Leopard rumor roundup: unconfirmed rumblings
Apple Computer on Monday will release plans for Leopard, a much anticipated update to its Mac OS X operating system.
Although the software has been under development for nearly two years, reports pertaining to specific feature enhancements have been few and far between.
For its part, Apple has only shed light on a couple of its plans for Leopard: primarily that the software would pack its Boot Camp dual-boot solution and be available for purchase by early 2007.
In an AppleInsider report released earlier this year, reputable sources indicated that Apple was keeping a close eye on the progress of Redmond, Wash.-based rival Microsoft Corp., which is similarly in the latter development stages of its own operating system overhaul called Windows Vista.
Maps and iChat
At the time, those sources said Apple was well aware of both Leopard's strengths when compared to Vista as well as its weaknesses. In somewhat of a catch-up effort, they said Apple had been priming a new geographical mapping solution for Leopard, as well as VoIP features for iChat. They also said Apple had thrown around the idea of releasing Leopard to market under a name other than "Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard."
In addition to those rumors, there were also others relative to plans for Apple's iCal, Spotlight and Safari application technologies. Although AppleInsider has been unable to corroborate the rumors with any degree of certainty, they're worth a quick review if for nothing more than the sake of discussion.
iCal
In what would be a broad expansion of the calendar software's internet sharing abilities, it was rumored that the next version of iCal would adopt features reminiscent of third party meeting maker software applications.
The enhanced functionality would presumably allow users to schedule meetings, keep prioritized to-do lists, and coordinate schedules with other users over the Internet or a local network.
Spotlight
On the search front, Apple was rumored to be expanding the reach of its meta data-based Spotlight technology to not only scour a user's local volumes, but also the Internet's largest search engine (Google) and retail store (Amazon).
Safari 3.0
Assuming the reports are accurate, Apple's plans also call for Spotlight to be tied into the next version of the company's Safari web browser. There, it was rumored the technology would play an instrumental role in a new feature that would allow users to group web sites into search channels. Users would then be able to perform web searches across a predefined set of web sites, such as "Apple news" or "Sports."
Other rumors surrounding Safari 3.0 included a new tab-based bookmarks management interface and the ability to save and later search through web histories.
Leopard preview next Monday
Apple chief executive Steve Jobs, along with several other Apple executives, will kick off the company?s annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) with a keynote preview of Mac OS X ?Leopard? on Monday, August 7, 2006, beginning at 10:00 a.m. at San Francisco?s Moscone West.
Although the software has been under development for nearly two years, reports pertaining to specific feature enhancements have been few and far between.
For its part, Apple has only shed light on a couple of its plans for Leopard: primarily that the software would pack its Boot Camp dual-boot solution and be available for purchase by early 2007.
In an AppleInsider report released earlier this year, reputable sources indicated that Apple was keeping a close eye on the progress of Redmond, Wash.-based rival Microsoft Corp., which is similarly in the latter development stages of its own operating system overhaul called Windows Vista.
Maps and iChat
At the time, those sources said Apple was well aware of both Leopard's strengths when compared to Vista as well as its weaknesses. In somewhat of a catch-up effort, they said Apple had been priming a new geographical mapping solution for Leopard, as well as VoIP features for iChat. They also said Apple had thrown around the idea of releasing Leopard to market under a name other than "Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard."
In addition to those rumors, there were also others relative to plans for Apple's iCal, Spotlight and Safari application technologies. Although AppleInsider has been unable to corroborate the rumors with any degree of certainty, they're worth a quick review if for nothing more than the sake of discussion.
iCal
In what would be a broad expansion of the calendar software's internet sharing abilities, it was rumored that the next version of iCal would adopt features reminiscent of third party meeting maker software applications.
The enhanced functionality would presumably allow users to schedule meetings, keep prioritized to-do lists, and coordinate schedules with other users over the Internet or a local network.
Spotlight
On the search front, Apple was rumored to be expanding the reach of its meta data-based Spotlight technology to not only scour a user's local volumes, but also the Internet's largest search engine (Google) and retail store (Amazon).
Safari 3.0
Assuming the reports are accurate, Apple's plans also call for Spotlight to be tied into the next version of the company's Safari web browser. There, it was rumored the technology would play an instrumental role in a new feature that would allow users to group web sites into search channels. Users would then be able to perform web searches across a predefined set of web sites, such as "Apple news" or "Sports."
Other rumors surrounding Safari 3.0 included a new tab-based bookmarks management interface and the ability to save and later search through web histories.
Leopard preview next Monday
Apple chief executive Steve Jobs, along with several other Apple executives, will kick off the company?s annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) with a keynote preview of Mac OS X ?Leopard? on Monday, August 7, 2006, beginning at 10:00 a.m. at San Francisco?s Moscone West.
Comments
I'm not expecting it, but some sort of cross-platform video conferencing capability would be a good idea. Then again, even with that, I have no use for the little iCamera because I don't know anyone that does video calls on any platform.
Likewise. I know of absolutely no one who is interested in videoconferencing, other than for product demonstrations. And usually what happens is, they'll just FedEx a package instead.
I'm not expecting it, but some sort of cross-platform video conferencing capability would be a good idea. Then again, even with that, I have no use for the little iCamera because I don't know anyone that does video calls on any platform.
Ditto. My friends rarely even go on IM anymore.
Anyway, I hope we get a lot of PUBLIC info about Leopard, and not a lot of closed-doors NDA-protected info (much as I understand the need to let devs know things and not the competition).
I think that's exactly why Apple is including iSights with every Mac, even on the low-end where such frills are not expected. It's a chicken-and-egg problem, and while video chat may never become widespread like email, it sure helps to start putting it people's hands.
Anyway, I hope we get a lot of PUBLIC info about Leopard, and not a lot of closed-doors NDA-protected info (much as I understand the need to let devs know things and not the competition).
There is also the lack of high speed is some areas that also holding it back as well.
You're an under-the-hood kind of guy.
I think we can expect tweaks to the kernel, but that's not a very sexy or advertisable change. They might just announce file system changes, but those are not the sort of updates rumors would rapidly spread about.
As for video conferencing, I work for a medium-large company and we video conference every now and then, and would do it more often if it were more seamless. We use IM already so a one-click solution would be great. Our telecommuting employees videoconference regularly. I am about to become one, and my girlfriend's temporarily out of state, so I for one am interested in anything regarding video chatting.
anyway, cameras have to be included with everything for it to work. heck, wasn't one of bill gates' concept pc's a monster with a cell phone and a camera glommed on the sides? he kinda had the tech right, but had no idea how to package it. so there is an urge to push video conferencing on both sides of the platform fence, it just takes someone to put up the money to make it all work.
Spotlight - Please, for the love of God, make it compatible with Xsan! It pains me to manually search though hundreds of folders (fortunately only hundreds in my situation) to find what Im looking for...
P.S. I like these new changes to the forums!
iCAL could definitely use some love and the sync features could improve a bunch and I'd be happy.
VOIP features sound nice since that's the craze nowadays. I don't really need Maps built into the OS but if that's the case we'll see how it works.
ichat is a piece of crap, not to mention extremely lame. also, do something about safari's occasional choke ups and slow downs.
the finder needs much improvement as well.
MacOS X 10.5 Leopard? <yawn>
OTHER than "MacOS X 10.5 Leopard"
OK, I guess iChat is a close second for uselessness. I mean, now that Skype does video, who is going to bother with iChat? Skype works cross-platform, and has a vast user base. And why is it that iChat is worse than practically any other client out there?
Before they start adding a bunch of useless bells and whistles, how about getting stuff that's already in Tiger to actually work? Because Safari sure doesn't work. I absolutely hate the pinwheel that's generated everytime I follow a link, the hangups, the crashes, the instability... thing is, I like Safari better than FF, but technically FF works a lot better for me... and sadly, there's nothing for OS X that works as well as FF on Windows (though to be fair, I should try Camino before going on too much about this). And it would be nice if Spotlight actually worked - I often stare at a file that Spotlight can't find. It's gotten to the point where I just don't use Spotlight, because I'm pretty well organized, and the few times I actually am looking for something, I have to find it manually, cause Spotlight sure can't. And how about having OS X actually be able to be hotswappable when it comes to external devices instead of freaking out. Plus they still haven't figured out the whole sleep/hibernate process... btw. try removing a USB device, say a mouse while your machine is sleeping - loads of fun...
I could go on like this for pages. But the bottom line is: fix what's already here, before you bloat it up with a lot of new broken toys!