Why is a macbook seen as best for programming?

Why would you want to use a trackpad, that is 2 inches below the keyboard, to use a keyboard shortcut? surely its easier to just... use the keyboard?
 
The Macbook trackpads are huge and what I love about them are the multitouch gestures (scrolling up, down, back forward, top, bottom, roll up windows, etc). Unlike a Windows touchpad (which is very small too) you can scroll the page using any part of it rather than just the scrollbar at the side. Once you're used to them you don't feel the need for a mouse.

The backlit keyboard is also useful in low light situations, although that's less useful for programming of course.
 
Macbook / Apple OS is fantastic for web development, working off a unix based os makes is easier to develop locally and its command line makes git and other utilities easier to use as well.

also they are pretty
 
I quite like mine TBH. Got a MacBook Pro that I keep at home for anything Mac related that needs some umph, a MacBook Air that I use day to day at Uni, and then my PC for gaming or anything Windows related that needs POWAR.

Mac has got a good choice of IDEs. I use Netbeans on OSX for Java, Visual Studio in a Win7 VM for C & C# (thanks to the SSD my MacBook Air manages fine running the VM), and Xcode on OSX for iOS.

Under the hood it's Unix, and when we came to use Unix at Uni it was funny how all the Windows fanboys didn't have a clue (didn't even know basic Unix commands FFS).
 
I use a Mac and the TextMate editor for developing, both at home and at work. The community for the sort of stuff I do is pretty mac-centric, and as a result is the platform that offers the smoothest development experience.
 
Personally I really don't like my Macbook, sure its great for doing simple stuff, but the moment I have to do anything remotely like research it becomes a complete waste of time, its 'unix' backbone turns out to be rubbish and poorly implemented, and trying to get a linux distro running on it is infuriating without an external mouse (works fine for any other laptop I have tried out of the box) and the best joy comes in when you update OSX and apple has decided to wipe out your EFI bootloader, because thats exactly what you want when you update one of the OSs on your laptop.
 
Back in Uni when I had Comp Sci as a second subject, the 2nd year lab was all iMacs.

I absolutely hated it!

The reason was the Unix base for OSX, however, that did not provide anything that couldn't be replicated on a PC, further it cut my productivity down massively.

No Alt-Tab, no right-mouse click, windows horribly organised and difficult to find.

I actually could only work at around 50% of the pace I can on a PC.
 
Can't say I've ever heard that they were better for programming, I have a few friends in my CS class who use them but I don't think the idea of them being better for programming had any factor in their choice of computer.

Find it a bit odd that university labs are using them to get comfortable with the Unix base. We have fedora installed on a few computers here to gain familiarity which I thought would have been a lot cheaper although guessing the macs are being used for design courses as well.
 
Docaroo said:
Back in Uni when I had Comp Sci as a second subject, the 2nd year lab was all iMacs.

I absolutely hated it!

The reason was the Unix base for OSX, however, that did not provide anything that couldn't be replicated on a PC, further it cut my productivity down massively.

No Alt-Tab, no right-mouse click, windows horribly organised and difficult to find.

I actually could only work at around 50% of the pace I can on a PC.
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Wait, so you haven't a clue how to use a mac and you find it easier to work on a PC? You are 27 so either went to uni late or you were there nearly 9 years ago. You are either incapable of using a mac or you were using a mac 9 years ago. Either way, not really an argument.

I used windows for 15 years and after 2 years with a mac, I am much more productive than I ever was on a PC. Thats just me personally but saying that you couldn't see how to change between programs or use a right click is silly.

Both are fine for 95% of programming tasks and it all comes down to personal preference unless you fancy OSX/iOS dev or .NET.
 
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