Linux and Mac, in Tandem?

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I’m a real big into Linux kinda person. So much so, trolls have had a laugh at my expense because of it, because, as we all know, Windows is totally superior, with its built-in ads, built-in AI, built-in (or soon to be) digital snoop, built-in forcing you to use Edge and making it so even if you use a different browser you have to tick a thousand boxes that say “open [file extension] in my new browser, instead.” And then there’s MacOS, which I also use, because I have a Macbook, an iPhone, and an Apple Watch, and the entire Homekit thing with the yellow ball that speaks words to me if I say “Hey Siri, what’s it like outside right now?” Which is fine! Because MacOS is also Unix.

It’s a purely locked down and extremely secure version of Unix, so-much-so that if you try and watch any streaming app on an external monitor through MacOS, the whole screen goes blank.

Yeah.

I wanted to write a plea to Apple, because they definitely read my blog (see: sarcasm), because, it’s almost 2025. No average person is pirating anything anymore. I’m pretty sure most gen z and alpha kids/adults have no idea what the phrase “pirating a movie” even means. Nobody is recording shows and movies through a capture device on a secondary monitor. So, can we please, let me watch Apple TV on my second, much larger monitor? I pay you to be able to watch Severance. The least you could do is let me watch it on my big honkin’ monitor.

Sure, I could turn on my Apple TV box but that takes WORK. I gotta use my CONTROLLER. I gotta switch the inputs.

Anyway, though, why use both Linux and MacOS?

Linux is great for pretty much a lot of things. Notice, I didn’t say everything. I like it for security and data ownership. I like it for all of the things I can do with it, that it absolutely won’t stop me from doing. I like it because my Linux PC is a beef-master 5000 and I can play Diablo 4 at max FPS (which is about the only game I play nowadays).

But, because I have all these millions of Apple devices, turning on my laptop and plugging into my larger display allows me to write while listening to my Apple music library that isn’t being displayed through a built-in web UI (I’m talking about the flatpaks via Linux). I can see all my texts coming through on my desktop, work on writing my book in the Pages app I’ve been using for over a year, and I can use Affinity!

I dumped Photoshop a long time ago, after they went face-first into AI, and started up with the predatory subscriptions. And Affinity is probably the greatest alternative.

But there’s no Linux port. And a dev told me directly they have no plans to support Linux.

Which is a huge bummer. In fact, it’s kind of … dumb. I almost swore off their entire software suite, because you’ve already developed this software for MacOS, which is a variation of UNIX!

Regardless …

If I somehow blew your mind that MacOS is in fact Unix based, and you don’t believe me, open up Terminal on your Mac. Create a simple bash script. I dunno, something that says “Hello world!” To do this, type “nano hello.sh”, and within that new file, type in “#!/bin/bash”, and then press enter. Now type “echo “Hello world!” Now, press ctrl + O, and then ctrl + X. Lastly, type in chmod +x hello.sh (or whatever you name your bash script). Now! Run it! Type in “./hello.sh”

And voila.

All of the things you just did are exactly how you’d accomplish the same thing in Linux. You probably thought, “Wait, what the heck? Nano is included in MacOS?”

Yup.

Anyway, welcome to the world of only Unix based machines.