Quite a while ago, Steve Jobs, the CEO of
Apple at that time, held a keynote titled "Back to the Mac" At that same keynote, he gave us a sneak preview of the next generation of Mac OS X, called
Mac OS X Lion.
Although Mac OS X Lion is still a while away, software developers signed up for Apple's Developer Program got an early look. OS X Lion is coming sometime in summer 2011, so the version of the operating system the developer's go is still in it's early stages. Still, what the developer's saw had some cool features.
This new version of OS X brings the best features of the
iPad onto the big screen size and more powerful specs of the macs.
Apple integrates the elegant home screen of the iPad onto the Mac, and allows you to click the little black Launchpad icon on the dock a the bottom of the screen. Any open Windows fade away, and an iPad like grid of icons appear. This is where you can find all of your apps. The apps can be dragged into folders, which look and open just like the folders on the iPad and iPhone.
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| Launchpad Screen |
Apple also apparently likes how all iPad and iPhone apps open full-screen. The new iPhoto, Mail, iCal, and Preview apps all can open full-screen. This allows you to concentrate on one thing at a time, or so Apple says. The apps can be changed to full-screen with one click, and open apps can be swiped through with multitouch gestures on the trackpad. The Developer platform also allows third-party apps to take advantage of the full-screen capabilities.
A new and funnily named feature in Mac OS X is Mission Control. Mission control allows you to see everything that's running on your Mac, from a birds eye kind of view. It shows little icons of running apps, the dashboard, and the desktop.
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| Mission Control |
OS X Lion also integrates a new auto-save feature. This automatically saves your work, and allows you to revert back to previous versions of a document. Similarly, you can see all previous versions of a document in the order that you edited it.
The new version of he OS also allows you to resume exactly where you left off when you restart your Mac. There is no more need to save and close everything, and then restart it all when you turn on your computer again.
A few new features come in the new Mail app, Mail 5. Mail now supports conversations, which groups a conversation of emails in one group, rather than showing ten emails separately. The layout of the app is also redesigned for the Mac's widescreen. It shows the one line preview on the left side of the screen, as well as a full height preview at the right.
The last main feature is called AirDrop. AirDrop allows you to share files with others wirelessly. To use AirDrop, you click the icon in the Finder, and you then see any Macs around you also using AirDrop. If they are in your contacts, you can even see their profile picture. To share a file, just drag a file to the other users profile. They can then accept the file, and it will start to download.
Overall, this seems like a very exciting update to the Mac operating system. The fact that Apple is bringing it's Macs closer to the iPad scares some. The iPad is a very closed platform. Any apps must be approved by Apple to be included in the App Store. With the recent launch of the Mac App Store, it seems that the Mac platform is getting less and less open, giving Apple more control. The end user thinks that the closed platform of the iPad is great, but overall it gives more control to Apple, which isn't necessarily a good thing.
