Am in the job hunt and virtually every employer wants MS Windows/ MS office experience which I have but every computer assessment I have taken uses Windows as the base and counts computer skills as being solely on MS Windows. I call this discrimination towards Mac users! At my last job I used Outlook, MS Excel, and Windows 10 for my daily duties. But since I am at home I use the Mac + iWorks + Mail at home since I prefer this over MS Windows. I hope this does not mean I will become rusty or will fail some stupid computer assessment because I am using a Mac.
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Discrimination towards Mac Users
- Thread starter jwolf6589
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There is no discrimination. They are testing on what is relevant to the enterprise you are applying to.
A parallel to what you are saying is if I called out a potential employer for interviewing me in English, and not taking into consideration my French skills. I would not bring up or use French in an interview, nor expect it to be used for my line of work.
A parallel to what you are saying is if I called out a potential employer for interviewing me in English, and not taking into consideration my French skills. I would not bring up or use French in an interview, nor expect it to be used for my line of work.
You seem to lack understanding of what discrimination is.
There is no discrimination. They are testing on what is relevant to the enterprise you are applying to.
A parallel to what you are saying is if I called out a potential employer for interviewing me in English, and not taking into consideration my French skills. I would not bring up or use French in an interview, nor expect it to be used for my line of work.
This... Just because you have a skill or knowledge of something, doesn't mean that is what your employer is looking for.
Okay okay I was on a rant..... You know how much I wish things were reversed and Macs dominated the enterprise.
Perhaps if you feel that strongly, change profession and/or target companies that use Macs. There are many, just not typically the larger generic enterprise type operations.
In a few of my computer classes, like the HTML class I took last semester, the teachers seemed to discriminate Mac users, acting like I couldn't do any HTML coding on a Mac just because Notepad+ was Windows-only.
That's not discrimination. That's ignorance perhaps. It's a lack of flexibility of thought and in general, but discrimination as we generally define it in society? We Mac users as a protected class? I'm not at all sold.
Yeah and going to school costs money I don't have. Besides Windows seems to dominate the business world. Its okay I have used it at every job I have had. I just don't want to install it via bootcamp on my machine at home unless its work related.
I have been solely a Mac user for the last 5 years, but before that I used PC/Windows for well over 30+ years. It should be like riding a bicycle if I was forced to use Windows for a test or my everyday workday. Though I think I would play around with the latest version of Windows just to get myself use to it as taking a test for a job interview is usually a timed event (even if they say it isn't).
For the basics yes, but I do not know how to troubleshoot windows without calling IT, and MS Office is different on Windows but I am very familiar with the Mac version. I used it heavily at my last job but every job has different work requirements. So overall I call my MS office and Windows experience at the basic/general level.
Just FYI - A handful of companies e.g. Google, employees are given a choice of Mac or Windows Laptops. Tools/Software within the company are all Cloud-based (isn't this where it's all going anyway) compatible with & irrespective of whichever OS platform. Some departments use MS Office if they have to communicate with outside companies/suppliers who use Office. I guess the main consideration is historical compatibility / going with the crowd, as well as an organisations budget plus IT support for hardware.
Trouble shooting is a matter of problem identification and resolution. Skills can be transferred between Windows and macOS. In a lot of cases is comes down to narrowing down the possibilities of issues/sources to a select few or even one.
If nothing else, search with Google to find answers to issues you're having.
Finally, some employers don't like end users resolving their own issues and require everything to go through a central IT office.
True. At my last job I just called IT whenever I had a problem. However at home with my Mac I solve most issues myself.
On a side note I've worked for several multinational companies like P&G, Ford, among others and they all use Microsoft products because compatibility and networking stuff is more powerful in windows or Linux environments than Mac.
I like both MAC and Windows but I have to admit Mac is more consumer focused and creative jobs like design, etc than Microsoft. Apple eco system is very close by meaning and many big companies need more flexibility.
However big servers are all linux.
I like both MAC and Windows but I have to admit Mac is more consumer focused and creative jobs like design, etc than Microsoft. Apple eco system is very close by meaning and many big companies need more flexibility.
However big servers are all linux.
I actually work for a company where Macs make up at least half of the total number of deployed machines.
But you know what? Apple is to blame, more than anyone else, for continually making a strong case for getting rid of Macs in the Enterprise and standardizing on Windows.
I mean, for starters, you've got Office 365 that STILL doesn't have feature parity between the Windows and the Mac versions. How come the Mac version isn't able to work with a .PST archive of email made on a Windows version of Outlook? There's currently no Mac solution for working with Excel spreadsheets containing VBA macros either.
And up until a few years go, you really could make a good cost justification for giving people Macs instead of Windows PCs. The Macbook Pros and Airs we deployed had held up great and Apple kept a lot of things consistent for years. (EG. If you invested in a set of Mini-DP to VGA/DVI/HDMI dongles for someone carrying an old Macbook Air from around 2011, they could get a newer Air in 2015 or 2016 and count on reusing them. Heck, with a little "shim" that sold for around $10, you could still use one of the old style Magsafe AC adapters with newer machines.)
These days? We have to pay a big premium for the newer Macbook Pros to get anything with a reasonable hardware configuration, and then, if a user breaks one, you usually may as well throw it out and buy a new one. The repair costs are insane, outside warranty. At least $600 or so for a new 13" LCD screen, if that's all that broke. And of course, none of our existing supply of dongles or spare power adapters work with them either.
Then, you get into the whole thing of central management. JAMF Pro is excellent for that, but $$$'s. We bought it and it looks like it'll do what we need. But at that price point, it almost should have been a universal, platform-independent tool. We have to pay double to buy another MDM solution for the Windows machines (probably Microsoft InTune) -- because InTune says it can manage Macs too, but not at more than a superficial level.
But you know what? Apple is to blame, more than anyone else, for continually making a strong case for getting rid of Macs in the Enterprise and standardizing on Windows.
I mean, for starters, you've got Office 365 that STILL doesn't have feature parity between the Windows and the Mac versions. How come the Mac version isn't able to work with a .PST archive of email made on a Windows version of Outlook? There's currently no Mac solution for working with Excel spreadsheets containing VBA macros either.
And up until a few years go, you really could make a good cost justification for giving people Macs instead of Windows PCs. The Macbook Pros and Airs we deployed had held up great and Apple kept a lot of things consistent for years. (EG. If you invested in a set of Mini-DP to VGA/DVI/HDMI dongles for someone carrying an old Macbook Air from around 2011, they could get a newer Air in 2015 or 2016 and count on reusing them. Heck, with a little "shim" that sold for around $10, you could still use one of the old style Magsafe AC adapters with newer machines.)
These days? We have to pay a big premium for the newer Macbook Pros to get anything with a reasonable hardware configuration, and then, if a user breaks one, you usually may as well throw it out and buy a new one. The repair costs are insane, outside warranty. At least $600 or so for a new 13" LCD screen, if that's all that broke. And of course, none of our existing supply of dongles or spare power adapters work with them either.
Then, you get into the whole thing of central management. JAMF Pro is excellent for that, but $$$'s. We bought it and it looks like it'll do what we need. But at that price point, it almost should have been a universal, platform-independent tool. We have to pay double to buy another MDM solution for the Windows machines (probably Microsoft InTune) -- because InTune says it can manage Macs too, but not at more than a superficial level.
I feel liberated using my Mac in a MS dominated enterprise. The admins have no interest in learning how to bend them to their will, leaving myself and a few others unencumbered by big brother's group policy, startup scripts, or "this action requires elevated privileges" nonsense.
I coded my first web site on a Commodore Amiga 3000 using CygnusEd back in 1996. You want to talk about discrimination. My first Internet dial-up company never even freaking HEARD OF an Amiga. I just asked for their tech guy for the info I needed for the Miami TCP/IP stack and then did my thing. Ironically, they had Unix shell account access at the time (where I could set up web counters and such for the site) and a Newsgroup server. After a few years, all that was gone (shell access due to 'security' concerns and the Newsgroup server because apparently they thought no one used it.
I remember Usenet Newsgroups, shell accounts, and IRC. I first got on the Internet in late 1995, but before that commercial online services such as AOL and Prodigy in 1994.
That's bonkers. Who is teaching these classes? Web development is dominated by Macs. If you go to any dev related conference you will see a sea of people toting around Mac laptops. My department at work is mostly developers and everyone uses Macs with their code/text editor of choice. Mostly people use VS Code and a Macbook Pro.
You could see if these folks need a helping hand...
https://tinyurl.com/y5y2u3nh
Seriously though, you just have to pick your industry carefully. Admittedly, Windows has the lion's share across large companies but it still has a strong foothold in graphic design, printing, many forms of media and (last I checked - it's been a while) music. I'm sure there are others I don't know about too.
If you feel strongly enough that you want to use macOS in your day job then it might take you longer to track down a suitable role, and you may need to relocate. If not, then it's time to bite the bullet and brush up those Windows skills. The flip side is that companies who *do* need someone with strong macOS skills may find those people harder to locate when a position comes up and so *might* be prepared to offer a little more to attract the right candidate.
Good luck!
https://tinyurl.com/y5y2u3nh
Seriously though, you just have to pick your industry carefully. Admittedly, Windows has the lion's share across large companies but it still has a strong foothold in graphic design, printing, many forms of media and (last I checked - it's been a while) music. I'm sure there are others I don't know about too.
If you feel strongly enough that you want to use macOS in your day job then it might take you longer to track down a suitable role, and you may need to relocate. If not, then it's time to bite the bullet and brush up those Windows skills. The flip side is that companies who *do* need someone with strong macOS skills may find those people harder to locate when a position comes up and so *might* be prepared to offer a little more to attract the right candidate.
Good luck!
I used Windows in my day to day duties my last job. Windows 10 and Windows 7 to be exact.