Apple to introduce OS X 10.6 "Snow Leopard" at WWDC?

The pre-WWDC Apple rumor mill has finally churned out something that doesn't have the words "3G" and "iPhone" involved -- sources have told both Ars Technica and our friends at TUAW that Steve will also use his keynote to introduce the next major version of OS X, codenamed "Snow Leopard." As the derivative release name indicates, there aren't many changes in store from 10.5 Leopard -- Apple's said to instead be focusing on tightening up speed and stability as it starts producing more mobile devices. What's more, this could be the end of PowerPC and Universal support in OS X, as Snow Leopard is said to be Intel-only. That's bound to ruffle a few feathers, but things could get even more heated if Carbon is deprecated as is also being rumored. We'll see when we see -- Monday can't get here fast enough.

Read - TUAW post
Read - Ars post

[Rafer @ Jun 4th 2008 7:04PM]

WHATS WITH THE BIG CATS??????

[TomTom2007 @ Jun 4th 2008 7:08PM]

next up: "Snow Cat"

http://blog.cleveland.com/photos/d055def59534e41d560257ea25234f9b.jpg

[MeatPop @ Jun 4th 2008 7:10PM]

Big Cat > Giant Turtles

[Aaron Wanker @ Jun 4th 2008 7:17PM]

If you're going to do big cats, you should use names like: Lion-O, Cheatara, Jaga, Panthro and Tygra.

[BigD145 @ Jun 4th 2008 8:10PM]

They should have called it Uncia uncia.

[linkbeat @ Jun 4th 2008 9:24PM]

Someone watched a wee bit of He-Man growing up. ;-)

[Haxxy @ Jun 4th 2008 10:50PM]

Thundercats, noob.

[Ender Wiggin @ Jun 4th 2008 11:08PM]

They should call the next one "Liger"

It's pretty much my favorite animal.

[Striker @ Jun 4th 2008 11:53PM]

If Apple wanted it to sound stable, then they would name it "Rock Lobster".

[Mike10010100 @ Jun 4th 2008 11:56PM]

Or Shield Liger?

[9bit @ Jun 5th 2008 12:24PM]

The problem with rock lobster is that it loses to a paper tiger.

[Striker @ Jun 5th 2008 12:43PM]

It beats a Scissor Bear though, and we all know that a Scissor Bear handily beats a Paper Tiger.

[Austin @ Jun 4th 2008 7:04PM]

Have you guys made the live-blogging page for WWDC yet? You should post it so us fanboys can book mark it :P

I can see them releasing a new OS built around stability, with the addition of Snow onto Leopard to represent stability? Lol.

[Sarig @ Jun 4th 2008 7:36PM]

For all the disagreement I've felt at some of clak's posts in the past; I can only nod my head in agreement at this. Both thumbs up!

[Smileypanda @ Jun 4th 2008 7:52PM]

Good show, sir! And some stuff to help game devs would be nice, too, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

[dan @ Jun 4th 2008 8:06PM]

Clak,

I switched to mac a year ago, and as soon as i realized what the zoom button was supposed to do, it works perfectly for me. The first click resizes the window to show all content. The second click reverts to the previous size. If it was the correct size to begin with, then the first click shrinks the window down. If i have 5 files in a folder and i click the zoom button, the window shrinks to the right size for those 5 files. If i have 20 files, and click the zoom button, the window enlarges to fit them. I prefer it alot to the maximize button in windows. Its one thing to not like it, but its an outright lie to say it never works the way its supposed to.

[clak @ Jun 4th 2008 8:20PM]

@dan

This is the problem I have with Maximize in OS X. I like to make my Finder and Safari windows full screen, because I use hot corners in Expose and it's very easy and convenient to switch between the windows. When I hit maximize, it makes the window smaller, which is great, but if I zoom twice, the window expands vertically instead of filling up the entire screen, as I originally had it. That is annoying, but I understand where you're coming from. It's okay if you like the way it works.

It's not a major deal to me, but OS X is like having the greatest Banana Split Sunday in history, only to find there are a a couple of hairs in the ice cream. I'm still going to eat the Banana Split, because it's the greatest in history, but damn, if you can get rid of the hairs, I'd be happy too.

And I also like Smileypanda's suggestion about gaming. Apple needs a better gaming API or else needs to assist the OpenGL dev team. I should have put that on the list.


We will make our products work out of the box—Steve Ballmer

[Isaac Levy @ Jun 4th 2008 9:13PM]

@clak, 2nd comment: Can't you hold shift and click the + button?

[digitallysick @ Jun 4th 2008 8:44PM]

@clak

Your exactly right steve jobs needs to fireup his internet tonight and read this. Also can i get a TABBED FINDER , and add some transparency options back (make them all optional please) I totally agree about elgato and eyetv/eyeconnect products that would rock. I would better media center options (avi's please!)

[clak @ Jun 4th 2008 8:53PM]

@digitallysick

Yes, agreed, a tabbed Finder would be nice. Although my characterization of the Finder maximize, or at least some of it, appears to be wrong. The behavior I was refering to seems to be more of a characteristic of Safari than the Finder. The Finder maximizes like it's supposed to. I just tested both. Funny that's it's not consistent across the board though. Very puzzling.


I haven't spoken to my wife in years. I didn't want to interrupt her—Rodney Dangerfield

[Taylor @ Jun 4th 2008 7:05PM]

If Apple stops supporting my PPC iMac I might be as ticked as when they charged me $20 for 5 crappy iPod Touch applications that everyone else got for free...

[Striker @ Jun 4th 2008 8:59PM]

I'm pissed so much about the apps, that I jailbroke my touch.

Typed on my jailbroken iPod touch.

[jakem @ Jun 4th 2008 7:06PM]

OS X SP6

[Michael LaFramboise @ Jun 4th 2008 7:14PM]

Says the guy using Windows 2000 SP8

[Chris B. @ Jun 4th 2008 7:39PM]

Yes, but Microsoft's service packs are FREE.

[BobTurbo @ Jun 4th 2008 7:44PM]

You get what you pay for.

[ThePengwin @ Jun 4th 2008 11:40PM]

@BobTurbo

Yes, especially with the brilliantly overpriced mac hardware.

But seriously, looking at the windows and mac OS life cycles, windows and mac aren't really more expensive than each other, you're just forking out money at different intervals.

[Ridgecity @ Jun 5th 2008 1:49AM]

I know. I got a Vista notebook that doesn't run Vista, how is that for a bargain...

[MeatPop @ Jun 4th 2008 7:06PM]

TUAW has in the last few days posted than as "confirmed" as well as the glossy black iPhone as the "confirmed" 3G iPhone, and says their sources are incredibly reliable, I don't buy it for a second, especially since they claim 10.6 will only be a speed and security update with no new features.

[Wiigee @ Jun 4th 2008 8:01PM]

unless its like 10.1 and free, then i can see it. but i dont think they will charge $129 for a speed boost.

[kal326 @ Jun 5th 2008 10:08AM]

Your right, its more then a speed booster. Its an Apple revenue booster, if the kill PPC support then anybody that is still running a G4 or G5 that could upgrade to Leopard is going to have to get a new box to run Snow Leopard.

And its not like Apple would make any of their software require the latest version of their OS to work, cough, Garage Band 08 and Leopard, cough.... I mean they already jumped hardware requirements from a G4 300Mhz to a G4 800+ Mhz from Tiger to Leopard. Not to mention that single proc G5 1.6Ghz machines run slow as hell under Leopard, they might as well kill PPC support if things get much slower.

[Homeboy @ Jun 4th 2008 7:06PM]

What is it going to be next, siamese cat?

[michael pina @ Jun 4th 2008 7:20PM]

I believe Apple has trademarked only 2 more big cats : Lynx and Cougar.

[Sarig @ Jun 4th 2008 7:38PM]

Which aren't *technically* big cats. Except for the size thing, obviously. Biology 'n stuff like that!

[happy_penguin @ Jun 4th 2008 8:11PM]

No, a siamese bat. They're much more vicious.

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Jun 4th 2008 8:27PM]

@ Michael Pina

You spelled something wrong, it is not lynx. I think you meant linux :P

That was sad...

[Clinton @ Jun 4th 2008 9:32PM]

no... I'm pretty sure he meant lynx..

linux is a kernel used in some operating systems.

[Ian @ Jun 4th 2008 10:24PM]

its ok CUBS i got what you meant even after you said to yourself that it was a lame joke..

[happy_penguin @ Jun 5th 2008 3:18AM]

Lynx is also an old text only web browser which is still included in many if not most Linux systems.

[Andrew A. @ Jun 5th 2008 9:32AM]

Apple abandoned Lynx as a trademark, looks like 10.6 will be called "Cougar," and it could be the last version of OS X.

[Andune @ Jun 4th 2008 7:06PM]

Don't know if this is true but at least i love the name (and Snow Leopards are cute).
Is "only" speed and stability worth a new version of OS X?

[Razor @ Jun 4th 2008 7:08PM]

Considering that Apple users seem willing to pay as much for a service pack (essentially), why not?

[Andune @ Jun 4th 2008 7:17PM]

Well at least Leopard is only one third the price of Vista so i would happily pay (^_^)

[clak @ Jun 4th 2008 7:28PM]

Razor, I have a new PC with nothing installed on it. Where can I buy the Vista's Service Pack 1? I've been looking for it in stores and came up with nothing.


Before printing was discovered, a century was equal to a thousand years—Henry David Thoreau

[Zak @ Jun 4th 2008 7:28PM]

uh, how are major releases with hundreds of new features "essentially a service pack"? Do Windows service packs include hundreds of new features? So how are they "essentially" the same thing?

By your logic, Vista is "essentially a service pack" for XP.

[Ruben @ Jun 4th 2008 7:56PM]

Zak, we all know the "hundreds" of new features were complete and utter bullshit, and that there were actually 10 - 20 new features in Leopard, while the rest were gems like event drop box for iCal, more smileys for iChat, and Searching by File name. Ive read through the list, and I had quite the laugh.

In saying that, the revisions of OSX can and should be considered OS releases, and not service packs. But i will say that 99 dollars for a few new features, and hundreds of very minor tweaks to the OS is a tad steep. Apple should offer upgrade versions of their OS which can install on top of previous OSX installs and a reduced price. Even Ubuntu offers more feature upgrades per release, and those are free.

And i dont think now is the time to be dropping the G4-G5 architecture, if this article proves to be true. Theres nothing like kicking Apple users in the balls and forcing them to upgrade their very expensive G5 PowerMac's to Intel variants just to get the security and performance upgrades (as well as some 100 more minor tweaks, such as an awesome Auto Zoom on the DVD player) that should have been included in Leopard to begin with, even though those PC's are still very capable.

[itsnotabigtruck @ Jun 4th 2008 8:51PM]

@Andune: I don't know if you didn't already know this or are just pretending not to, but NOBODY pays list price for Windows. Vista Home Premium is $100 OEM on NewEgg and XP Pro is $130. For comparison, Leopard is $120. Plus, the prices all go up and down, so one day Leopard is a little more expensive while another it's a little cheaper.

[clak @ Jun 4th 2008 9:15PM]

@Ruben

You are full of shit. If a third party offered you a package of applications that included Spaces, Time Machine, Quick Look, Boot Camp, Stacks, Back to My Mac, and a bunch of other added functionality like iChat screen sharing, Web Clips for Safari and Dashboard, and tab dragging in Safari, you would be charged a shit load of money and you know it.

I bought PathFinder, which is a glorified tweak of OS X's Finder, made by CocoaTech, and it was $34.95! That's for one app!

A partitioner like Boot Camp will cost you between $50 and $60 in the Windows world. That's one fucking program!

So, please, spare me the pathetic Apple-is-over-charging-you-for-a-Service-Pack argument. That's complete bullshit when you examine the facts.


Black Snake Moan: edited with Final Cut Pro

[Ruben @ Jun 4th 2008 9:56PM]

@clack:

Reading comprehension is key.

The features you mentioned are the ones that actually warrant Leopards release, not the other 290 "features" which are nothing but bullshit minor additions that should have been there in the first place. Those 300+ features were filled with crap, and a simple read of the features tell you that they are a joke. Please continue reading:

You obviously only read the first paragraph, since in the second, i stated that Leopard is worthy of an OS release, but that its too expensive for what you get. I stated that it was 99, but to the general public, its 129, which is way too much for those features. Thats why i said that previous owners of Tiger should have gotten a discount via an "upgrade" version of the OS, and not just for Leopard, but for all their OS's.

Microsoft has partitioning built in to Vista and XP, and Ubuntu offers it for free, not to mention the many freeware applications that accomplish the same task with incredible reliability on Microsoft, Mac and Linux platforms. Just because one costs money doesnt mean all the variations of that software warrant that price, especially considering they are nearly the same quality (ive used plenty, and they are all the same).

I have examined the facts, and they are overcharging for their OS. An OS built on a free platform that costs over 100 dollars every year or two is too expensive, especially when 2 of their 10-20 actual features were once freeware applications which i used to use on Tiger (Coverflow and Spaces were purchased and integrated by Apple, not to mention the integration of the free VNC and Apache). Ubuntu is free, and improved on a yearly basis for absolutly no money, often with featuresets that rival what OSX and Vista have to offer. XP and Vista are all made by Microsoft themselves (and nearly every part of it) and Microsoft only charges 129 for OEM copies of Vista Home Premium (179 ish for Ultimate, so you can get all the Business features along with Media Center), and they built that all themselves. Those are the facts.

[clak @ Jun 4th 2008 10:40PM]

@Ruben

No, asshole, making a coherent argument is key.

If you're going to compare OS X to Linux, then we have a problem, because by that standard, Microsoft is also ripping off people for Windows, which is the sixth upgrade to the NT code base. And don't give me that shit about BSD Unix. The BSD license allows for proprietary commercial use. Microsoft incorporated BSD's TCP/IP stack into Windows 2000, so you're not going to get anywhere using that argument.

Apple is not a charity. No matter how you skew the facts, developing software costs money. And as you pointed out, Apple has purchased companies to get certain software, which as you know, also costs money.


These are great days we're living, bros. We are jolly green giants, walking the Earth with guns. These people we wasted here today are the finest human beings we will ever know. After we rotate back to the world, we're gonna miss not having anyone around that's worth shooting—Crazy Earl, Full Metal Jacket