MacOS has a different methodology but the idea is most applications do things the exact same way every time, the menu at the top is standardized across software. Take some time to familiarize yourself with basic usage and then just fire up a new program and you’ll see what I mean. Keyboard shortcuts in apps are always the same for the same function. They’re easily accessible. Alt+f4 is fucking not, command+q is. Command+space to search for anything. That existed before MS implemented search in the taskbar. It’s got its ups and downs, but the OS is really tailored to make things accessible.

The reason it’s so wildly different from windows is partly due to a Microsoft going patent crazy on design and ui elements to try and monopolize home computing. Technically a “desktop” is their patent, which is why it’s called a workspace in every other OS. They also have been sued by Microsoft in the past over UX things.

I don’t understand the hate for MacOS or Ubuntu frankly. Windows was fine until they stopped making “features” opt in. Fedora has been toying with adding AI, and my experiences with Arch have been subpar for my needs. I’m kinda at the point in my life where I don’t care as long as the OS works. They’re all so similar at the end of the day, they help me do the websites, work tools and vidya gaems.

A lot of the “different first” has to do with Microsoft patenting UI elements, methodologies and design choices. I’ve never understood why people trash Apple computers so vehemently. They’re a fairly robust software suite targeted at consumers and amateur creatives that’s tailor made to run on the hardware it ships with, if you don’t use those things that’s fine, but it doesn’t mean it’s bad.

I’ve had laptops from almost every major manufacturer and frankly the MacBooks I’ve had stood out save for a few niche problems like dock compatibility. The only manufacturer that regularly comes even remotely close is Lenovo. My work provided dell is 4 years old, cost the same as than an equivalent Mac at the time and is trash. I get 90 minutes out of the battery if I’m lucky, trackpad feels horrible and is inaccurate, can’t do gestures reliably and is horribly unintuitive (must click on the bottom left corner to get a left click despite the whole thing being clickable (tapping works about half the time) but it’s placed so far left i think it’s made for left handed people), case is warped because the battery swelled and had to be replaced after 2 months, it bitches about the charger it was shipped with saying it’s underpowered, the screen has bleeding on many pixel clusters. Why was that thing listed so high when the Mac we bought another user at the same price still works and has only had a problem with cheap dock compatibility? Oh because it said i7, had an ssd (which failed), a “multi-touch/gesture capable” trackpad. and a numpad. This has been the general quality of 4/5 of work provided laptops, 3 were Dell, one was HP, the only good one was a Lenovo. All were business targeted models with not too dissimilar pricing from a MacBook. I als deploy a lot of machines, mostly laptops, and honestly the only ones that do not come half functional out of the box or need warranty in less than a year are Apple and Lenovo.