Apple’s Lion
In the last couple weeks Apple has released the newest version of OS X, this one being called Lion. I suppose, technically counting this is the eighth version under the OS X banner and is numbered 10.7. Seems to me it should have likely occurred back in spring with the Mac computers seeing a refresh, but that is another story all together. Welcome to Tech Friday, as I explore this OS and what it offers.
OS X Lion is a big step for Apple in regards to the computer lineup. If you look down the list of the features and upgrades, you will find a large portion of those that say something like it makes this application look and function more like the same application in the iOS or even straight out that it gives it an iPad interface. It has been suspected and rumored for some time that this was the direction that Apple was going to head and it is coming true. Speculation is that sometime in the near future the iOS (the operating system that runs on the iPhones and iPads) could also become the Mac computer OS. This move toward making everything similar certainly gets all the Mac users ready for that potential future move.
Outside of those big look and feel changes for so many parts of OS X, there really is not a whole lot that is offered by the new Lion. A few of the highlights, in my mind at list, include:
- Airdrop – allows transfer of data between to machines over Wi-Fi without having to connect to a router. I could see this maybe being useful when on the road with a couple of mac books, but blue tooth, while slow, already allows this and how often is this going to be a need anyway?
- Security – Both File Vault and Address Space Randomization are nice features in this regard, especially if your machine should be stolen or otherwise compromised.
- Recovery Partition – Something most PC maker have included for a while, a disk partition with recovery information that allows you to set back to factory defaults and correct issues without having to go find the disk media that came with the machine.
- Multi-User Remote – This one is a big one in my opinion as a system admin with several Mac machines around. Currently you can set up for remote access, but if someone is logged in you can only ‘share’ the space with them. This version will allow two users to be logged in (one remote) with their own separate login and space to work with in. About time on this one.
- Rosetta – Silently done and not mentioned, Rosetta has been dropped. Rosetta is the translator for making non-Intel compiled stuff work on the Intel based Mac architecture. I agree it is probably time to drop it, but Apple said back when they switched to Intel this was something users would never have to worry about.
