It can't do the literal entire thing an operating system is supposed to do: manage applications and their resulting windows, in a sensible way.
I want to know what application is running.
Sure it's in the dock!
I want to find a specific application window.
Go fuck yourself right to hell.
Wait, the taskbar doesn't show the running windows, like it does on every other OS? It's at least discrete right?
It discretely takes up 1.5cm of the bottom of the screen at all times. It's so discrete it doesn't even need to use the corners.
Uh, alright, well that's all the system space you need right?
Yeah of course just that bottom inch or so .... And a top of screen system level menu bar to display what windows does in the bottom corners.
/sigh/ ok, fine, I just want to be able to full screen a window and still see what else is open.
Burn in hell and die.
I want to be able to easily switch left and right between open windows.
Go full screen or I will shoot you.
I want to move an open window into the other monitor.
You can't because you're full screen dumbass.
I want to let a window present a popup like they normally do.
You can't because youre full screen dumbass. Why would you be full screen?
I want an application like Slack to be able to popup and remove notifications when is appropriate.
Choose to have every single notification persists on screen until you manually remove it, or miss all your notifications.
Can't we trouble you for something in between, where we trust an application and let it manage them in a way that makes sense based on their context?
You can trouble me for something in between these cheeks, shit stain.
Like honestly, I fucking hate what an advertising and AI filled mess Windows is, but it can actually manage your windows and virtual desktops in a way that makes a modicum of sense.
It feels like a single Apple product manager decided that the way that they use their computer (a single application at a time, no windows to manage) is the only way anyone does, so who cares if we implement a nonsensical full screen paradigm, it makes one tiny niche edge case slightly simpler.
right click them, but you're a programmer, why do you even care about the dock at all, you should hide it and use hammerspoon to make your system more suited for you.
well this is just wrong. On windows and KDE Plasma it definitely shows just the running application. You can hover over it and get a ridiculously long list of windows but that's honestly just as bad as mac. They're both bad solutions. Either you right click and get a list of text you have to remember, or you get a picture of the window that you have to scroll (I usually have way more windows open than this)
you can disable this.. like, what even is this complaint. You can literally hide it just like you can on windows. You can actually resize it easier than windows, you just grab it and drag! You can set the size programmatically (
defaults write com.apple.dock tilesize -int 42sets the size to 42 pixels) or completely disable it or set it to hide, like seriously? this is your complaint? https://mikefrobbins.com/2025/05/07/customize-and-automate-a-clean-macos-dock-layout/#dock-preferencesyou can also set this to hide...
click the plus button while holding option. it's not hard. You can probably even applescript it or use BTT or Hammerspoon to make it so that it always works that way, but once again, why are you clicking buttons manually? For me to fullscreen an app I click
alt+r spaceto make it fullscreen with no distractions, and for the windows way it'salt+r f.I can't tell if these are jokes or not.
you literally can. it's the same as rearranging any other space. I can think of no less than three separate ways to do this.
FINALLY a REAL FUCKING PROBLEM. holy shit how did it take this long for you to mention something that is actually an issue with mac.
This is a choice of the developer.
so yeah you literally don't know how it works. it literally is the developer's choice for how long a notification stays up and if it is persistent or not.
How about this. Go try out Hammerspoon, go try out AltTab. If those are too difficult for you then use BetterTouchTool (though that costs money). Your problems are nonexistent besides the single qualm about the popups not showing for 'true fullscreen' apps. But you don't like fs apps anyway! So don't use them!
I want to know which ones are running on that monitor.
Because I'm a programmer. I have enough code to write and maintain, and because if it was possible, I assume someone else would have done it by now given how much it's asked for.
First of all no, on windows that's a setting, because windows has settings for things. You can either
Lmao, no they are not equally bad.
First of all, on windows you can also right click and get that shitty list, but you probably don't use that because it's worse than the hover.
Second, the hover exists, and is better. An image preview of the window plus it's title is easier to scan quickly.
Third, you can also three finger swipe left and right on a trackpad, or windows key plus arrow key left and right to switch between windows, and you get a handy horizontal list in the middle when you do so you know exactly where you are in that list.
How do you switch between the running windows on a single monitor on a Mac, without having to consider every running application and window on your whole computer?
Alt Tabbing switches between applications, not windows.
Command + Arrow key, only switches between full screen windows / desktops, forcing you to full screen windows, just so you can quickly switch back and forth between them.
The complaint is that Apple's designers are obnoxious as fuck to waste more space than Windows on a taskbar that does less.
No, it is not. The user chooses in the MacOS settings for an app whether that app getsalerts or banners, and that changes their behaviour entirely. Alerts disappear and get lost, banners persist on your desktop until you dismiss them.
How about the trillion dollar corporation spend their time and money coding a functional window system into their 30 year old operating system? Or how about they stop using bullshit walled garden tactics like the iOS / Safari Rendering engine to force developers into buying Macs?
Again, there is no way to switch between running windows on a single monitor.
I do not understand why some people feel the need to defend such a dumb fucking windowing system. You obviously recognize how nonsensical Apple's full screen system is, and yet you come in here to insist it's not worse then Windows' because it has awkward multi step equivalents to windows' single shortcuts.