I'm thinking Mac OSX 10.7 Cougar. As for "features" of 10.7 I'd have to say that anything really consumer facing that was dropped from 10.6 to develop the foundation will get revisited.
New Marble UI will likely be introduced?
I see a bigger expansion of MobileMe integration with the system (TimeMachine) and iLife '11
OpenGL will get fully updated to 100% support of all versions including the latest version
OpenCL will be expanded into the core frameworks
New interfaces will be included such as facial recognition, head and eye tracking, etc..
who knows what else they might add, I'm hoping for a peak at WWDC '10 but I'm thinking it will be mostly focused on new iPhone hardware, and new iPhone OS4 features for that new hardware, and demoing pandora as background app, some games with fast app switching, and a few other examples of the multi-tasking modals. they increased the $$$ for a ticket by more than $300 so maybe this year the 5000 attendees will get a new iPhoneHD/4G instead of a dev preview of 10.7
Welcome the boards PopinFRESH.
I agree. Apple will likely unify the whole OS so that it doesn't look like a hodge podge of UI elements from 3 generations of OS X.
Mobileme 2.0 hopefully should show up this year and by the time 10.7 hits more Cloud features will be rolled into the OS. Apple's NC Datacenter will be operational and there to take the additional load.
Open GL 4.x will ship with 10.7 which will provide full backwards compatibility with OpenGL 3.x yet give Apple and others pretty much every features they'd want for games and general 3D work.
OpenCL 1.1 will be delivered which will integrate nicely within a OpenGL workflow and will erase alot of those maiden voyage kinks.
Apple will deliver a new filesystem. The filesystem will be heavily metadata infused. It'll have data corruption prevention features and it'll allow Time Machine to only back up delta file changes (block level). We may even get dedupe features for secondary storage.
Apple will bring the notification system from the iPhone to the Mac and like Growl. Instead of RAM hungry helper apps running in the background eating up cycles applications that need to "listen" in will use a similar system to what's on the iphone. Keeping the OS running lean and mean.
Quicktime X will take a LARGE leap forward (right now it doesn't support enough features to power Final Cut Studio to 64-bit). 10.7 QTX will change that.
Software update will support more 3rd party apps.
CoreData goes multi-user (finally)
Resolution Independence is delivered (finally)
Xcode 4.0 makes it much easier to move code from Mac to iPhone. This is important because Apple may begin to place an ARM chip on board
future Macbooks. This would allow the Macbooks to run essential apps like retrieve mail, twitter feeds, etc based on a scaled down iPhone like OS.
1 - 32-bit processors will not be supported, but 32-bit apps will run as usual. This will require Apple to provide EFI updates to all 64-bit processors that do not have it now.
2- Rosetta will not be an option.
3 - Xcode will drop support for PowerPC development. 64-bit PPC support was dropped with Xcode 3.2, but 32-bit support was kept, most likely for the development of the iLife and iWork suites.
4 - QuickTime X "Pro" is a tough one. On the one hand, it make sense for Apple to movie the "Pro" features into iMovie which is already "cloud-connected". On the other hand, Apple also makes QuickTime for Windows so either Windows does not get QuickTime X Pro until Apple releases OS X 10.7 or Apple splits development of QuickTime. It will be interesting to see how Apple deals with Windows since QuickTime X uses Apple's Core technologies. Maybe Apple will port them to Windows. QuickTime X player for 32/64-bit Windows Vista/7 and QuickTime X Pro for 64-bit Windows Vista/7.
5 - Most of the applications and utilities that are included with OS X were moved to 64-bit with the release of Snow Leopard, but OS X 10.7 will move the rest to 64-bit.
I am familiar with Zoom. Unfortunately, all magnification (Mac or Windows) results in a blurry/fuzzy situation for me. Pretty much the same result as altering my iMac resolution. Apple seems to have a very decent desire to create tools for blind and low vision. I have an iMac 20 inch. I have to get very close to the screen. Alex is a mandatory feature for my situation. I hope, by the time 10.7 arrives, the mini will have true HDMI. That would allow me to buy a TV and run a larger screen in 1366 x 768 resolution. While I am in a huge minority, it wouldn't be that hard for Apple to do. Many machines on the Windows side are including HDMI.
Not sure I get it when it comes to names. Safari? Then again, Firefox is a critter too. Will Apple continue with 10.7 then 8, then 9? Then what ... 11? Would it be OS 11 or OS XI? If Apple were to release the next OS in late 2011, then OS 11 is a perfect name. I like the simplicity of Ubuntu. The OS is number by year and month. Done. Perhaps the next Mac OS will have a pet name from another part of the jungle.
You can easily connect any Mac via HDMI to a TV, all macs that come equipped with the mini display port are able to support HDCP over HDMI. All you need is 1 adapter & 1 cord. Here are the links to the adapter and cord you need ADAPTERCORD Although this will not carry audio if your problem is purely the visual aspect it shouldnt matter. If you need audio you can always connect an optical cable from your mac to your audio receiver. Once connected it presents various additional resolutions in the Displays Control Panel and you can either "mirror" or extend your desktop. Unless you plan on playing games that are graphic intensive simply get a mini place it near your HDTV use these cords get a wireless mouse & keyboard and voila your solution. I can say almost for certain you will not see an HDMI port on a Mac, why you ask....simple HDMI is a licensed spec, Apple would have to pay a fee for every Mac that rolled out of the factory with the port and they simply arent going to do that, too few people would utilize it to make it worthwhile and justify the expense. If any Mac does gets an HDMI port it will be the mini since even Apple is touting its "media center" usability especially with Front Row and a remote (scroll 1/2 way down page and look on the right hand side). Finally before long we will see (if anyone remembers this from a while back which Apple & Intel are the initial developers) LightPeak ports on our Mac's and consumer devices (several manufacturers of TV's and audio equip.{especially Sony} have expressed high interest since it would allow them to simplify ports more) then possibly at the same time or after we will go to wireless HD (although I believe we will always have some sort of cable most likely optical like LightPeak since without considerable wattage wireless will never be able to transmit data as quickly and efficiently as a cord).
You can easily connect any Mac via HDMI to a TV, all macs that come equipped with the mini display port are able to support HDCP over HDMI. All you need is 1 adapter & 1 cord. Here are the links to the adapter and cord you need ADAPTERCORD Although this will not carry audio if your problem is purely the visual aspect it shouldnt matter. If you need audio you can always connect an optical cable from your mac to your audio receiver. Once connected it presents various additional resolutions in the Displays Control Panel and you can either "mirror" or extend your desktop. Unless you plan on playing games that are graphic intensive simply get a mini place it near your HDTV use these cords get a wireless mouse & keyboard and voila your solution. I can say almost for certain you will not see an HDMI port on a Mac, why you ask....simple HDMI is a licensed spec, Apple would have to pay a fee for every Mac that rolled out of the factory with the port and they simply arent going to do that, too few people would utilize it to make it worthwhile and justify the expense. If any Mac does gets an HDMI port it will be the mini since even Apple is touting its "media center" usability especially with Front Row and a remote (scroll 1/2 way down page and look on the right hand side). Finally before long we will see (if anyone remembers this from a while back which Apple & Intel are the initial developers) LightPeak ports on our Mac's and consumer devices (several manufacturers of TV's and audio equip.{especially Sony} have expressed high interest since it would allow them to simplify ports more) then possibly at the same time or after we will go to wireless HD (although I believe we will always have some sort of cable most likely optical like LightPeak since without considerable wattage wireless will never be able to transmit data as quickly and efficiently as a cord).
I appreciate all the effort put into your post. My eyesight is a very unique situation. I'm sure the mini is a decent machine. I hate being backed into corner by Apple. I am not fond of the mini. I think of it as more than just an entry-level Mac. It is a novelty box, aka toy computer, IMHO. It would be foolish on my part to purchase a Mac notebook, when I can't see the screen. The same applies to the iMacs now. The Mac Pro costs as much as a Buick. So, if I want a Mac, the mini is my only choice. I just don't like that option.
After checking out the resolution independence test from solipsism, I am finding that is not a solution for my needs either. For my needs, Windows is probably a better choice. Nothing against Mac OSX, but I can't enjoy something that is hard to see. I can see Windows better. Comparing apples to apples, I have used W7 RC on this iMac. It looks better.
Too bad Steve Jobs cannot see a Mac through my eyes. Then he would be forced to adapt.
I posted this on another thread not seeing this thread before.
My predictions are:
1) Smaller and faster OS because Apple builds the system with Xcode 4 and LLVM compiler which makes for faster and smaller executables. I think they will keep 32 bit support.
2) Ability to run Windows programs via a Wine-like function. Official Apple support for Windows programs (not assured though) will help in marketing to businesses who have a lot invested in custom Windows programs.
3) Something I didn't mention before. Ability to use Xcode 4 to make programs that run on OS X and Windows. Programmers can do this already but it makes for Mac programs that look too much like Windows programs. By Apple having control, the Mac-Windows applications will look like Mac applications on both OSes so Windows users can be indoctrinated to the Mac way.
I'm still betting that 10.7 Lion will drop support for all Macs with 32-bit processorsIn other words, I believe 10.7 will drop support for Macs with Core Solo and Core Duo processors. Note that Core 2 Duo (64-bit) was the successor of Core Duo (32-bit). The reasons for this belief are explained in earlier posts in this thread, so I will not repeat them.
You know, I don't see any mention of "10.7" anywhere on apple.com or the dev site. Just Mac OS X Lion. Could this be version 11.0 finally? Or just downplaying the actual version of the OS like Microsoft did with 2000, xp and vista.
I can only see 3 options for Apple to choose from in terms of phasing out support for old hardware with 10.7:
- support all the hardware supported by 10.6,
- drop support for the 32-bit processors (my prediction for 10.7),
- drop support for 32-bit EFI (my prediction for 10.8).
Dropping support for 32-bit processors means not needing to ship fat binaries. That would allow Apple to boast that 10.7 takes less disk space than 10.6. As I noted in the opening post, relatively few machines would be affected. It would be the first six or so months' production of Intel MacBooks, Macbooks Pro, and iMacs plus the first 17 months' production of Intel Macs Mini.
Dropping support for 32-bit EFI means not having to ship 32-bit kernels.
The problems with not dropping support for any old machines are:
- it sets unreasonable customer expectations for the future, and
- it means 10.8 will see a very large set of hardware rendered unsupported.
In my opinion, it's better to take a small slice with each release than a large slice every once in a while.
I also note that, with the exception of some high-end MacBooks Pro, all the Macs which shipped with 32-bit Intel processors came equipped with only 512MB of ram in standard configurations. 10.6 demands 1GB of ram. The 32-bit Intel Macs are already obsolescent and will be obsolete by the time 10.7 ships (presumably in 2011).
Now it's clear that 10.7 will drop support for 32-bit CPUs, as predicted in September 2009. I still expect 10.7 to boot 64-bit kernels by default on all Macs capable of booting a 64-bit kernel. I continue to predict that 10.8 will drop support for 32-bit EFI and ship only with 64-bit kernels.
You know, I don't see any mention of "10.7" anywhere on apple.com or the dev site. Just Mac OS X Lion. Could this be version 11.0 finally? Or just downplaying the actual version of the OS like Microsoft did with 2000, xp and vista.
I believe i distinctly heard that after Snow Leopard, that Apple was going right to work with Mac OSX 11. Has anyone heard that too?
No, and the amount of people who actually care about a version number of a software product is slim to none. Windows 7, for example, has the internal version of NT 6.1. Slackware Linux jumped from 6.0 to 13.0, IIRC. Google Chrome is up to 11.0.
Apple markets x.y releases as major, when other vendors would consider that a minor release. Apple could have called Leopard Mac OS 11 and few customers would have cared. They could market Lion as Mac OS 37 and again, most customers couldn't care less.
I'm sure we will have an actual System 11 at some point, but Mac OS X has become not just a number, but both a brand name and a platform. It would be like if Microsoft wanted to rename Windows to something else overnight. It just wouldn't fly. And it's the same with Apple... Mac OS X has become so ingrained that they might actually do something odd like use a cat-themed code name for a literal version 11.0.
Comments
I'm thinking Mac OSX 10.7 Cougar. As for "features" of 10.7 I'd have to say that anything really consumer facing that was dropped from 10.6 to develop the foundation will get revisited.
New Marble UI will likely be introduced?
I see a bigger expansion of MobileMe integration with the system (TimeMachine) and iLife '11
OpenGL will get fully updated to 100% support of all versions including the latest version
OpenCL will be expanded into the core frameworks
New interfaces will be included such as facial recognition, head and eye tracking, etc..
who knows what else they might add, I'm hoping for a peak at WWDC '10 but I'm thinking it will be mostly focused on new iPhone hardware, and new iPhone OS4 features for that new hardware, and demoing pandora as background app, some games with fast app switching, and a few other examples of the multi-tasking modals. they increased the $$$ for a ticket by more than $300 so maybe this year the 5000 attendees will get a new iPhoneHD/4G instead of a dev preview of 10.7
Welcome the boards PopinFRESH.
I agree. Apple will likely unify the whole OS so that it doesn't look like a hodge podge of UI elements from 3 generations of OS X.
Mobileme 2.0 hopefully should show up this year and by the time 10.7 hits more Cloud features will be rolled into the OS. Apple's NC Datacenter will be operational and there to take the additional load.
Open GL 4.x will ship with 10.7 which will provide full backwards compatibility with OpenGL 3.x yet give Apple and others pretty much every features they'd want for games and general 3D work.
OpenCL 1.1 will be delivered which will integrate nicely within a OpenGL workflow and will erase alot of those maiden voyage kinks.
Apple will deliver a new filesystem. The filesystem will be heavily metadata infused. It'll have data corruption prevention features and it'll allow Time Machine to only back up delta file changes (block level). We may even get dedupe features for secondary storage.
Apple will bring the notification system from the iPhone to the Mac and like Growl. Instead of RAM hungry helper apps running in the background eating up cycles applications that need to "listen" in will use a similar system to what's on the iphone. Keeping the OS running lean and mean.
Quicktime X will take a LARGE leap forward (right now it doesn't support enough features to power Final Cut Studio to 64-bit). 10.7 QTX will change that.
Software update will support more 3rd party apps.
CoreData goes multi-user (finally)
Resolution Independence is delivered (finally)
Xcode 4.0 makes it much easier to move code from Mac to iPhone. This is important because Apple may begin to place an ARM chip on board
future Macbooks. This would allow the Macbooks to run essential apps like retrieve mail, twitter feeds, etc based on a scaled down iPhone like OS.
2- Rosetta will not be an option.
3 - Xcode will drop support for PowerPC development. 64-bit PPC support was dropped with Xcode 3.2, but 32-bit support was kept, most likely for the development of the iLife and iWork suites.
4 - QuickTime X "Pro" is a tough one. On the one hand, it make sense for Apple to movie the "Pro" features into iMovie which is already "cloud-connected". On the other hand, Apple also makes QuickTime for Windows so either Windows does not get QuickTime X Pro until Apple releases OS X 10.7 or Apple splits development of QuickTime. It will be interesting to see how Apple deals with Windows since QuickTime X uses Apple's Core technologies. Maybe Apple will port them to Windows. QuickTime X player for 32/64-bit Windows Vista/7 and QuickTime X Pro for 64-bit Windows Vista/7.
5 - Most of the applications and utilities that are included with OS X were moved to 64-bit with the release of Snow Leopard, but OS X 10.7 will move the rest to 64-bit.
I am familiar with Zoom. Unfortunately, all magnification (Mac or Windows) results in a blurry/fuzzy situation for me. Pretty much the same result as altering my iMac resolution. Apple seems to have a very decent desire to create tools for blind and low vision. I have an iMac 20 inch. I have to get very close to the screen. Alex is a mandatory feature for my situation. I hope, by the time 10.7 arrives, the mini will have true HDMI. That would allow me to buy a TV and run a larger screen in 1366 x 768 resolution. While I am in a huge minority, it wouldn't be that hard for Apple to do. Many machines on the Windows side are including HDMI.
Not sure I get it when it comes to names. Safari? Then again, Firefox is a critter too. Will Apple continue with 10.7 then 8, then 9? Then what ... 11? Would it be OS 11 or OS XI? If Apple were to release the next OS in late 2011, then OS 11 is a perfect name. I like the simplicity of Ubuntu. The OS is number by year and month. Done. Perhaps the next Mac OS will have a pet name from another part of the jungle.
You can easily connect any Mac via HDMI to a TV, all macs that come equipped with the mini display port are able to support HDCP over HDMI. All you need is 1 adapter & 1 cord. Here are the links to the adapter and cord you need ADAPTER CORD Although this will not carry audio if your problem is purely the visual aspect it shouldnt matter. If you need audio you can always connect an optical cable from your mac to your audio receiver. Once connected it presents various additional resolutions in the Displays Control Panel and you can either "mirror" or extend your desktop. Unless you plan on playing games that are graphic intensive simply get a mini place it near your HDTV use these cords get a wireless mouse & keyboard and voila your solution. I can say almost for certain you will not see an HDMI port on a Mac, why you ask....simple HDMI is a licensed spec, Apple would have to pay a fee for every Mac that rolled out of the factory with the port and they simply arent going to do that, too few people would utilize it to make it worthwhile and justify the expense. If any Mac does gets an HDMI port it will be the mini since even Apple is touting its "media center" usability especially with Front Row and a remote (scroll 1/2 way down page and look on the right hand side). Finally before long we will see (if anyone remembers this from a while back which Apple & Intel are the initial developers) LightPeak ports on our Mac's and consumer devices (several manufacturers of TV's and audio equip.{especially Sony} have expressed high interest since it would allow them to simplify ports more) then possibly at the same time or after we will go to wireless HD (although I believe we will always have some sort of cable most likely optical like LightPeak since without considerable wattage wireless will never be able to transmit data as quickly and efficiently as a cord).
You can easily connect any Mac via HDMI to a TV, all macs that come equipped with the mini display port are able to support HDCP over HDMI. All you need is 1 adapter & 1 cord. Here are the links to the adapter and cord you need ADAPTER CORD Although this will not carry audio if your problem is purely the visual aspect it shouldnt matter. If you need audio you can always connect an optical cable from your mac to your audio receiver. Once connected it presents various additional resolutions in the Displays Control Panel and you can either "mirror" or extend your desktop. Unless you plan on playing games that are graphic intensive simply get a mini place it near your HDTV use these cords get a wireless mouse & keyboard and voila your solution. I can say almost for certain you will not see an HDMI port on a Mac, why you ask....simple HDMI is a licensed spec, Apple would have to pay a fee for every Mac that rolled out of the factory with the port and they simply arent going to do that, too few people would utilize it to make it worthwhile and justify the expense. If any Mac does gets an HDMI port it will be the mini since even Apple is touting its "media center" usability especially with Front Row and a remote (scroll 1/2 way down page and look on the right hand side). Finally before long we will see (if anyone remembers this from a while back which Apple & Intel are the initial developers) LightPeak ports on our Mac's and consumer devices (several manufacturers of TV's and audio equip.{especially Sony} have expressed high interest since it would allow them to simplify ports more) then possibly at the same time or after we will go to wireless HD (although I believe we will always have some sort of cable most likely optical like LightPeak since without considerable wattage wireless will never be able to transmit data as quickly and efficiently as a cord).
I appreciate all the effort put into your post. My eyesight is a very unique situation. I'm sure the mini is a decent machine. I hate being backed into corner by Apple. I am not fond of the mini. I think of it as more than just an entry-level Mac. It is a novelty box, aka toy computer, IMHO. It would be foolish on my part to purchase a Mac notebook, when I can't see the screen. The same applies to the iMacs now. The Mac Pro costs as much as a Buick. So, if I want a Mac, the mini is my only choice. I just don't like that option.
After checking out the resolution independence test from solipsism, I am finding that is not a solution for my needs either. For my needs, Windows is probably a better choice. Nothing against Mac OSX, but I can't enjoy something that is hard to see. I can see Windows better. Comparing apples to apples, I have used W7 RC on this iMac. It looks better.
Too bad Steve Jobs cannot see a Mac through my eyes. Then he would be forced to adapt.
My predictions are:
1) Smaller and faster OS because Apple builds the system with Xcode 4 and LLVM compiler which makes for faster and smaller executables. I think they will keep 32 bit support.
2) Ability to run Windows programs via a Wine-like function. Official Apple support for Windows programs (not assured though) will help in marketing to businesses who have a lot invested in custom Windows programs.
3) Something I didn't mention before. Ability to use Xcode 4 to make programs that run on OS X and Windows. Programmers can do this already but it makes for Mac programs that look too much like Windows programs. By Apple having control, the Mac-Windows applications will look like Mac applications on both OSes so Windows users can be indoctrinated to the Mac way.
A Mail progam that didn't forget your passwords three times a day would be nice.
I'm getting a bit sick of retyping my passwords and checking the 'Remember my password' box (whcih clearly isn't connected to anything).
Odd, I never have this problem...
Odd, I never have this problem...
Happens to me all the time. My wife and I use 4 Gmail accounts...
I can only see 3 options for Apple to choose from in terms of phasing out support for old hardware with 10.7:
- support all the hardware supported by 10.6,
- drop support for the 32-bit processors (my prediction for 10.7),
- drop support for 32-bit EFI (my prediction for 10.8).
Dropping support for 32-bit processors means not needing to ship fat binaries. That would allow Apple to boast that 10.7 takes less disk space than 10.6. As I noted in the opening post, relatively few machines would be affected. It would be the first six or so months' production of Intel MacBooks, Macbooks Pro, and iMacs plus the first 17 months' production of Intel Macs Mini.
Dropping support for 32-bit EFI means not having to ship 32-bit kernels.
The problems with not dropping support for any old machines are:
- it sets unreasonable customer expectations for the future, and
- it means 10.8 will see a very large set of hardware rendered unsupported.
In my opinion, it's better to take a small slice with each release than a large slice every once in a while.
I also note that, with the exception of some high-end MacBooks Pro, all the Macs which shipped with 32-bit Intel processors came equipped with only 512MB of ram in standard configurations. 10.6 demands 1GB of ram. The 32-bit Intel Macs are already obsolescent and will be obsolete by the time 10.7 ships (presumably in 2011).
Now it's clear that 10.7 will drop support for 32-bit CPUs, as predicted in September 2009. I still expect 10.7 to boot 64-bit kernels by default on all Macs capable of booting a 64-bit kernel. I continue to predict that 10.8 will drop support for 32-bit EFI and ship only with 64-bit kernels.
You know, I don't see any mention of "10.7" anywhere on apple.com or the dev site. Just Mac OS X Lion. Could this be version 11.0 finally? Or just downplaying the actual version of the OS like Microsoft did with 2000, xp and vista.
It's 10.7.
I believe i distinctly heard that after Snow Leopard, that Apple was going right to work with Mac OSX 11. Has anyone heard that too?
No, and the amount of people who actually care about a version number of a software product is slim to none. Windows 7, for example, has the internal version of NT 6.1. Slackware Linux jumped from 6.0 to 13.0, IIRC. Google Chrome is up to 11.0.
Apple markets x.y releases as major, when other vendors would consider that a minor release. Apple could have called Leopard Mac OS 11 and few customers would have cared. They could market Lion as Mac OS 37 and again, most customers couldn't care less.
I'm sure we will have an actual System 11 at some point, but Mac OS X has become not just a number, but both a brand name and a platform. It would be like if Microsoft wanted to rename Windows to something else overnight. It just wouldn't fly. And it's the same with Apple... Mac OS X has become so ingrained that they might actually do something odd like use a cat-themed code name for a literal version 11.0.