I Joined The Dark Side

Welcome to The Empire.

I have been, for as long as I can remember, a supporter of free and open source software. Since I discovered Ubuntu way back in 2007, I have long stopped having to pay for software on my personal computing life. However, there have been challenges. I've been easily able to overcome them. But there are some things that can't just be easily overcome.

Some of those things, for example, are integrated solutions that are brought about by proprietary platforms like say, Facetime. Yes, there are plenty of alternatives that don't cost a penny. But for some users, the alternatives don't add too much value. For one, those things aren't installed upon purchasing hardware. 

My family has been an Apple family since the iPhone 4s. My siblings use iPhones, and my father is very fond of his iPad Mini. While I remain vigilant to the cause of free software (and admittedly, too cheap to pay for software. And no, pirated software isn't a viable solution for me.) I get curious from time to time to see what it's like on the other side. I'm not really a huge fan of Apple products, and even much less of Windows products. I prefer Android phones (and the cheap ones at that) over the iPhone and iPod, and I use Linux over Windows and OSX. 

Used to be that I saw and used the interface on Apple stores while fiddling with their demo units. The touch pad used by Macs and even the mouse has been a bit of sorcery to me (How do I right click on this thing? Where are the buttons?)... Once I spent almost half an hour on a friend's macbook (Hello Dania! Hugs and kisses to little meatbun growing up so fast!) trying to look for the "print screen" key and figuring out how to capture a screenshot... But that was all half a decade ago.

Macbook Pro. One of the few expensive computers I know.

Fast forward to 2015. There came a time that I managed to spend some generous quality time with the OSX. My sister got herself a Macbook Pro but I hardly got to use it. Then the opportunity came- My brother's girlfriend got herself a 13 inch Macbook Pro. They encountered some difficulties updating it. That problem went beyond my bro's wits so I volunteered to give it a shot before they return it. A few search words, pages and clicks after, I was doing a clean sweep of it with system restore. Thank you Google and Apple support page. 

I had the time to fiddle and poke around and I admit, it was an interesting experience. I had a tad of difficulty with the keyboard but it's not because of design issues- it's because it's merely different. This interface designed by the folks at Cupertino was quite polished, elegant and I must say, all that hype about it isn't just because of people being blind fan boys/girls. It feels more consistent compared to the the one they make at Redmond (Bill, I like you more than Steve, but seriously, Steve wins me over in the UI.). I've used many interfaces in my time. From the desktop in Windows 3.1, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, that well-loved Windows XP, that loathsome Windows Vista (that drove me to switch to using Linux, BTW.) to Windows 7 and the very interesting Windows 8.1, up to KDE, XFCE, MATE, Unity (Ubuntu), up to even just a command terminal. And that's not counting the mobile devices.

The most responsive interface I ever used. Mad typing skills is a plus.

There came a time I needed to have a new computer. Something more compact. It's not everyday that I can just stay at home. Many times i tend to go on the road and do errands, some that involve a lot of waiting. And an afternoons spent waiting mean afternoons that I'm disconnected. Be it from social media or researching stuff or general computer related fiddling of things, it's better than just sitting and waiting in a public place watching people go by.

And so I got my first Mac. One may argue that there are more sensible solutions for less money. True that, except for my dad's argument I couldn't really counter: "I want you to be able to Facetime with us." 

Facetime. He loves his facetime. Not Viber, not Skype or any other solution. (Hell I can get away with using Ekiga if I want to except that I have nobody else to call there.) Yep, Facetime. It comes built in with dad's iPad, bro's iPhone and my sister's Macbook Pro. I suppose it's high time I joined them.

While an iPad Mini is plenty competent, I was never a fan of the iOS platform. So I decided to go nuts and go for OSX. I admit it wasn't cheap. But it actually offers relatively plenty. Switching to this system has been quite interesting and challenging. I cringe at the sight of seeing price tags at the items in the App Store in contrast to say, Linux Mint's software store where apps are mostly free. Conversely, in the Mac App Store, apps are mostly paid. :(

Fortunately, a little browsing here and there shows that there are free and decent alternatives. This allowed me to do some tweaks and I got to install a few interesting apps. I'll detail that journey on another entry though. Also, I haven't abandoned my Linux Mint system. I'm still using it as a secondary computer. At the time of this writing I'm pretty much adjusted to this new system. I am enjoying this "prison" so far and I don't see myself switching systems anytime in the near future. 

Then again, after the warranty expires or if I don't end up liking the direction OSX goes in the software updates, I'll just load Ubuntu on this thing. Yes, this is one prison where I can actually break free from.