Apple, the creator of both the Macintosh OS, running on all Mac computers, as well as the more popular iOS, that runs on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, has announced yet another update to the Mac OS that will bring both of those platforms closer together.
Until July 2011, the Mac and iOS platforms were completely separate. They had no similar user interface features, the underlying operating system was completely different, and the Apple-made apps were different from Mac to iOS. In July 2011, the next version of Mac OSX, the operating system Mac computers run, called Lion, was released. Lion brought some of the best features from the iPhone to the Mac. These weren't so blatantly iOS features, but more like an iOS-like experience coming to the Mac. After that point, the two platforms became more and more alike, with some of the major Mac apps coming to iOS, and more.
Officially, Mountain Lion brings over 100 new features to Mac OS X, but many of those will go completely unnoticed. Any iOS user will probably recognize most of the main features in Mountain Lion.
Firstly, iChat has been replaced with an application Apple calls Messages. Messages allows you to use AIM, Jabber, Yahoo! Messenger, and Google Talk, as well as iMessage, the free Apple service originally introduced on iOS that allows users to send and receive text messages without using SMS. Mac users and iOS users both text each other, making iMessage a fluid messaging experience. The beta version of iMessage is available as a free download from the Apple.com website.
Reminders, an app also introduced on the iOS platform is becoming a Mac feature. It allows users to create simple lists with tasks to do, as well as set a time for the app to remind you to do that tasks. A user can create custom lists, and fill them with tasks, as well as set a priority, repeat date, and add notes. With iCloud, all Reminders data is synced from the Mac the iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, and vice versa. Reminders had been integrated into iCal, but is now a separate and more simple app.
Notes is an app that has been on the iPhone since the very beginning, but is coming to the Mac as its own app for the first time. In addition to the simple note-taking abilities found in iOS, Notes for the Mac also allows you to add photos, videos, links, rich text, and bullet-points to make a more-robust note-taking platform. In Notes for the Mac, a user can also drag a note and pin in to the desktop.
Notification Center is another feature taken straight from iOS, and it looks almost exactly like the iOS version. Notification Center allows one to see and keep track of everything happening on the Mac. Any new emails, messages, calendar events, reminders, system updates, and even notifications from third-party apps will pop up non-intrusively at the top of the screen, and to see all of them in one glance, one can just swipe left from the right side of the track-pad, to view the Notification Center. Clicking on a notification will bring you directly to the proper place in the app.
One of iOS's least noticed feature is the ability to share photos, links, and more to various places with a tap. Mountain Lion brings this same feature to the Mac, called Share Sheets. Mountain Lion apps that integrate this feature will have the familiar share button, that, when clicked, will drop down a list of sharing options specific to that app.
Game Center, Apple's social gaming network launched originally for iOS is now coming to the Mac. Game Center allows players to play multiplayer games from an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, and now a Mac. Game Center also shows what games your friends are playing, and recommends new games a user might like. Game Center allows you to challenge friends in games, check out leader-boards, and earn achievements.
AirPlay mirroring, a feature found in the iPad that allows a user to hook up his device to any AirPlay supported device (such as an Apple TV), and mirror exactly whats happening on the screen, and put it on the big-screen, is now coming to the Mac in Mac OS X Mountain Lion. This can be used to play games, watch movies, or give conference presentations, all from the Mac.
A new feature that is specific to the Mac is called Gatekeeper. Gatekeeper is a security program for the Mac. Security is something that many think is not a problem on the Mac. For many years, due to the Mac's smaller market share, hackers and virus-authors kept away from the Mac, because Windows had a much bigger audience. However, with the Mac's market share slowly rising, bad guys see more potential in writing viruses for the Mac, and therefore viruses are becoming more common. Also, since there is this idea that the Mac is secure, users don't have software to protect themselves, and therefore are more likely to fall for a virus. Windows users, on the other hand, know of these insecurities, and are more likely to protect themselves. Gatekeeper is a really important feature that will help protect Mac users as malware becomes more common.
Mountain Lion is available now to registered Apple developers, and will be coming out for the public sometime this summer, but, like Apple did last time with their FaceTime app, a beta Messages app is available as a free download from the Apple website. Like Lion previously, Mountain Lion will probably be available as an upgrade for a relatively low price.
This is a major step forward in the evolution of the Mac OS X platform. Apple seems to be very set on slowly bringing Mac OS and iOS closer together. High-end users may feel that their desktop experience is dying, but all of the features found in the previous versions of Mac OS X are still there. Making Mac OS more like iOS is not taking away from the experience of a high-end user.
The iPhone and iPad seem to be very easy-to-learn platforms. Many people who could never operate a desktop computer can work an iPad fine, because of its intuitive user interface. Making Mac more like iOS can also be a great business move for Apple, because users who may never have touched a computer, but are familiar with iOS, will be more likely to get how to use a desktop computer, because of its similarities to the iPad.
This announcement not only lets us see what the next version of Mac OS X will look like, it lets us see Apple's strategy for the Mac, one that we will see in versions of Mac OS X for years to come.