What is the best operating system for a developer?

DiligentIdyia's Experience

sexy See More

RespectfulNinsusinak's Experience

very good See More

There are only a few remote vulnerabilities, probably due to the reduced software that comes by default. See More

score 24 · Answer 2

OpenBSD

Top Pro

Most secure operative system

Top Con

Driver support is limited

Using OpenBSD without making sure the hardware is right first is bound to be painful. See More

IngeniousEshu's Experience

its good See More

Specs

License:BSD, ISC and other permissive licenses

Based On:Research Unix>Berkeley Software Distribution>

Package Manager:OpenBSD package tools

Developer:Theo de Raadt

Top Pro

Simple, minimal, just works

Shane Knysh's Experience

Besides Debian (which was first released in August 1993), it is the oldest still maintained Linux Distribution and was first released in July 1993. See More

score 9 · Answer 3

Slackware

Top Pro

Oldest surviving Linux distro

Top Con

Takes a patient person

Specs

OS Family:GNU+Linux

Based On:Softlanding Linux System

Package Manager:pkgtool

Init-System:SysVinit

Uses stable, plain-vanilla packages from upstream. See More

Top Pro

No systemd

Top Pro

Super fast

Top Pro

Stable

Top Pro

Doesn't get in your way

Slackware won't deny you from doing something, even for package management, you have to install and manage dependencies by yourself (or you can use a third-party tool like slpkg). See More

The UI of Mac OS is rather unrivaled. The smooth, responsive, and cohesive UI makes the system quite joyous to use. See More

score 145 · Answer 4

macOS

Top Pro

Polished UI

Top Con

Expensive

OSX is tied Apple hardware and Apple hardware tends to be expensive for what it gives. See More

Adam Fields's Experience

While in my heart I want to recommend a desktop Linux distribution like Ubuntu, Neon, or Mint, I have to go with macOS (FKA OSX). I alternate between Windows 10 Pro, macOS, and KDE Neon (Ubuntu with the KDE Plasma desktop). While I do spend a lot of time in the terminal for things like SSH/SCP, VPN, Git, package management, running build jobs, and Docker/Kubernetes administration; I still write all of my application code/scripts and interact with databases using GUI tools. I've just found that VS Code/Atom, JetBrains IDEs, Mongo Compass/MySQL Workbench, and other GUI tools run better on macOS (and Windows). Now that Docker usage has become mainstream, you can write your application targeting a Linux host and create a Docker image using the Linux distribution of your choice to see how your app runs on Debian/CentOS/Alpine/etc. Docker for Mac and Kitematic run great on macOS, and can optionally create a single-node Kubernetes for you with the click of a mouse. Package Management on macOS is outstanding and incredibly simple thanks to Homebrew. Homebrew can even manage daemon services (like your database server), much like systemctl on Linux. Linux is a great Operating System, but as with everything open source, you do have to factor in some time for fixing bugs and general system administration tasks. For example, upgrading my Dell Ubuntu laptop from 14.04 to 16.04 caused my audio and WiFi to stop working (had to do a clean install to get it working). At the end of the day, I don't think anyone should go out and buy another computer just for writing code. Programming is creative problem solving, and if you run into a problem, try to find a simple solution before spending thousands of dollars on a new computer. See More

Specs

OS Family:UNIX (BSD/Darwin)

License:EULA

Based On:Research UNIX>BSD>NeXTSTEP

Top Pro

Based on Unix

macOS being a UNIX certified system means that you can install a lot more stuff with a lot fewer headaches than if you were on Windows. See More

Top Con

Limited hardware

Usually, the hardware that can run this can't be upgraded. See More

Brian Bezanson's Experience

I've been developing on the Macintosh since it first came out in 1984. I have developed applications for commercial, educational, entertainment segments. I have shifted to web development in the last 22 years and have developed on Macintosh, Windows, and SGI Unix. See More

Top Pro

Easy access to lots of great dev tools

There's a large selection of great development tools available for OSX. The operating system itself comes bundled with a powerful terminal emulator, called Terminal. Additionally, Apple provides tools, like Xcode, an IDE that contains a comprehensive collection of tools for developing OSX and iOS software, for free. See More

Top Con

Most software is closed source

For people who like to use open source tools for their development work, this may be a problem. There's plenty of advantages to open source software, one of which is the ability to tinker with and customize the tools themselves that you are using. Although there's plenty of FOSS tools available for Mac, especially through Homebrew, the number of packages available is much lower than the number of packages available for any Linux distribution. See More

DashingTelete's Experience

It gonna spy you See More

Top Pro

Powerful terminal

It's very similar to a Linux terminal. See More

Top Con

Closed source

Mac OS is closed source itself, which means that it is developed more slowly and has more problems. See More

Shane Knysh's Experience

A comparison of package managers available for OSX can be found here. See More

Top Pro

Best support for Objective-C

Top Con

No native package management

Top Pro

More commercial software and gaming support compared to other Unix systems

Adobe CC, MS Office, Steam games. See More

Top Con

Poor application support

Fewer apps run on Mac OS than on Windows or Linux. See More

Top Pro

Has many special tools for developers

Has support for multiple IDEs. See More

Top Con

Bash version is obsolete

macOS comes with an obsolete version of Bash, due to licensing issues. See More

Top Pro

Lots of open-source software available

Because it's Unix under the fancy GUI, most open source ports easily to it. See More

Top Con

Vendor-Lock-in

You are now forced to use the Apple services. See More

Top Pro

Ideal setup, out of the box

Next to no custom configuration is necessary. See More

Top Con

Silly modifier keys layout

The Command key is strange, Alt is where Super should be. See More

Top Pro

Great Git GUI tools

Tower, Kaleidoscope, SourceTree. See More

Top Con

Poor X11 integration

The most open source software does work but is very poorly integrated due apples ancient version of the X-server. See More

Top Pro

Has software that only runs on Mac

For example, Sketch. See More

Top Con

Very few options for running hosted, on the cloud

Top Pro

Streamlined workflow between devices

Because this is an Apple product, there is a streamlined workflow between your computer and all mobile devices. For example, if you type an a Pages document, once you save, you can open the updated document just moments later on your iPad, and vice versa. The same goes for iMessage, (yes, you can text people with your phone number from your computer. Actually, you can text other people with apple devices with just your Apple ID, with or without a phone number, for free!) Numbers, Notes, Reminders, Contacts, and just about any other Apple workflow application. See More

Top Con

Too little customization options

Top Pro

Great modifier key layout

Top Con

Touchbar on Macbook Pro's

Top Pro

Using VMware you can also run Windows 10 on the Mac

This is useful for testing and some development tools that are Windows-only (XML Spy, MapForce). See More

Top Con

Not very user-friendly

Top Pro

You need it to compile macOS or iOS apps

Need to run Photoshop? No luck. Even most software that's portable to Linux will have a hard time running on FreeBSD. You're stuck with ONLY running the free software. See More

score 34 · Answer 5

FreeBSD

Top Con

Pathetic third-party application support

Top Pro

Powerful ports collection

Ports provide a wide collection of software which are easy to build, install and modify. They contain recipes and patches to build various software, so you can simply run "make && make install" to build and install the software. You may also keep local patches and it would be picked up automatically. It also allows you to use the latest software even if you are not using the latest version of the operating system. See More

TrustingOsiris's Experience

Native zfs on root filesystem See More

Specs

License:BSD

Price:Free

Language:C

Top Con

Inferior driver support for workstations

Lack of drivers for some modern personal devices. See More

Top Pro

Batteries included

Base system contains basic developer tools, including compiler, debugger and system utilities. See More

SomeCallMeTim's Experience

Terrible driver support for laptops. System isn't focused on desktop usage. See More

Top Con

Not for beginners

If a user needs an easy way to navigate around the filesystem, a text only Unix-derivative is not his best choice. See More

Top Pro

Jails mechanism

Jails allow for partitioning a system into several independent "mini-systems", a feature not found in many of the popular OS choices. See More

PowerfulShara's Experience

Great, rock solid OS for anyone. See More

Top Con

Very shallow desktop support

Top Pro

Stable updates

Shane Knysh's Experience

FreeBSD won't change everything from a version to another, it tries to keep and maintain old tools as long as possible, and won't replace half the system every two versions like GNU/Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, Arch or Fedora does. everything is stable and also pretty minimal. FreeBSD is designed for performance. See More

Top Pro

Great philosophy

This distro was written for pen testing and security work. It is not meant to be a day-to-day OS (unless that's your job). See More

score 12 · Answer 6

Kali Linux

Top Con

Not intended to be a daily driver

score 18 · Answer 7

NetBSD

Top Pro

Adhere to the standard

It adheres to traditional Unix and new defined standards. See More

Top Con

Lack of drivers

It lacks drivers for some new devices. See More

Shane Knysh's Experience

Based On:Research Unix>Berkeley Software Distribution>

Specs

Official Supported Architectures:https://www.netbsd.org/ports/

Top Pro

It's Open Source

It's open source with a BSD License, which is much more business friendly than GPL. It's the real ancestor of Mac, that is being used nowadays. See More

Top Pro

It's real

Under NetBSD csh is csh not tcsh; also vi is real vi not elvis, nvi or vim. It's ideal for purists. See More

Top Pro

Architecture portability

It's the most portable OS in the world when considering what architectures it can run on. It runs on very wide range of hardware, from toaster to satellites. This of course does not mean it supports drivers for many consumer facing products making it a difficult solution to just boot up and use when compared to other OSs. See More

Top Pro

Clean source code

It prioritizes source code cleanliness over anything. See More

It's a very niche OS that no one uses. See More

score 39 · Answer 8

Haiku

Top Con

No one uses it

Top Pro

Very fast

VigilantHnoss's Experience

Designed for multicore/multiprocessor usage from day one. See More

Specs

OS Family:BeOS-like

License:MIT

Widget Toolkit:Interface Kit

Programming Language:C++, C

Top Con

Unfinished

It's still in beta and quite unstable. Making it unsuitable for developing applications of any kind. See More

Top Pro

Beta has been released

After about 6 years since the alpha version, beta has been released on Fri, 2018-09-28. Check here for release notes. See More

ConfidentEnyalius's Experience

It's just plain fun to work through a 25 year old GUI , Graphical User Interface, that is up-to-date with functioning applications and internet. Good move. See More

Top Con

Language support is terrible

Top Pro

Only need 512mb ram

DeliberateAhti's Experience

Best OS I’ve used outside of the Mac. Fast, easy to use, and runs LibreOffice, Krita, and other apps. See More

Top Con

Small community

It is important when developing to be familiar with tools that other developers use. You can make any utility in any language you feel like, but if it's in an esoteric language that no one can read targeting a small platform that no one uses, then it was just something you did as a hobbyist, not as a developer. This is not to say that Haiku isn't a great operating system to hack around on. Just don't delude yourself into thinking you're doing it to get familiar with tools that you need to know to be a better developer. See More

Top Pro

Stability

OpinionatedAglibol's Experience

Haiku is slick and fast. Quite close to hardware. See More

Top Con

UI quite different to other OSes

Top Pro

Runs perfectly on old Hardware

DashingTelete's Experience

The new Beta are very Cool, have a lot of software and is fast and stable. See More

By default Windows 10 gathers information related to contacts, location, calendar and input (text and touch). The process for opting out of all data collection efforts is both time consuming and requires a reasonable amount of technical know-how. See More

score 43 · Answer 9

Windows 10

Top Con

Collects a lot of user data and sends it to Microsoft by default

Top Pro

Windows Subsystem Linux

Makes it very seamless for web development. In fact, it's nicer than MacOS because you get to choose the distro all without virtualization. Super convenient even if there are some minor issues like I/O performance. See More

SuccessfulHuitztlampaehecatl's Experience

Honestly, Microsoft is making a huge come back here. In many ways they were more on top the ball thajln Apple in 2018. They are now embracing open source and have added windows subsystem Linux which is amazing. While not without issues, particularly I/O (which only highlights how annoying it is to be a JavaScript developer these days), it's still a good feature and step in the right direction. New features ahead for 2019 only look brighter and include more sandbox/isolation features for security. I've switched from MacOS and a MacBook Pro to a Surface Pro for web development and I don't miss a thing to be frank. This is a monumental change here that's taking place. See More

Specs

OS Family:Windows NT

License:Proprietary

Based On:Windows 8.1

Package Manager:winget, MS Store, Windows Installer

Many interface and functionality changes have not been finalized yet, creating an inconsistent user experience. For example, there are both simplified Windows 10 style settings menus as well as Windows 7 style settings menus that can easily create confusion. Similarly, many of the bundled applications (People, Photos, Groove, Mail, Calendar, etc) lack functionality compared to their counterparts in previous Windows versions. See More

Top Con

Lacks polish

Top Pro

Good compatibility with Windows 7 software

Both applications and drivers created for Windows 7 work well on Windows 10. See More

MightyPolyphemus's Experience

Windows 10 should be better. Contains more browsers than plan 9 from bell labs. See More

Top Con

Installs bloatware

It installs many Windows Store apps by default. Moreover, it updates them automatically even after you uninstalled them, then they come back when you install a bigger update or service pack, eg: the creator's update. See More

Top Pro

DirectX 12

The newest version of Microsoft’s DirectX application programming interface, which handles visual and other multimedia tasks on Windows-based systems. See More

PoliteMagec's Experience

The MSVC C compiler is decades behind GCC and Clang. It is also not fully compliant with any of the ISO C standards- not even C89. As such, working with C code on Windows is extremely frustrating, unless you're using non-native tools that work more reliably in their native environment. See More

Top Con

Includes ads by default

Even in the Pro version. See More

Top Pro

Returns to a more familiar style start bar unlike Windows 8

Shane Knysh's Experience

Since Microsoft has a checkered past in regard to Windows updates, many people worry that a bad patch might break applications, drivers, peripherals or even brick their computers. See More

Top Con

Forced updates to Home and Pro versions

Top Pro

Built-in support for VPNs

A VPN connection can be established from the "Change Virtual Private Network" panel. Quickest way to access the panel is by searching for "VPN" in the start menu. See More

Top Con

Start menu lacks expected customization options

It's not possible to cascade menus, pin files, locations or apps to the list (it's possible to pin apps to the live tile section) or add custom menus. See More

Top Pro

Latest version of Windows

Top Con

Virus magnet

Top Pro

Easy to use

Top Con

Horrible stock performance on old hardware

Would recommend windows 7 (or even 8.1) on older (older than 5-6 years) hardware. See More

Top Pro

Availability of tools and software

Top Con

Guest account setup is painstaking (need to do via PC management panel)

Windows 10 lacks the ability to set up guest accounts via user account setup wizard. See More

Top Pro

Built-in way to play DVDs

No third-party software is required to play DVDs. See More

Top Con

Anitvirus software runs above administrator level

You are not allowed to turn off CPU intensive security scans or remove the software and replace it with something else, as of Windows 10. See More

Top Pro

Good user experience: superb driver support

Top Con

Kind of a mystery what the OS is actually doing

There have been Microsoft operating system code leaks. But for the most part there could be millions of security back doors and no one but hackers and Microsoft would know about them. See More

Top Pro

Very user friendly UI

Top Con

No built-in way to play DVDs

Third-party software is required to play DVDs. See More

Top Pro

Secure for Layman use

Top Con

Security features are stapled-on third party software

Top Pro

More browsers

More browsers, a bit more security. See More

Top Con

Proprietary

You're not allowed to modify or share a copy of Windows, you also can't read the source code to know what it's doing. See More

Top Pro

Tablet mode is a pain to use

The tablet mode of Windows 10 has many issues compared to other major tablet operating systems like Android, for example: 1.) In the tablet mode the desktop is replaced by the Windows 10 start menu 1.1.) As there is no Desktop there is no proper launcher to start your apps so you always have to open that windows 10 start menu... 2.) Virtual keyboard often don't come up automatically(you need to click on the keybord icon near the systray to bring it up) 2.1.) If the keyboard is docked and comes up it will lay over the window and if(like here on slant) the entry box is on the bottom of the page it will lay over that box so you have to manually undock the keyboard and move it to any other border which of course breaks other options like scrolling a page etc. 2.2.) Virtual keyboard and virtual touchpad have no customization options so you can't make them bigger or smaller etc. See More

Top Con

Hard to use

Windows had tons of buttons doing the same things, and tons of buttons named the same way that does different things. And you can't change that ! See More

Top Pro

Best operating system

Windows is the best. See More

Top Con

No guest accounts

Windows 10 lacks the ability to set up Guest accounts. See More

Top Con

Horrendous programming experience

You can generally never run "Linux" binaries without patching them or starting up an FHS sandbox. Some build scripts just won't work. See More

score 1 · Answer 10

NixOS

Top Pro

Stable

Top Con

Difficulty running software that's not packaged

Specs

Based On:Independent

Package Manager:Nix

Init-System:SystemD

Release Schedule:Fixed

Isolation and well-made defaults means for most systems changes there's a simple flag to switch and it will work with everything you've got. See More

Top Pro

Most settings just work

Top Con

Beginners Linux users may not want to learn Nix Expression Language to customize more advanced installs

Top Pro

Roll back updates

Top Pro

No package conflicts

Top Pro

Reuse configuration

Top Pro

No package dependecy hell

Plan 9 is very different from most other operating systems, and as such it's extremely difficult to bring in software designed for other operating systems ('porting'). See More

score 9 · Answer 11

Plan 9

Top Con

Difficult to use software made for other systems

Top Pro

Well designed

Plan 9's design is very orthogonal and well done. See More

Specs

OS Family:Plan 9

License:MIT

Top Con

No fully featured web browser

As indicated on the official Bell Labs webpage, there is no full featured web browser currently working on Plan 9, except abaco. See More

Top Pro

Designed to allow for multiple computers to work as if they were one

With Plan 9, computers are turned into terminals where you can access files and processing units which can be located elsewhere. Data storage is handled by another external server. This means that instead of each person having their own individual computer with all the required parts, all of the computing and storage is done in a central area and everything is networked in together. See More

Top Con

Not supported by most tools

Not supported by most dev tools beyond text editors. See More

Good kernel terminal and secure. See More

score 1 · Answer 12

Debian GNU/Linux

Top Pro

It has a pretty minimalist GUI, pretty much extensible, light weight

Top Con

It has a little hardware incompatibility here and there

Specs

OS Family:GNU/Linux

Based On:NONE

Package Manager:dpkg with apt, aptitude or apt-build

Init-System:Systemd

Terry Davis was hit by a train and it's unclear who will be taking over the project in his absence. See More

Answer 13

Arch Linux Testing

score 15 · Answer 14

TempleOS

Top Con

Lead maintainer is dead

Top Pro

It's templeOS

DevotedPoseidon's Experience

Beautiful See More

Top Pro

Allows you to talk to God

TempleOS comes with an oracle that lets you communicate directly with the Lord. See More

Top Pro

Created by the smartest programmer that's ever lived

Terry Davis wrote the entire operating system, and the compiler for the language that the OS is written in, by himself. See More