infra to get linux workstations and jumpboxes. Microsoft did me a massive favor by raising our licensing pricing so now it’s cheaper to replace Azure AD.
Should have used AI to up scale it
ducks
I dev every workday on Windows 11 and I don’t get why people feel like it’s awful to work on? I dunno what everyone else is doing but it’s basically just switching between the IDE, Slack and the browser. The OS never seems to be an issue for me. My only real gripe is that even I click update and shutdown at the end of the day, it updates and restarts.
Same for my colleagues using a Mac.
I’d be more bothered about using Teams over Slack
It very much depends on what you’re developing for.
Back when I did server-side development (which almost invariably is targetting Linux servers), having Linux as my dev environment was much better if only because I could run parts (or even all) of our server code directly in my machine configured as a Dev Environment.
However, for example, for Game Dev running Linux is much more of a problem because some tools are for Windows and you have to jump through hoops to make it run in Linux, if at all.
If you’re doing development on internal frontend systems for use by the Business side of a non-Tech company, then Windows is almost certainly the best dev OS because the software is meant to run in Windows machines (as that’s what the Business runs, unless we’re talking about creative companies, in which case it will be Mac) so the very same reasons why Linux is better for server dev apply here for Windows - it way more straightforward to develop in a machine where you can directly test at least parts of the code within the OS it will be running in.
Yeah, you can run virtual machines or deploy to a dev server, but that just adds extra steps and hence extra overhead for frequently done things like running small snippets of code whilst developing just to check it’s working as expected.
Then there’s the whole big company vs small company side of things: big companies have dedicated IT Support people and those will naturally try to standardize things for the obvious reason that it’s way more effective (same thing in dev, by the way, good Technical Architects try to keep the number of programming languages used low because its generally more efficient to have libraries, frameworks, maintenance and hiring practices around a smaller number of languages than it is to do it for many languages) which in turn means that in large companies “everybody gets the same” is an almost unassailable policy except for top-level management.
I think a lot of it comes down to the build team.
We have a very strict build, and while there is bloatware I could do without, they’ve always been great about handing out new machines, so we generally stay ahead of it.
The issue I run into is that at our company, I’m very much “That guy”, who needs all the exceptions and special software.
While they’ve created some AD groups for me that provide most of what I need, transferring to a new laptop is a major procedure as I never know what new restrictions have been put in place that I’ll need exceptions for. It’s a constant battle between security and having the tools I need to do the job. I always have at least three laptops, one that I’m using, one I’m working on setting up, and the old one I can’t let go of.
All that being said, yes, win 11 is an absolute pig compared to other options, once my machine is dialed in, I really don’t mind the environment.
Course, it helps that my lab shares space with the end user IT support team, so all I have to do is call over my shoulder to have something fixed.
I always have at least three laptops, one that I’m using, one I’m working on setting up, and the old one I can’t let go of.
You sound like you need some VMs. Particularly for whatever is on that old laptop.
Have been working on moving what I can to a VM, but the systems I develop require physical access, and when I’ve asked, I’ve been told there is no way to give a VM access to the laptops ports.
Many of the systems / devices are on physically isolated networks, use RS-232 or USB for access, etc.
If there are netsec approved ways of passing physical ports to the VM that would solve a ton of my issues.
It’s slow, it’s unstable, it’s slow, it’s hard to customise, it’s slow, it’s bloated, it’s slow, it’s counter intuitive. Did I also mention that it’s slow?
Personally I’ve never experienced any performance issues with it, seems fast and responsive to me.
Same here. I primarily use WSL2 as my dev environment. Everything outside that is native apps for collab and tooling.
Sure, if you just use Linux for dev, with a Windows hypervisor, you won’t notice the difference.
We devs also have a serious issue of performance blindness, because generally work and test on pretty beefy machines. Windows 11 is undeniably heavier on the system than Linux, and Mac hardware flies anyway. If your dev machine is beefy enough, you won’t really notice though.
Yeah I always have high end systems.
I dont disagree that windows sucks. I just don’t see it as a major issue for doing dev. As you say, that’s correlated to my high end system
Windows can add some complications as a dev, especially in the corporate environment when really strict group policies are implemented that stop Devs from installing or configuring systems as they need.
One company I worked at remained on Windows LTSC for security reasons, and a lot of Devs that were working with Java hit a snag if for whatever reason an IDE they were using really wanted a system environment variable configured a certain way and it would straight up ignore user environment variables. They would be restricted from basically being able to configure anything without getting IT to remote on and make the changes for them.
I was forced to use a Mac for the first time years ago for work, I still hate working on a Mac but I can’t deny how much more flexible it can be compared to working in a Windows environment that is locked down.
This isnt a windows issue, its a company policy issue. If developers dont have full admin rights on their systems, its a failure of managment. If you cant trust your developers enough to give them admin rights, thats not a co worker i want to be around.
You have to install extra crap to get the terminal to work like unix and I always had to fight with it to install things. Not worth the time. Maybe if you don’t need a terminal though?
Or you could just use a cross platform terminal such as Powershell? I also use Terminal to have nice UX.
You install git and you get git bash that works great in the Windows terminal. That’s something you do once. I use the terminal daily, not an issue at all.
I never had to do anything on my Mac it just works every time
Enterprise Windows does not get all those ads. I haven’t seen a single ad on any of my Windows machines.
Apples doesn’t sell a Mac version with ads and a version without so that seems better to me too. Why do I have to pay extra for that?
Because you’re already paying more for the hardware with a Mac.
Cool, and then there’s NEVER any problems with different paths? With back and forward slashes? With the limit on path length? With missing permissions on the file system requiring weird workarounds?
Most importantly, your server is likely not Windows, yet you test on Windows, and that’s never ever been a serious source of issues?
And don’t say WSL. That’s like saying the fix to using Windows is to use Linux, but fiddlier. Not to mention you still get issues with the mounted file system.
Cool, and then there’s NEVER any problems with different paths? With back and forward slashes? With the limit on path length? With missing permissions on the file system requiring weird workarounds?
Nope. The language we use handles that for us. I don’t think path length has been an issue for a while now?
Most importantly, your server is likely not Windows, yet you test on Windows, and that’s never ever been a serious source of issues?
We use serverless functions using Linux and it’s never an issue. My previous employer, we had Windows servers and Linux based containers, and that wasn’t an issue either.
This sounds more like IT babysitting.
If IT cant trust software engineers to have full admin rights on a work computer, either the calibur of your co workers is so bad that no one should want to work there, or the IT department has such a god complex, no one should want to work there.
No IT should trust devs to have full admin rights. Y’all know enough to fuck everything up and then blame IT for not knowing how to fix your weird ass edge case in 30 seconds before crying to the CIO.
It obviously depends on the environment, but if I am supposed to develop tools that, in theory, can fuck up everything, then I also need access to everything (on my machine). There’s no point in testing, if the elevated access rights on the server suddenly surface a fuckton of extra bugs.
Heck, I need admin just for the basics of installing developer tools and opening web ports.
They tried to lock our stuff down once. After a couple of days of absolutely zero work being done because all our tooling was missing, and the poor IT guy had to somehow learn how to install every tool we needed and taking forever, we just got sudo rights.
What ide are you using?
Im in firmware. IDEs change often depending on the chip i am working with. In some cases, the tools are better on windows, or have been in the past. It has gotten alot better recently.
Teams has recently decided to stop working on any browser except edge. I don’t know if this is intentional (at least chromium should work similarly) or if it’s a wayland thing, but I’m just assuming malice since webrtc works fine in all other instances.
Fuck all of microslop on principle.
I use it in Firefox. I think I had to make some cookie exceptions or something like that to make it work, but it’s functional. Still buggy, but Teams has always been buggy for me no matter the platform.
That doesn’t seem to be a generic issue, I am still running Teams through Firefox as a PWA on Ubuntu.
I use teams in Vivaldi with wayland. No problems beyond standard teams jank.
God damn powershell. I use my terminal daily! More than daily even!
