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This year, with the launch of Lion, Apple has been all about “Back to the Mac” – Taking great features from iOS, and porting them over to OS X. For the most part, this has been fairly successful. For this reason, it makes sense that many iOS developers would do the same.
In this roundup, we’ll have a look at the biggest success stories in this field. The developers featured here didn’t just rebuild the interface for OS X, they enhanced the app to rival (and often surpass) their iOS counterparts.
It’s been a long two years since the release of Snow Leopard, and with all the fanfare surrounding Apple’s mobile devices recently, many Mac users, myself included, are feeling a little left out. Lion’s much-anticipated release follows Apple’s promise to bring focus “back to the Mac” by integrating advancements from iPhone and iPad development into the Mac platform. In its attempt to bring the best of iOS to the next generation of OSX, Apple has some people worried that Lion will turn their Macs into giant iPads, or introduce iOS-like restrictions to the Mac. Now that this cat is finally out of its cage, let’s dive right in and see what Lion has to offer!
Unlike Snow Leopard, which featured mostly behind-the-scenes improvements and few obvious changes, Lion is a feature-packed major update that will noticeably change the way you use your Mac. Lion comes packed with over 250 new features, so let’s take a look at some of its biggest selling points (in no particular order).
In today’s WWDC keynote, Apple shared the usual set of Mac statistics that we now almost take for granted. Notebook and desktop sales are up, the platform continues to outgrow the PC industry as a whole, and everything is going swimmingly. There’s still a major bias toward portable computers – 73% of Macs sold are notebooks.
One of the headline stories centred around what to expect in their next operating system — OS X Lion — due for release in July 2011. Not only did Apple announce that this will be a download-only release through the Mac App Store, but it’s also their lowest priced operating system to date, costing $29.99.
Let’s take a look at what you can expect from the big cat!
Being productive is all about being efficient, and restarting your computer is always a process that steals precious minutes from your life. If only there was a way to have a fine level of control over this frustrating task…
That’s the concept behind Startupizer, a new app available at the Mac App Store. If you’re anything like me, you have a few different extensions that all load up prior to the machine actually being usable.
Startupizer lets you tweak your startup settings so that you decide what opens when, making boot times substantially faster. As usual, there’s more to it, so let’s take a moment and delve into Startupizer and what it does after the break.
If you, like me, sometimes find distraction in anything and everything other than your work, paring down your digital workspace to maximize productivity can be a daunting task. Fortunately, Mac OS X comes with some built-in tools that you can use to combat your lack of willpower. These tools are cleverly disguised as Parental Controls.
Sure, OS X’s built-in Parental Controls may be used to monitor and limit your child’s usage of your Mac, but I’ve found that some crafty tinkering can turn this set of options into a powerful way of managing your distractions and keeping yourself on-task. The following set of steps is meant to be a guide on how to set up Parental Controls to increase your productivity, but feel free to amend the guide based on the distractions you need to eliminate most.
If you recently made the switch to Mac from a Windows computer, you might be a little “lost” regarding what software is supposed to replace your old setup, or what apps are particularly worthwhile to own on the Mac platform.
One of the great things about having a Macintosh is the amazing range of beautiful apps available, many of which have the potential to add a great deal to your computing experience.
Today, we’re taking a look at some of the apps that we find vital and very useful, as well as software that makes using a Mac much easier than Windows!
I’ve been a Mac user now for about a year and a half, give or take. As is common, I’m completely happy I took the plunge and will never look back. There is very little I dislike about my MacBook and OS X. If you’re looking to convert yourself I’ll tell right now, you won’t regret it. The rumors are true. It is a fantastic experience overall.
But there are certainly some possible areas of frustration. As an advanced Windows user, I found many aspects of OS X to be overly-simplified, and really quite alien. Today, I’ll be outlining a few of these examples – and explaining the best way to deal with this source of frustration!
The announcement of a new operating system is no small deal, so today has proven to be an exciting time for Mac enthusiasts everywhere. OS X Lion seems set to be a huge step forward for the Mac operating system, and there are some significant changes to be expected.
A few of the top highlights include a Mac App Store, Launchpad, full-screen apps, and “Mission Control”, but read on for the full lowdown on what to expect from Apple’s next big cat.
Welcome to our coverage of Apple’s “Back to the Mac” event. We’ll be keeping you updated in real-time with news from across the web. You can see when things kick off in your time zone, so stay tuned for all our news and analysis.
There’s plenty of anticipation and hype surrounding Apple’s Mac event tomorrow, and I’m really excited to see which new features and functionality are announced. It’s about time that the Mac and OS X saw some love and attention from Apple.
So, what do I really want to see announced tomorrow? First and foremost, I’d love to see anything that helps to improve Apple’s support for cloud functionality and syncing. This has been a long time coming and, although it’s related to iOS as well, it might make an appearance as one of the new pieces of core functionality in OS X Lion.
Second, I’m excited about the potential that AirPlay has to stream content between devices in real-time. Being able to send a video wirelessly to my iPad or iPhone from my Mac would be fantastic, as would doing the same thing in reverse.
As for all the rumours surrounding tweaks to the OS X interface? I could take it or leave it. I’m a big fan of the look-and-feel of the current Snow Leopard UI and, short of adding iOS style scrolling (and “pull to refresh”), there isn’t much I’d change.
What are you hoping to see tomorrow? Let us know your favourite potential feature in the poll above, and give me a shout in the comments if what you’re excited about isn’t listed!
