OS X Mavericks
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The Daily Roundup for 06.24.2013
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Apple OS X Mavericks 10.9 preview
There was no OS XI at WWDC. There was no plan to reinvent the wheel. The takeaway message at the launch event was simple: Apple is committed to OS X. What that means, in the long run (naming scheme aside) is that changes to the desktop will probably continue to be gradual. New features will be added and things will evolve over time. Like other recent versions of OS X, version 10.9 Mavericks follows the lead of iOS, culling from its most successful features -- though there's nothing on the order of iOS 7's dramatic redesign in store. But while the iPhone operating system seems to have taken the lead in terms of innovation, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of feature crippling in Mavericks, which some feared would come with the mobilization of the OS. In fact, there are a number of welcome upgrades here -- things like folder tabs, tags and a more interactive Notification Center will likely improve the workflow of many Mac users. Built-in apps like Safari and Calendar have gotten nice facelifts, as well. We've spent a few days with the most recent build of OS X and are ready to give you a peek at what you're in store for, come fall. Still, knowing Apple, the company's likely still got a couple of tricks up its sleeve.%Gallery-192205%
Dev Juice: Parallels Desktop 8 update makes OS X Mavericks VMs, hosts possible
Just last week I was bemoaning the fact that neither Parallels nor VMWare Fusion provided an easy way for a developer to create a virtual machine (VM) for testing of OS X Mavericks, so I ended up installing the new Mac operating system on a separate partition. Today Parallels released an update to Parallels Desktop 8 for Mac that not only allows the update of existing OS X VMs to OS X Mavericks, but also allows Mavericks to be a host machine for Parallels. If there's a downside, it's that you still can't install OS X Mavericks on a blank VM; instead, you'll have to install a previous version of OS X on a virtual machine, then acquire the installer from the Apple Developer Center and upgrade the VM. The update can be applied to an existing install of Parallels Desktop 8 by launching the app and selecting Check for Updates under the Parallels Desktop menu. As of yet, there's still no word from VMWare on how they're progressing on OS X Mavericks compatibility, but we'll be sure to pass along any information that we hear about.
So you've been Sherlocked: AirParrot developers respond to new Mavericks features
On Monday, Apple introduced OS X Mavericks, their next-generation operating system for Macs. One feature Apple demoed on stage enables users to use an HDTV as an extra monitor, courtesy of Apple TV and AirPlay connectivity. If that feature sounds familiar, you may already be an AirParrot customer. The US$9.99 app allows you to stream your screen or individual windows to Apple TV and it also offers extra screen support. The app's popular extended desktop features have been around for a while. After Monday's announcement, we contacted Sidney Keith of Squirrels to get his reaction to the Mavericks feature. Today, he provided the following, thoughtful response. We're continuing to innovate and develop at our own pace. Just because Apple released one of our features as its own doesn't mean we quit. We're still striving for quality applications that solve our customers and users needs. Honestly, we're glad Apple finally caught up. It gives us that much more motivation to innovate and create cooler applications that users want and need. Software is about progress, and that's what this is going to give us. Not only do we have the motivation to keep innovating, we now have the opportunity and obligation to help those that can't or won't upgrade to 10.9. We have a large and loyal customer base that we'll continue supporting. We don't plan on dropping support for 10.6, even though we've now seen three major releases since then, and not everyone is as loyal to Apple as we may think. Upgrades can be costly for institutions and businesses that have hundreds of systems that need to be upgraded. We're here for those users, and we're here for the ones that don't trust the first iterations of Apple products. Whatever the reason for not upgrading, we have their back. Apple has a global audience to attend to, and while we also have users all around the globe, our feature set is much more focused. We're able to focus solely on one group of features instead of an entire operating system. While Apple might add a feature, it's likely they'll not change that feature significantly in any future releases. We saw the addition of AirPlay desktop mirroring in OS X 10.8, but that feature hasn't changed since its initial release-roughly a year since the beta. We've got the ability to focus our entire teams attention on that one specific feature if we need to. That's something you'll be seeing over the next few months. We'll be doing a lot of innovation and creation in this area, and while we hope Apple doesn't steal our new features, we know it's inevitable. It's almost an honor. If you want to see what Apple's going to to include AirPlay-wise at WWDC 14, you can probably bet our next few releases will be a preview. Squirrels is also the developer of the Reflector app, which nearly all of us at TUAW have purchased. It allows you to stream AirPlay to your Mac or PC. Note: in case you're wondering what "Sherlocked" refers to, here's a definition. Looking for other examples? Here's another for your delectation. No downeys, millers, cumberbatches, lauries, bretts, etc. were hurt in the preparation of this article.
DevJuice: The easy way to set up an OS X Mavericks test environment
OK, this is going to be a "duh" moment for most Mac developers, but apparently there are some people who are having issues with setting up a test environment in which to run OS X Mavericks. I have to admit that I was one of those who first started asking if anyone was having success running the latest Mac OS in a virtual machine under VMWare or Parallels. There are some people who claim to have OS X Mavericks running fine under one virtual environment or the other, although most are being rather closed-mouth about how they accomplished it. So, tired of waiting, I decided to do what I've done with previous releases and just create a dual-boot machine. It's stupid easy to do this: 1) On your OS X 10.8 machine, sign into your Mac Dev Center account, click on the appropriate tab for OS X Mavericks, and then download the OS X 10.9 Developer Preview (click the button, which launches the Mac App Store, and magic happens). 2) While you're waiting for the download to complete, it's time to set up your Mavericks partition. Fire up Disk Utility, click on your primary disk drive and add a partition. I made mine 64 GB (on a 256 GB SSD MacBook Pro with Retina display), named it Mavericks just so I'd be more apt to select it instead of my main drive when installing 10.9, and then let Disk Utility do its thing. This takes very little time, so go enjoy the outdoors while the download continues and try to get some sun. 3) Once the Installer has finished downloading, it should launch itself; if not, go into Applications, find the app named "Install OS X 10.9 Developer Preview" and launch it. Follow the instructions, select the Mavericks partition you created in step 2 as the target for the beta OS and sit back while the installation continues. 4) Now you have a dual-boot 10.8 / 10.9 machine. To boot into one or the other of the partitions, just hold down the Option key while rebooting and select the appropriate one. Of course, that's not particularly helpful if you just have a single development machine and you don't want the irritation of booting in and out of two versions of OS X several times a day. That's why as soon as things are working smoothly with Parallels 8 and/or VMWare, we'll pass along the instructions for setting up Mavericks virtual machines in both of those environments.
TUAW TV Live: Much ado about WWDC 2013
Welcome back to another hour of mirth and merriment with me and my co-host Shawn "Doc Rock" Boyd! Today we have one topic in particular to discuss -- WWDC 2013 -- and a lot of subtopics dealing with the minutiae that have been leaking out from developers. There are some fascinating things to see in both iOS 7 and OS X Mavericks, and we'll talk about what we've heard from our "feet on the street" in San Francisco. To join in to watch the live feed and participate in the chat, just click here. You'll join us on the AOL On Network. If you can't watch the entire show today, come back to this page within 24 hours to see the video or visit http://tuaw.com/tuawtvlive to see the latest show.
Apple releases Mavericks core technology overview
Apple spent a lot of time talking about the key new features of OS X Mavericks, but the company only glossed over the impressive underlying technology that powers the operating system. For those hardware and software geeks in the audience, Apple has released a document detailing the core technology that drives Mavericks power optimizations and its improved performance. You can download the PDF document from Apple's website. [Via Engadget and Ars Technica]
Macs compatible with OS X Mavericks
One outstanding question about OS X Mavericks is the minimum hardware requirements needed to run the operating system. There are a lot of older Core 2 Duo machines kicking around, and those owners are wondering it they still have the horsepower to run Mavericks. Apple hasn't released those details, but Apple Insider talked to OS X developers who have access to release notes and other details about OS X 10.9. According to AI's sources, any Apple computer capable of running OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion will be able to run Mavericks. This includes the following machines: iMac (mid-2007 or later) MacBook (13-inch aluminum, late 2008), (13-inch, early 2009 or later) MacBook Pro (13-inch, mid-2009 or later), (15-inch, mid/late 2007 or later), (17-inch, late 2007 or later) MacBook Air (late 2008 or later) Mac mini (Early 2009 or later) Mac Pro (early 2008 or later) Xserve (early 2009) This early information is promising for Apple owners with hardware that is approaching its fifth or even sixth year of faithful use. Keep in mind that these hardware specs may change when Apple releases the final version of OS X Mavericks later this year. [Via Gizmodo]
TUAW TV Live Special Edition: WWDC 2013
Thanks for joining us today here on TUAW for our continuing coverage of WWDC 2013. I am joined this afternoon by renowned author, developer and TUAW buddy Erica Sadun on a special edition of TUAW TV Live. Here's the archived video for your viewing pleasure!
Apple unveils Keychain for iCloud, confirms 300 million iCloud accounts
Apple today at WWDC announced some changes to iCloud, including a new iWork for iCloud and a keychain feature that'll sync your logins across all your iOS devices. The keychain is a cloud-connected password manager that ties into Safari on the desktop and Safari on the iPad and iPhone. It'll save passwords as well as credit card information and more. Tim Cook also confirmed that iCloud now has 300 million accounts, making it the fastest-growing cloud service ever (even faster than Facebook). More than 300 million iOS owners use iTunes in the cloud and these folks have downloaded their content 35 billion times. Cook also confirmed that 240 million users are on Game Center and blew us away with stats on iMessages that confirm the service has transferred 800 billion iMessages and sent 740 trillion push notifications.
Apple announces Safari upgrades as part of OS X Mavericks
Apple has announced an updated version of Safari at WWDC. The browser update adds a new home page featuring a Top Sites feature that stores all of your bookmarks and regularly read sites. Using a new bookmark bar, you can easily add and remove links to your Top Sites selection. They've also introduced a "Reading List" feature to the home page that allows you to quickly jump from story to story on the sites you read the most. Safari also now has Twitter and LinkedIn integration that allows you to monitor and open links shared in those services within the browser using another sidebar. Enhancements have also been made under the hood of the program, including improved Javascript support. In addition, Safari now uses far less memory and is better at power management than other browsers. To quote Craig Federighi "When you compare [Safari's energy efficiency] to Firefox, it's actually kind of sad."
Apple brings Maps to OS X in Mavericks
Maps in OS X was expected, but is very welcome. After a rough beginning on iOS, Apple Maps has been progressing, and now with Maps running on OS X, we'll see some powerful integration between the Mac and iOS. Maps on a Mac looks smooth and impressive in 3D. Even better, there's a big effort to integrate maps with Calendar, and sync mapping data between all your Apple devices. If you set up an appointment, you'll get the ability to map it, and when scheduling your day, the travel time and traffic will be taken into account. Also, Apple says you can send directions from your iPhone to your desktop, or back the other way. Sent directions will show up as notifications, so it is easy to start on your journey without a lot of fiddling around. These new features will come on OS X Mavericks, and will be a part of the upcoming iOS 7.
Apple announces iBooks for OS X
Apple has announced that iBooks for OS X will be included as part of OS X 10.9 Mavericks. Users will be able to access all 1.8 million iBooks on the Mac. The iBooks for OS X interface will be a two-page layout by default and be totally flat, which means there will be no skeuomorphic pages. Users will also be able to add notes and highlights, with the notes being usable as study cards. These notes, highlights, bookmarks and more will be synced with your iOS device. iBooks for OS X will also sync your reading progress, so you can stop reading on your Mac and pick up right where you left off on your iOS device. You can read more about iBooks for OS X on Apple's Mavericks preview web page.
Apple Maps for OS X Mavericks lets you instantly send directions to your iPhone
Apple just announced that it's bringing "fantastic updates" to Maps on the desktop, including the ability send directions to your iPhone and back. That feature will arrive with OS X Mavericks, and a brief demo showed how you could map your route to a restaurant, then instantly bring up the same map and directions on your iPhone with a couple of taps, when you're ready to go. Maps will be built-in to the Calendar, Contacts and Mail, as well in Mavericks, letting you map any address directly from those apps. You'll be able to check out the new features when the OS arrives this fall, or via a developer's preview, available later today. %Gallery-190867% Follow all of our WWDC 2013 coverage at our event hub.
Apple introduces OS X Mavericks at WWDC 2013
Apple has run out of cat names for its new OS, so it's gone to a California theme. The next OS X will be... ta da... OS X Mavericks. Apple claims the new release, OS X 10.9, will have deep improvements in battery life and finder tabs. Apple is also adding tagging, which will enhance search greatly and will be welcomed by power users. In an on-stage demo by VP of Software Engineering Craig Federighi, you could see the power of tabs and tagging. Tags can appear in the finder sidebar, making this a very useful addition to OS X. Multiple displays also got a lot of applause from the crowd. Spaces can be shown on any display, and an AirPlay-connected TV can act as a fully independent display. In a demo of the new feature, you could see the ease of moving assets around the screens, and it was impressive seeing an HDTV added as an extra display via an Apple TV. Apple has also put a lot of thought into battery life and other advanced technologies. Mavericks is claimed to "intelligently align" interrupts, so CPUs can get up to a 72 percent boost in performance. Apple has also highlighted "Compressed Memory," a method of improving memory use on the fly. That's just a bit of what is coming in OS X Mavericks. It looks to be a big leap over the current offerings, and seems focused on ease of use and performance. A beta version of OS X Mavericks will be available today for developers, while the final version will debut this fall. You can read more about OS X Mavericks on Apple's website.
