“Apple has posted for developers the ‘GM seed’ of the next version of its desktop operating system, OS X Mavericks, in preparation for expected consumer availability sometime later this month,” Thomas Claburn reports for InformationWeek.
“The GM seed will become the official commercial release if no show-stopping errors turn up,” Claburn reports. “OS X Mavericks follows the release of iOS 7, Apple’s mobile operating system, last month — timing that works well given the growing areas of overlap between the two operating systems. iOS 7 added AirDrop, a file-sharing mechanism introduced in OS X Lion, and OS X Mavericks adds Maps and iBooks from the iOS world. That’s in addition to crossovers facilitated by iCloud with apps such as Notes and Reminders and common services like iTunes Radio.”
Claburn reports, “OS X Mavericks doesn’t bring dramatic changes to the Mac, but it does offer a lot of thoughtful improvements that add up. Here are 11 of the new features that might make it worth installing.”
1. App Nap
2. Sprite Kit
3. AV Kit
4. Safari Power Saver
5. Compressed Memory
6. Multiple Screens
7. Tags
8. Safari Push Notifications
9. iCloud Keychain
10. iBooks
11. Automatic Updates
Read more in the full article here.
You would think a new OS would be included with a new hardware announcement. Here’s to hoping it’s updated MacBook Pros!
Because I really need an upgrade from my 6 year old MacBook Pro that’s starting to fail now.
Might not fit your use case, but I just got one of the new macbook airs and it’s AMAZING. Beats the pants off my 5-year-old iMac!
Tell me something laddie, do you sit in front of your MacBook Air not wearing pants like all true Scotsmen?
Very few Scotsmen actually wear kilts you know, just in case you think the highlands are alive with bagpipes, Caber tossers and sporrans.
Not entirely true. At some point in their life, almost every Scot has worn a kilt. weddings, Ceilidhs, parties you name it.
Now if you had said very few own a kilt, that’d be slightly more believable.
I was freed from me pants years ago… Wear one every day I do….. All year round..rain, sun or snow… Wouldn’t recommend snowmobiling through… Ill layer up more next time….
I’d also recommend either NOT wearing a wool kilt (itchy, scratchy) or alternatively wearing something to protect your goolies.
The only one that may actually impact me is Multiple Screens.
I love the dock on both screens and the menu bars following the active app on that screen. I don’t love that having each screen have it’s own spaces mean that windows can’t grow wider than the screen they are primarily on — that’s a bit quirky and not mentioned in the marketing demos 😉 So you can turn off the feature in order to have really wide windows (log files, packet trace analysis, banner/poster creation) but then you don’t get the dock at the bottom of wherever you go looking for it. And you have to log out and back in for changes to the feature (on/off) to become effective.
Why is this considered a new feature rather than a simple bug fix? I’m totally underwhelmed by this list. It just be a point rev, not a new release.
I hope this means we will finally get reliable Mini Display\Thunderbolt to HDMI connections.
I agree; multiple screens has been an irritation for years.
and hopefully tags will make the job of file management better. Everything since Snow Leopard has added to the file management job.
I work almost totally in web content creation and almost totally in 3rd party apps by necessity. Many of those apps require their own project folder, and Lion etc. is unhappy with that since it wants to file by app. Most of my projects use as many as 10 separate apps and the output must be filed in the main project folder for it all to work. So I have to be monitor and be aware to ensure the individual file, whatever the app is that created it, actually does save it where I need it to be. Latest versions of OSX want to argue with me about that and save the file where it wants them, and its not even consistent. Almost like the file management problems that are inherent with Windows. But this may help, hopefully some areas of Apple are again aware that some of us don’t just use our Macs for entertainment delivery using only Apple apps.
They need to remember that without content creators, there is no web, and no iOS apps for that matter.
I will remain optimistic.
I second your comment denouncing Apple’s stubborn refusal to recognize that for productivity, there is often a need to organize stuff BY PROJECT, not by App.
We should be able to group and access Web links, mails, notes, pdfs, pages/numbers/keynote docs, images, notes, contact data, (and more) that belong together in a project.
How this is done (e.g., through aliases, or whether only supplements other access models), doesn’t manner, as long as it is easy and reliable (aliases have a tendancy to lose their target files)
Saying that ‘Multiple Screens’ is anything new is a semantic error. What’s new is that the multiple screens will each have full OS X capabilities (as opposed showing just windows and not much else).
And one other feature: iTunes? Will it finally work? iTunes 11.1.1 is still a work in progress.
Yes, I hope mine will stop syncing my phone twice every time I connect with my Mini. That is new with 11.1.1, but then I get something unexpected every time iTunes updates,so…….
I was playing with iTunes v11.1.1 today. I only had one mysterious CRASH, which is an improvement. However, I had several sessions of Sit&Spin temporary lockups. IOW: It still has cruddy memory management in evidence.
Coding good memory management remains the single most difficult aspect of modern coding. I could rant about it all day.
I look for it to be out on or before 15 Oct.
Can someone tell me what they mean by multiple screens?
Is that only if you have dual monitor or more?
Maybe this will give me a reason to buy another 27″ thunderbolt! 🙂
Can’t wait!!!
Yes, multiple monitors. With Mavericks If you have “multiple screens” the dock and tool bar are available on each screen and available on whichever screen you happen to be using at that moment.
I should have said that the toolbar and dock are active on whichever screen you happen to be using at the time. :\
The best OSX yet. Great new features for pro users.
tags looks like the killer “app” for me in mavs
also, ibooks and apple maps will be real good, should be able to link iMac, iPhone, iPad and nav system in the car all up in maps!!
Note that ‘Tags’ is an elaboration upon good old Mac OS Labels. Except you can essentially metadata the hell out of them for far more functionality. Be sure to read about their functionality in order to make the most of them.
Yawn.
I’d add the multiple tabs feature in Finder to the list. For folks that do a lot of file management it’s a terrific time saver.
It is a bit of a shocker when you first experience it. But it’s a nice space saver, as well as time saver.
Forgot to mention Maps.
Thomas forgot to mention OpenGL 4.1, an outdated standard, but still a welcome improvement over 3.2
Now if only we’d get some actual 3D object GUI elements into OS X, as opposed to merely 2D trickery and animations.
Well… maybe there are some freaks like me out there who own many books and articles and want to edit their metadata. Since Apple in their wisdom moved the Books out of iTunes and into the iBooks app, it is no longer possible to edit any of the metadata as there is no editing mode in iBooks. This fact (and the horror that is iTunes 11) will keep me in Mountain Lion for as long as it takes. I think Apple under Cook and Ive has made too many mistakes lately. I just hope they will get their act together soon. And by the way, I DO HATE the abomination that is iOS7.
Of course if Apple said it was going to introduce a bi-annual subscription everyone would scream.
Bi-annual updates at $30 (or less ) and the customers will be swamping the servers in their millions to get OS Mavericks.
Pity M$ can’t seem to work that one out. Maybe after the departure of SB there might be some enlightenment,