Menu
I recently switched over to a MacBook Pro so I'm still really new at Mac software ecosystem. What is the best guide or what tips do you have to quickly get adept at using Mac for developing on both Mac/Unix and MS platforms (*.NET, SharePoint, SQL Server, etc) using VMWare Fusion? For example, I've setup NetBeans, FlexBuilder, Eclipse, TextMate, VMWare Fusion, OpenOffice, FireFox, dragged Terminal.app to my dock, upgraded the Ruby installation and related gems and so on... Things I've not done but looking at (based on other's experiences) include QuickSilver (is it all that different than SpotLight?), MacPorts (or Fink?), getting started with iPhone, Android, and so on. You can tell from my inexperience that I don't know what the best ways of doing things are yet, and don't want to get in the habit of just installing things and then leave files and stuff laying around slowing the system down. If you have any really cool tips about setting up a developer's Mac please share them!
Update: The nature of my job is I'm always working with new/different technologies, some Windows/MS based, some not, and with the Mac (and Fusion) even the MS based stuff is more enjoyable to me.
902
If you see a message that “macOS cannot verify that this app is free from malware” then you're dealing with Gatekeeper. Generally speaking, you can bypass Gatekeeper restrictions by control-clicking the application and selecting Open from the pop-up menu.
during the initial setup where the user inputs before the setup completes, yeah you can indeed safely shut it down.
By default, closing the lid on your MacBook Pro will put it to sleep. Here is some more information about sleep and other energy saving methods. As long as your hard drive has spun down, as it does when it goes to sleep, you should be fine to put your computer to sleep and carry it around.
I'd highly recommend MacPorts - you can quickly and easily install new packages with a simple
sudo port install package-name
Instead of having to deal with browsing a website to find the distribution, download a disk image, and run an installer, or downloading a tarball and untarring it, running a configure script, and running make, etc.
55
Find some cash and invest in extra memory for your mac. I know it's probably not the tip you want to hear, but honestly, it'll save you frustration in the long run. Apple ships these babies with way less memory than they deserve, and charges an arm and a leg for an expansion. I had a Mac Pro (quad-core Xeon) crawl to a halt until I got some real memory in there.
Another tip is to get a decent keyboard and mouse. Don't trust Steve Jobs with that "single mouse key for everything" crap. It works for ichat, not for real programming. Get yourself a real keyboard and a real mouse with multiple buttons. Configure your middle scrollwheel button to open expose or whatever it is that shows you all windows. Configure your fourth button for magnification.
Also, from your description it sounds like you don't really know what it is that you want to develop. If you're doing mac-specific things, get used to XCode ASAP and lose the rest. If you want to be doing windows programming, not sure why you would use a mac. If you want Java, you have Eclipse, you're ready to go.
26
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With
