In a very unexpected move today, Apple announced "OS X Mountain Lion," the ninth major release of the Mac OS X desktop operating system. Mountain Lion will be released to the public this summer, with a developer preview being seeded today. The OS will come less than a year after OS X Lion was released to the public.
OS X Mountain Lion continues Apple's work on migrating features of iOS to the Mac environment. The OS touts 100 new features, including: Reminders, Notes, Game Center, Notification Center, AirPlay Mirroring, Twitter integration, and Messages. Messages will be replacing the aging iChat application on OS X, and will feature iMessage support, allowing messages to be sent between Macs and iOS devices.
“The Mac is on a roll, growing faster than the PC for 23 straight quarters, and with Mountain Lion things get even better,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “The developer preview of Mountain Lion comes just seven months after the incredibly successful release of Lion and sets a rapid pace of development for the world’s most advanced personal computer operating system.”
OS X Mountain Lion will also include tighter integration with iCloud, which will allow apps like Mail, FaceTime, and Find My Mac to be automatically setup. In addition, documents will be automatically synced and pushed to all iCloud-enabled devices.
Another new feature is dubbed "Gatekeeper," which will allow Mountain Lion users to determine which sources are able to run and install things on the computer. This seems to be Apple's attempt at drastically improving OS X security.
OS X Mountain Lion will be a Mac App Store exclusive download and will be available sometime in the late summer of 2012.
A couple of other notes about Mountain Lion:
- Removes the "Mac" title from "Mac OS X"
- System software updates have been moved to the Mac App Store
- By default, apps must either be "signed" with a certificate or be installed through the Mac App Store. This can be overridden, but lessens security
[...] today, Apple announced the ninth major release of Mac OS, dubbed "OS X Mountain Lion." The update brings a number of new [...]
[...] the release of the OS X Mountain Lion developer preview earlier today, Apple also seeded developers with a build of the upcoming Safari [...]
[...] week, Apple surprised everyone and unveiled "OS X Mountain Lion," the ninth major release of its desktop operating system. Besides dropping the "Mac" from "Mac OS [...]
[...] week, Apple surprised everyone and unveiled “OS X Mountain Lion,” the ninth major release of its desktop operating system. Besides dropping the “Mac” [...]