SnowLeopard
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Snow Leopard offers more Automator "purrfection"
If you know me, then you know that I love Automator and scripting things on the Mac. I believe that Automator should be something that everyone can take advantage of, not just the select few that already know how to use it well. That's why I've been working on the TUAW Mac Automation and AppleScript series for over a year now (we're going to have more coming soon, so stay tuned). I was watching the WWDC '09 keynote, desperately waiting to see if anything new was announced for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard in regards to automation, and specifically Automator.app. Nothing was said at the keynote, but when I looked on the newly updated Snow Leopard page on Apple's site, I was ecstatic. One of the refinements listed was that Mac OS X Services would now be a feature of Automator. Services let you use features of one application while you are inside of another. In the Automator instance, you would be able to use workflows while you are inside of any Mac OS X application that supports the use of Services. In addition to updating Automator for Services, Apple has also added more starting points for workflows. You can now choose between a standard workflow, application, service, folder action, print plugin, iCal alarm, or an image capture plugin. We will have more information about Automator and Services in Snow Leopard when it launches in September.
OS 10.6: PowerPC officially left behind
It's not news. It was just less than a year ago that we initially announced that Snow Leopard would likely be Intel-only. Still, it was a report based off an initial developer's release of the software, and PowerPC users prayed that maybe it was a mistake. Maybe Apple would change its mind and toss a bone at these faithful users of Macs-gone-by. But, the emerging reality showed that Apple has left its PowerPC days behind. In February, we reported on how GarageBand's new Learn to Play feature was Intel-only. In addition to that, not every feature in iPhoto was available to PowerPC users. During that same month, we reported that even more G4 systems were being added to Apple's vintage and obsolete lists. Now the writing is fully on the wall for PowerPC users. The official release of tech specs for Snow Leopard indicates that it is an Intel-only release, meaning that if you do want to go past Leopard, you'll have to upgrade. There are still a lot of PowerPC users out there, and they're still very good machines... but are owners of older Macs going to be satisfied without the latest OS? Answer our poll or let us know in the comments: what does Snow Leopard mean to PPC owners? %Poll-31002%
Snow Leopard officially puts PowerPC Macs on endangered species list
It was just a day short of a year ago that we first got a bad feeling Snow Leopard was going to be end of the road for the PowerPC crowd. Now we know the truth, with Apple confirming Mac OS X version 10.6 will require Intel processors, cutting the cord on that rich lineage of alternative CPU support. From here on out it's Intel or bust -- until Apple finds a new silicon suitor it prefers, anyway.[Via MacRumors]
Apple WWDC 2009: the good, the bad, and the ugly
Sure, Apple didn't really shock anyone with the announcement of the iPhone 3G S this morning at WWDC, but there was no shortage of news at the Moscone Center -- we also got new MacBooks, final Snow Leopard details, and a release date for iPhone OS 3.0. On the other hand, it wasn't all good news either: AT&T's iPhone upgrade pricing and service levels leave a lot to be desired, and Apple's unfortunate penchant for sealed-in batteries has finally hit the 15-inch MacBook Pro. Apple's posted its stream of the keynote if you want to relive things in real-time, but here's a quick rewind in case you missed anything:The good Current iPhone owners will get iPhone OS 3.0 for free, although some features like video recording and voice control are limited to the iPhone 3G S. It's not perfect, but we don't really complain about free. Snow Leopard upgrades will cost just $29, instead of the usual $129. The original 8GB iPhone 3G is now only $99 for new AT&T subscribers. That's definitely going to make some waves in the smartphone market. We'd have loved to see some external design improvements and maybe some more surprising features that weren't rumored, but overall the iPhone 3G S is definitely in the "good" column -- it's a solid set of improvements to an already very good platform. MacBook Air and MacBook Pro (including the new 13-inch Pro) specs have increased while prices have come down, and glory be, FireWire is back on everything but the Air. The bad As usual, iPod touch owners are going to get dinged $9.95 for the iPhone OS 3.0 upgrade. Hey Apple -- maybe switch these guys over to subscription accounting as well? Let's face it, "iPhone 3G S" is a pretty clunky name. Sure, it's nice that the MacBook Pros now have an SD card slot, but losing ExpressCard hurts. And why not a multicard reader? Pro DSLRs still use CF. The ugly Sure, new customers and qualified upgraders are getting some sweet pricing on iPhone hardware, but AT&T's basically flipping existing customers the bird -- they'll have to pay anywhere from $399 to a whopping $699 to get an iPhone 3G S. You'd think they'd have looked at how many people went from a first-gen iPhone to a 3G and realized those same people would want a 3G S, but apparently not. On top of that insult, AT&T isn't supporting all of iPhone OS 3.0's features out the gate: MMS is coming "later this summer," and tethering has been promised but there's no timeline and no pricing information. Thanks, AT&T. Sure, it's grand that the 15-inch MacBook Pro's battery now lasts for up to seven hours on a charge and won't lose capacity for five years, but a non-swappable battery on a workhorse professional machine just doesn't cut it for us. So all in all we'd say that the good outweighs the bad, although AT&T really disappointed here. Of course, that's just scratching the surface -- check out the rest of our coverage after the break and let us know what you think!
WWDC '09 keynote stream now available via QuickTime
With all the news floating around today about the new iPhone 3G S, and the updates on the release dates of iPhone 3.0 or Snow Leopard, you might feel deprived if you didn't get to make it out to this year's WWDC. Don't fret. You can now watch the keynote stream on the Apple website and see all of the announcements from the event. Click here to go to the stream page. You can view all of our coverage from this week on the TUAW WWDC page. Update: You should soon be able to download the keynote as a podcast from iTunes via the Apple Keynotes feed, which can be found here [click opens iTunes].
Apple unveils Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server, cuts price in half
If you have Mac servers in your business, you weren't left out of the Snow Leopard fun during the keynote earlier today. Apple also announced that Mac OS X Server 10.6, A.K.A. Snow Leopard Server, will be shipping in September. Like Snow Leopard, the server version of the OS provides 64-bit support, and many of the Apple applications have been updated to take advantage of that. For example, SMB file server performance is 2.3x faster than Leopard Server, and AFP file server performance is now 1.3x faster. New features include: iCal Server 2 -- This upgrade to Leopard's iCal Server now provides push notification, wireless accessibility to your calendar from any iPhone, a new web-based calendaring interface, and updates to CalDAV that now allow you to invite colleagues to meetings via email. Podcast Producer 2 -- Podcast Producer, which was added to the server mix in Leopard, is now improved with Podcast Composer. This new feature lets you create your own workflows for automating completion and publishing of podcasts. There's also a new Setup Assistant in Server Admin that can set up Podcast Producer 2 in a manner of minutes, even if you're setting up a cluster of servers. Wiki Server 2 -- Workgroups wishing to collaborate now have a little bit more to love from Wiki Server. The only real new feature is iPhone support; users can securely log into confidential wikis and content, and even review content and comments from the iPhone. Mobile Access Server -- The piece that I'm probably the most excited about as an Xserve admin is Mobile Access Server. This new feature is like a custom VPN for Mac and iPhone users. As long as they're set up in the server's directory service, users can get secure, encrypted access to the server and network with very little hassle. Mail Server -- The engine running Mail Server has been totally redesigned for much faster service, and now provides push email, vacation messages and server-side rules, and improvements to mail server clustering. Web Server -- The biggest change to Web Server is that it can now do HTTP live video streaming. Performance is about 1.3x faster than Leopard Server's web services as well. Client Management -- Organizations that are deploying many iPhones will love the new client management piece of Snow Leopard Server. It has an iPhone configuration utility for creating profiles that can be emailed to corporate users, thus setting up secure services in a few seconds. Administrators can now also use NetRestore to rebuild Macs over networks, based on either a custom build disk image or a standard OS X install disk. Best of all, Snow Leopard Server will cost $499 for unlimited users (a sharp reduction from Leopard Server's price of $999 unlimited, $499 for 10 users) and should be shipping at the same time OS X 10.6 is available to the rest of us. I'd just be happy if Apple has finally fixed a lot of the issues with backing up network users to Mac OS X Server using Time Machine.
Snow Leopard is out of the bag
For the ultra low price of $29 (for existing Leopard users), Apple gave a deeper look into the upcoming Snow Leopard release -- slated for some time in September."We've built on the success of Leopard and created an even better experience for our users from installation to shutdown," said Bertrand Serlet, Apple's senior vice president of Software Engineering. "Apple engineers have made hundreds of improvements so with Snow Leopard your system is going to feel faster, more responsive and even more reliable than before."Here's more highlights of the Snow Leopard release...
QuickTime X leaps forward in Snow Leopard
Seems like only yesterday that QuickTime was at version 7. Oh wait, that was yesterday. Among the many announcements surrounding Snow Leopard we saw a little more of QuickTime X, Apple's next-generation version of the venerable media player/technology/doohickey. While the interface has been totally overhauled, the changes are more than skin deep.QuickTime X is a significant update. For consumers, there won't be a Pro version. Any version will allow simple editing, video/audio capture, and allow you to "publish your media to MobileMe or YouTube -- without worrying about codec formats or resolutions." We're not sure if you'll be able to save as a QuickTime movie or source file as before, but the removal of some previous limits will make QuickTime the snappy iMovie substitute it could be. Plus, QuickTime X will allow you to use any web server to stream live video over HTTP. Can't wait to see what people do with that.In addition to the visible changes, QuickTime X looks like a fundamental rewrite of the application and its underpinnings. Support for Core Audio, Core Video and Core Animation could mean some really interesting things for the future of media playback (not that we weren't promised as much a few years ago, of course). All of this comes wrapped up in Snow Leopard, and takes full advantage of the speed-tuning tech therein.
Apple to release $29 10.6 Snow Leopard Upgrade in September
Today, Apple announced a ship date and upgrade pricing for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. 10.6 will debut this September as an upgrade for Mac OS X Leopard users for just $29. "We've built on the success of Leopard and created an even better experience for our users from installation to shutdown," said Bertrand Serlet, Apple's senior vice president of Software Engineering in an Apple Press Release. "Apple engineers have made hundreds of improvements so with Snow Leopard your system is going to feel faster, more responsive and even more reliable than before. Snow Leopard features include built-in Microsoft Exchange 2007 support along with a slicker install process, faster applications, and 64-bit versions of standard applications that boost overall performance. Apple brags that "[u]sers will notice a more responsive Finder; Mail that loads messages 85 percent faster and conducts searches up to 90 percent faster; Time Machine with up to 50 percent faster initial backup; a Dock with Expose integration; a 64-bit version of Safari 4 that boosts the performance of the Nitro JavaScript engine by up to 50 percent and is resistant to crashes caused by plug-ins." In addition to the $29 single user upgrade, a family pack upgrade will cost $49. Tiger users will pay $169 for a 10.6/iLife box set or $229 for a family pack. All users who purchased or will purchase a new qualifying Mac between 8 June 2009 and 26 December 2009 will receive a free upgrade package and pay $9.95 for shipping and handling. You must request your up-to-date upgrade within 90 days of your original purchase. Snow Leopard requires a minimum of 1GB RAM and runs on Intel-based Macintoshes. Full system requirements are hosted at Apple's tech specs page.
Apple shipping Snow Leopard in September, $29 upgrade
After showing off Mac OS X 10.6 "Snow Leopard" at last year's WWDC, Apple is finally ready to ship it out the door this coming September, for a quite reasonable upgrade fee of $29 for Leopard users (as opposed to the regular $129 for larger refreshes). Folks who buy a Leopard machine between now and December can get the upgrade for $10 in shipping. While the added feature list is relatively slim, and there are few surprises between what was confirmed last year and the various leaks from developer previews, Apple's still giving users and developers some fun new tech to play with -- particularly the GPU-exploiting OpenCL, and the Grand Central Dispatch tech for developers to ease application optimization for multi-core processors. Pretty nerdy stuff, but if it makes our Dashboard Sudoku Widgets run faster, we can hardly complain. Other updates to the OS Apple is trotting out at WWDC: Apple rewrote the Finder, while keeping it mostly the same on the surface, for a bunch of "little benefits." Tweaks include faster Quick Look previews and Spotlight searches. There's built-in Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 support in the OS, including Mail, Calendar and Address Book syncing. QuickTime X has a new "modern foundation," HTTP streaming and a whole new look. Users can record and trim video, and upload to sharing sites like MobileMe and YouTube. Snow Leopard has half the footprint of Leopard, amounting to 6GB in savings and 45% faster installs. New trackpads can handle handwriting recognition now, and there's new text selection "AI." There's also support for wireless Braille accessories (pictured). Safari 4 is available for Windows, Leopard and Tiger, but Snow Leopard adds "Crash Resistance," which keeps browser and tabs intact even if a plugin crashes -- user just refreshes the page. 64-bit version does JavaScript 50% faster. All core apps are 64-bit, and performance improvements abound. Mail boasts 85% faster message loads and 90% faster loads, while Time Machine has a 50% faster initial backup time. Update: More Snow Leopard additions and refinements are detailed here. Highlights we've spotted so far include Text Expander-style capabilities in Text Edit and Mail, and three finger and four finger multitouch gesture support for older (pre unibody) MacBooks! [Thanks, Jakob]
Apple digs into Microsoft at WWDC
Apple may have plenty of announcements of its own to make at this year's WWDC, but it looks like it just couldn't help itself from taking a few jabs at Microsoft as well. Doing the honors was Bertrand Serlet, who took the stage by saying "what a sharp contrast with Vista our OS is," and only got rolling from there, pointing out "what a big hole Microsoft has dug," and adding that "they're trying to get out of it with Windows 7." Of course, Serlet didn't have many good things to say about Windows 7 either, which he says has "even more complexity" than Vista because it's just based on the "same old tech as Vista."
Counting down to WWDC: Last-minute rumors
We're down to the wire -- less than 90 minutes before the WWDC Keynote ramps up, and the rumor mill has wound down to a murmur after a week of wild speculation. Want to read about how the new iPhone will singlehandedly boost your love life, bring you millions of dollars and boast a video camera, Swiss Army knife, automatic can opener and turn into a mini TARDIS? Sadly, those rumors have yet to appear. Except maybe the video camera.Daring Fireball's John Gruber has been the focus of most of the very last-minute guessing with his thoughts of today: The iPhone 3G ... oh, sorry, iPhone 3GS: It'll be faster, twice the current amount of RAM, video camera, more storage ... those aren't new rumors. But, Gruber says that he's heard that the phone will also receive a name upgrade to the iPhone 3GS. The other nice piece of speculation is that the iPhone 3GS will also have a 15-20% longer battery life over the current model. Cheaper phones for the masses: A $99 version of the iPhone that will not have as many features as its more expensive siblings, though it could just be the existing 3G iPhone at a lower price after the new models are introduced. This isn't exactly that new of a rumor considering that The Financial Times had this one over the weekend. Snow Leopard pricing: Gruber believes we could see Snow Leopard priced as low as $19 considering it doesn't have any major features ... unless Apple manages to pull out something today. Playing with Marble: Of course, that new $129-cost "feature" could be that Snow Leopard will feature a reimaging of the OS's visual appearance. However, it's more likely that a move to "Marble" is slated for OS 10.7. The Holy Grail ... er Mac tablet: It's real, but not today. To prepare your rumor checklist, check out our other posts rounding up rumors, speculation and just plain ole guessing from over the weekend.
TUAW at WWDC 2009: We want to hear from you
It's that time of year again. In the US, schools are emptying, weather is heating up and all sorts of developers are readying to wend their way to San Francisco for Apple's annual Worldwide Developer Conference, or WWDC. Sure, the noncoding masses are expecting a hardware announcement (new iPhone, anyone?), but developers are really salivating over improvements to OS X in the upcoming Snow Leopard (10.6) release, and iPhone OS 3.0. After all, with great hardware comes awesome software. Apple might even have some surprises in store for us.TUAW will be at WWDC during the week, and if you're a developer for iPhone or the Mac, we want to talk to you! Be sure to polish your elevator pitch, as we'd like to shoot as many demos as possible. Plus, we're attending the Parallels party (RSVP here), the iPhone Launch Party and maybe a few others, so there will be plenty of chances for your shot at fame. If you'd like to get in touch with us before the event, you can email us at wwdc at tuaw (dot com). See you in San Francisco! You can also join us online and on the phone during Sunday night's talkcast, where we'll be talking about the final round of preconference rumors and expected announcements.For those you not attending, stay tuned to TUAW as we liveblog the keynote, dig into the announcements, and show the newest of the new apps being demoed at the event.
Mac 101: Supersize your icon views
Welcome back to Mac 101, our occasional series of tips for new and novice Mac users. Over the past 25 years, icons may have become ubiquitous almost to the point of fading into the visual background; still, the little pictures that began in 32x32 black and white format have grown up quite nicely into the massive 512x512 icons we enjoy in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. Although the list and column views are more utilitarian for most file management tasks, there are times when icon view is the way to go. You can control whether or not a particular Finder window displays in Icon view via the View Menu ("as Icons," or ⌘-1), and then adjust the display size of the icons via the View Options inspector panel (⌘-J). You can get up to 128px square icons in Finder windows, which is plenty big, but what if you want to see all the graphical power of those fully operational battle icons? One way to see the full-size icons is via Cover Flow -- simply switch your Finder window to "as Cover Flow" (via the toolbar button, the View menu, or with a quick ⌘-4) and you can scale your icons at will by adjusting the window size. If you prefer not to have that black background around your icon, however, what is there to do? Thanks to Rob Griffiths at Macworld & MacOSXHints, here's a great tip for getting the maximum size out of your icon previews in the Finder without resorting to Cover Flow. To view icon previews up to 512x512, hit the Spotlight search field at the top right of the window; search for a null string (two quotation marks next to each other, no space in between, like so ""), then change the search target from This Mac to Current Folder and the search type from Contents to File Name. Switch to icon view and you'll see, at the bottom right corner of the window, a scaling slider. Push it to the right to maximize your icon size. It's just the thing for appreciating the fine detail on your bottle of unicorn tears. (If you're looking for the CHOCK LOCK and Rick Astley icons above, they're in the QuickPix 2008 pack from the Iconfactory.) Rob also hazarded a guess that we might see a more accessible version of this feature in future Mac OS X versions. If you watched the Snow Leopard stealth preview video posted earlier, you know he may well be right.
Alleged Snow Leopard screenshots and video
Mac Magazine has posted (English translation) what they're claiming to be several screenshots and videos of Snow Leopard, the forthcoming major update to OS X. Some of the goodies on display include a slider that allows you to adjust the size of icons in a Finder window (much like iPhoto does), new Stacks behavior and a peek at Quicktime X, which has a black border in this build.In the video above, we see some cool smart quotes, smart dashes, smart dates (add to iCal; view date in iCal) and auto-correction of spelling errors.We first saw screenshots last year, and Apple issued a code freeze on the APIs last week. I, for one, am looking forward to this tidied up version of Leopard.For more, check out this video.
Schiller and team to deliver WWDC keynote, Snow Leopard developer preview June 8
Apple issued a press release this morning, saying that Worldwide Marketing VP Phil Schiller would lead a "team of Apple executives" to deliver the Worldwide Developer Conference keynote June 8 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific (1 p.m. Eastern). According to the press release, attendees will receive a developer preview of Snow Leopard, the next major version of Mac OS X. The developer preview is designed to show off a new version of QuickTime, QuickTime X, multi-core and GPU processor support, and accessibility enhancements. "At WWDC, we will be giving our developers a final Developer Preview release so they can see the incredible progress we've made on Snow Leopard and work with us as we move toward its final release," said Bertrand Serlet, senior VP of Software Engineering. During the conference, iPhone developers can also attend over 100 technical sessions and meet with more than a thousand Apple engineers about iPhone OS 3.0, the release says. WWDC runs from June 8 to June 12 at Moscone West in San Francisco. The conference is sold out.
Code freeze on Snow Leopard APIs issued
We're getting close to Mac OS 10.6 release time, I can feel it. MacNN is reporting that Apple has issued a code freeze on Snow Leopard APIs. What that means is developers who are using the current build, number 10A354, are able to write code assuming all major components of the OS are in place. Minor changes in this build include Chinese handwriting recognition for multi-touch trackpads.For now, your guess is as good as ours as to when Snow Leopard will be released. In the meantime, you can browse Apple's Snow Leopard web pages (which went up in June of '08 believe it or not) or catch up on other rumors.
Apple puts a freeze on Snow Leopard APIs, freeing up developers to work their magic
Can you taste it? No, we suppose you probably can't. While Microsoft has been happy to share Windows 7 with just about anyone with a taste for danger, Apple has followed the traditional route of development with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, sharing it with developers alone. The good news is that things are starting to coalesce in the run-up to WWDC, with Apple just now informing developers that Snow Leopard's APIs are now frozen, with no more alterations planned before release. That means developers can work on their Snow Leopard-ready applications without much fear of Apple mucking things up with late game OS-level changes, and is a decent milestone towards what should presumably be a summer launch. The latest build also includes Chinese handwriting recognition for Macs with multitouch trackpads, similar to the functionality included in iPhone Software 2.0, and also finalizes the Grand Central architecture, which lets developers address multiple processing cores without all the know-how and complication usually required.Update: MacRumors is also reporting that the new build includes Windows HFS+ drivers with Apple's Boot Camp utility, allowing Windows-on-Mac users to access their Mac OS X HFS+ partitions out of the box.
New Snow Leopard discussions on Apple's Developer Forums
Apple has relaxed a long-standing policy of restrictiveness regarding open conversation about unreleased versions of Mac OS X by creating a Snow Leopard discussion forum for developers. Historically, Apple has prevented conversation about future versions even among those bound by the same Non-Disclosure Agreement (which proved very challenging in the rampup to the iPhone SDK going public).These new forums aren't available to the public or student developers, so don't begin a fruitless search. Only the developers who receive seed releases (those in Apple's Premier and Select developer programs) have access.I'm not a member of the ADC. We know that some of you are. What's your take on this? Is it a surprise, and do you plan to make use of the forum? Let us know.
New Snow Leopard beta build includes screen recording capabilities, a certain je ne sais quoi
If you're keeping track of Snow Leopard's progress, you'll be pleased to know that a new build (10A335) has been released into the hands of devs (and consequently, the world). Most interestingly, however, is that it seem this new iteration has a handy screen grab feature that hasn't made an appearance until now -- namely, the native ability (under QuickTime) to "record" your on-screen activities. There are other third-party apps that handle this duty, like the classily-named Snapz Pro X, but the inclusion in this latest beta will almost certainly mainstream the function. It should come in handy if you're constantly trying to tell you parents how to change their network settings, or if you're thinking about producing your own version of You Suck at Photoshop. [Via Mac Rumors]
