Hi, I’m wondering if anyone uses macOS user accounts in order to sandbox audio and midi setups.
I use my Mac most of the time for my design work during the day. But the way I use my audio during the day is different to how I’d use it when doing music production.
Surely there are benefits to separating those production contexts?
It would also allow my Mac to be less “noisy” or busy doing background stuff that I’d not need when in music production mode.
Any thoughts on this?
Cheers
Marc
have you tried setting up a dedicated focus mode and a separate desktop for music apps?
I do all kinds of different things with my mac and I use both features a lot, never had the urge to separate things with a different user though, seems like a hassle to login/logout and theoretically if you have same software installed for all users there’s no real benefit except for mental separation…
I use MacOS Spaces to seperate my audio / business work flows. Look into it if not familiar
I dont have the need to sandbox as so damn stable
Oof … never heard of spaces before now. Thank you.
I had no idea they called Spaces, I just call them Desktops 
and yeah one of the best features of macos
I never got quite used to Spaces because at some point I got annoyed always moving between them and I only had two…
I do use Stage Manager more nowadays to have a clean desktop. Works most of the time and if I want all windows open I just disable it through the control menu bar…
I used to partition my drive into 2-3 separate partitions for different purposes but at some point I figured it was kind of pointless, just adding an extra layer of thought process and complication. I use my computer for work in the day and the same machine for music stuff the rest of the time, just having one ‘space’ (ie desktop) for one thing and then another one for something else works fine.
Hmm i’m looking into it, It’s not intuitive at all thus far. And I’ve been a mac user since 1995.
Thinking…
So my first question is, this is soemthing you setup as you go along with your days work, right?
Can you save Spaces?
That would be so cool, you just select a pre-saved Space, i guess a work/app template of sorts with various apps and files open for that work mode.
Forget setting up different spaces, the best way is different computers. One for work, one for music, one for emails, one for ordering pizza…
No you setup diff apps for different spaces.
Eg
Email / Excel / Word - Work Space
Ableton / Logic / Standalone Plugins - Audio Space
They then stay saved as part of the MacOS until you reassign or remove them.
I find it hand for hiding all my work crap out the way but one click away if required!
from my experience, that extra abstraction layer is not worth all the effort required to manage it.
This next distraction will work for sure…
Spaces?
Set mine up 2 years ago and it took 5 minutes lol
Luckily I have a different computer for work…
I’m confused. Are MacOS Spaces a true sandboxing feacture (i.e. virtual environments or even virtual machines) or is it just different views on the same system?
No it just kind of boxes / groups select apps into its own desktop.
Best way to describe it is kind of like having multiple laptops hooked up to one screen and you are selecting which computer uses the monitor but in reality of course its one computer.
I used to have my excel spreadsheets / emails apps open all the time for work and their windows stuck behind my audio apps etc which was messy flicking between stuff. This kind of tidys it all up into cleaner desktops (Spaces) and gives the impression the other apps are closed.
Its nothing technical just neater management really if one multitasks a lot between different computer usages.
on most major linux distros it’s called virtual desktop / workspaces, it’s basically a tool to separate workspaces into multiple desktops so you can have many open windows simultaneously without them being hidden one behind the other, so for example you can have “social” workspace where you’d put all your messaging apps etc, or “music” where you’d put all your music related stuff, etc.
you’d usually switch between the desktop with a single shortcut, on macos it’s Control+Left or Right, so it’s easier then Alt-Tabbing into a window when you have many open.
you can also assign apps to open in specific desktop, so no matter on what desktop you are and how cluttered it is, you can for example open Live and it will automatically switch to that Space with everything else still open but hidden from the eyes.
very useful feature once you get used to it. I actually removed my second monitor because of that feature, it’s easier to switch desktops and keep your head straight instead of breaking the neck looking at two monitors.
I use Bunch to separate work spaces, it helps me get up and running with a different set up apps with one click. I tried spaces, but that sucks for me.
Having different users might become a nightmare with setup and software licences , depending on how personalized your system is.
@Kultschar @alechko actually the reason I want to separate is not just for work-mode environments, it’s also to optimise the use of the CPU. Which tbh i’m not sure really matters but hear me out:
I’m pretty deep into audiophile level equipment with my music listening setup (not production) and there is a whole thing about using a standalone DAC (digital analogue converters), streamer equipment and so on.
Having invested in this stuff (if you’re curious: Doge 7 and the iFi Zen, i can confirm that offboarding signal processing from a “noisy” machine like a PC/laptop, truly makes a difference. Beyond these stand-alone components in my setup, the whole rig looks like this currently (and the results are glorious)
Even my cables are kinda silly engineered, made by a company that is contracted by NASA. (and i know very well about the snake oil in this world, there are cables that sell for 40k, no joke 
)
So if I care so much about listening to music, it figures I should care as much about my music production setup.
So much of the music I love: house, techno esp the early days of these genres, were made on thrift shop buys, by pioneers who didn’t have the budget to even go into a studio. So I don’t think it’s a deal breaker.
But surely sandboxing my macs internal processes with a separate user account, where I kill ALL the extensions and background apps, can only be help? And this would give me the same work environment focus as macOS spaces. Also, Apple’s implementation of account switching is fast af.
Final thing to add here is that this comparison i’ve been outlying is actually not that different to how all of us here produce music, via stand-alone hardware. Separate, dedicated equipment that does a thing singularly and well. So why not treat our laptops in the same way? Imagine if your Digitakt was also checking mails, running 100s of invisible processes… doesn’t feel right hah.
I’d love to know the facts though. Actually i might ask Chat GPT in a sec. But if anyone has facts-level info about this, please share This is all super speculative and anecdotal.