<p>I know this may be a little university independent but hopefully I can get some input. I have been a mac user for almost all of my life and I am looking to major into computer science. What surprised me when I visited Purdue (probably the college I will be attending), is that the majority of their CS students were using linux. I was probably going to throw a Ubuntu partition onto my MBP to get an edge on using Linux since it's not as user friendly. Is this typical for most CS students, and would Mac OS X suffice since it's also a unix environment?</p>
<p>Look at it this way: Over the course of a computer science major, you will probably run a couple of linux distros and windows to use Visual Studio. Bootcamping (multiple OS’s on one computer) on a Mac is super easy, so having one more OS on your computer wouldn’t be too ridiculous. Plus you get the battery life of a Mac and OS X is the ultimate backup partition, as it is really hard to mess up to the point of un-usability. </p>
<p>Substituting Mac OS X for Linux likely won’t work. OS X is, by its nature, closed source. The whole point of linux is that it’s open source (and free). </p>
<p>If you’re afraid of trying Linux, bootcamp your MBP and try Ubuntu w/ gnome before you go off to school. It’s by far the most user-friendly distro, and it’s regularly updated.</p>
<p>I completely agree with Beanwolf.
You’re in the best situation. You own a Apple computer which can run all three of the major operating systems. Linux is open source so getting it is very easy as well as installing it.</p>
<p>FYI, OP, if you wait until the end of this month (April 2012) you will be able to download Ubuntu 12.04 LTE. The LTE (Long Term Edition) in this case being the importance. In the past, all of Ubuntu LTE desktop software has been supported with updates for 3 years (5 years for server), but starting with 12.04, the LTE will extend updates to 5 years to coincide with server editions. That means that version will be supported with updates for the entire time you’re in school.</p>
<p>Keep OS X.</p>
<p>It’s nicer to run Linux, but in my experience, the isolated tasks involved in CS have always been just as easily done on OS X vs Linux.</p>
<p>At my college, a vast majority of the professors use Macs. Half of the students get by with Mac systems.</p>
<p>If you really need Linux, run it in a virtual machine. It’s just nice to have a working, compatible machine.</p>
<p>I’ve seen plenty of CS majors with Macs who enjoy the unix underpinnings of MacOSX. </p>
<p>They’ve all successfully used virtualization software and/or bootcamp to run linux and windows as needed.</p>
<p>Yeah, you really don’t need Ubuntu, but I realize the cachet that Linux has among the computer-savvy population. If you really don’t understand how to use it, spend some time over the summer reading about it, watching videos and generally testing the waters. If anything, you can always switch to Ubuntu while at college… you don’t have to be an incoming freshman already using Ubuntu, as I’m sure many of the current CS majors only switched after starting college. </p>
<p>Regardless, stick with your mac. As everyone before has mentioned, it’ll allow you to run all three operating systems, while a native Windows computer won’t.</p>
<p>You can run the Mac OS on non-Apple computers if you want.
It’s not legal and may require some driver hacks.</p>