Apple

Apple's Bertrand Serlet outlines changes to Mac OS X 10.6 at WWDC.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET)

According to rumors, the release of Mac OS X 10.6, Apple's operating system also known as Snow Leopard, might arrive a bit early. Though Apple announced at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June that Snow Leopard would hit stores in September, tech blogs became overly excited when it was whispered that it might be ready to debut on or about August 28.

How much does it matter that it could arrive five whole days before September officially begins? It doesn't. Regardless of when the operating system ships, here's what to expect from Snow Leopard, and why it might matter to you.

What's the difference between Snow Leopard and Leopard?

First thing to know: This is not a complete overhaul of Mac OS X. Rather, it's a series of small to medium-sized improvements, what Apple calls "refinements." Much of the new shine to OS X 10.6 comes from changes that are under the surface, possibly not obvious to the unobservant. But Apple does say that the improvements make the overall OS much faster, including a 45-percent faster installation than the previous version of the operating system, OS X 10.5, or Leopard. Apple is also promising faster boot times, quicker shut down, a speedier process when joining wireless networks, and faster backups to Time Machine. And it's not just quicker, Apple says, it's lighter: Upon install it frees up 6GB of space.

Specific applications have been tinkered with as well, with a lot of attention focused on Quicktime, Expose, and a shiny new Safari 4 browser, which was released in June. For more on that, see here.

Quicktime gets a mysterious new version number, and is now called Quicktime X. It's a bit slicker, and the new interface appears similar to the iPhone's media player. The real change is that many features that were previously in the Pro version of Quicktime are now in the free version. You will be able to edit video inside QuickTime using a video timeline ribbon that appears along the bottom of the screen. And there will be fewer steps involved in video uploading. You don't have to worry about file formats--Quicktime will do any necessary conversion and upload directly to video-hosting sites or MobileMe, Apple's subscription service that syncs personal files on any of its devices. Apple promises it will take just one click to record audio or video (on a Mac's built-in mic or camera) with the new Quicktime. It will also support HTTP streaming of a wider variety of file formats (like h.264 and AAC). It's a feature that many competing media players have long offered, and it automatically adjusts the playback bit rate according to what the connection can handle. It also means you can stream video or audio through more firewalls.

Expose, an operating system UI feature for organizing open application windows, or just the windows from a particular application currently running, gets tweaked a bit too. In Snow Leopard, Expose is integrated with app icons in the dock, which cuts out the need to first switch to the specific application you want before activating Expose to see its open windows. It also means you don't have to use a keyboard, or use a trackpad gesture to call it up. Clicking and holding an app's icon will bring all windows open that are associated with that program to the front.

What's the one killer feature worth upgrading for?

Many people will probably consider support for Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 the most important new feature of Snow Leopard. Improved Exchange support will be integrated into Mail, iCal, and Address Book in Snow Leopard, which means e-mail, calendar appointments, to-do lists, and contacts from Outlook will be viewable on your personal calendar, mail, and address books. It also allows things like dragging and dropping contacts into iCal to schedule meetings, and your Mac will be able to discover time conflicts between personal and work calendars and change the meeting time and location.

Related: Microsoft is improving its Exchange support for the Mac too. This week Microsoft said that Outlook for Mac will replace Entourage, the current e-mail and calendar program in the Mac Office suite. Although it will still differ from the Windows version of Outlook, it will add support for more Exchange features, such as public folders and rights management features.

How much?

Apple surprised people by putting the price to upgrade to Snow Leopard at a very attractive $29 for a single license, and $49 for a five-user family pack. But there's a catch: you have to already have Leopard installed to pay those prices. If you're upgrading from a previous version of Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger), you'll have to pay $169, which includes an upgrade to 10.5 (Leopard) and 10.6 (Snow Leopard). For a 5-user family pack license, it'll cost $229. And Snow Leopard is only compatible with Macs containing Intel chips. On the OS front, Leopard is the end of the line for PowerPC Mac owners.

Is it worth upgrading right away, or should I wait?

Some people are fans of waiting until the first update, the 0.1 release, which tends to correct any of the immediate issues that inevitably pop up when a new operating system is released to the public. Some who attempted to upgrade to the first version of Leopard ran into trouble after the software was installed, and when they attempted to restart their machines a blue screen would appear instead. But it appeared to hinge on a specific piece of third-party software many had installed that was out of date. The majority had a smooth transition to Leopard.

Overall, we think this will be a worthwhile upgrade if the speed claims turn out to be true. Another way of looking at is that for the price of the Quicktime to Quicktime Pro upgrade, you get most of the Quicktime Pro features plus a newly tweaked core OS. We think it's a good deal for Apple OS X 10.5 users.

When will it be available?

So far, Apple has said only "September." Recent rumors have indicated it might be ready earlier than that, but it's mid-August now, so that's mostly inconsequential. No matter what, it's going to be available before Windows 7 is set to roll out on October 22. When it's available, we'll be sure to let you know.

Bertrand Serlet demoes new features of Safari 4 at WWDC 2009.

(Credit: James Martin/CNET)

Though Apple isn't saying whether it's working on a touchscreen tablet, the company may have shown its hand at its Worldwide Developers Conference last week.

Of course, the has become the Apple press corps' version of a Bigfoot hunt. Some believe the evidence is overwhelming. Others are, well, underwhelmed. And Apple doesn't discuss products before it's ready to.

However, based on the features last week, the newest version of the Mac operating system, OS X 10.6, dubbed Snow Leopard, could turn out to be the most touchscreen-friendly Mac OS the company has ever built. Snow Leopard won't be available until September, and so far, Apple does not sell a touchscreen notebook or tablet. But some of the features in the upcoming OS at least show a path on which Apple could be headed toward offering a larger touchscreen device.

At the developer event, a list of new features of OS X 10.6 was rattled off by Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet. But most of the upgrades to the operating system from the previous build, OS X 10.5, known as Leopard, are gentle tweaks aimed at easier usability and faster processing, things the average user may or may not notice.

After a closer look, however, the unifying theme of several of the new features of Snow Leopard is that they're now extremely easy to navigate without a keyboard, or without a lot of mouse clicking. That also happens to be one of the keys to a successful mobile interface: keeping steps to opening applications and performing tasks to a minimum.

Expose in Dock Starting with the Finder, the addition of Expose to the dock is a great example. Expose is a feature that is used for organizing all your open windows at once, or just the windows from a particular application you were running. Putting Expose directly into the dock now cuts out the need to first switch to the specific application you want before activating Expose. It also cuts out the need to use a keyboard, or use a trackpad gesture to call it up. Clicking and holding an app's icon will bring all windows open that are associated with that program to the front. Being able to tap and hold on a touchscreen would make it that much easier.

Stacks now has a scrolling option and resizable thumbnails.

(Credit: Apple)

Stacks There's also Stacks, a feature that keeps shortcuts to chosen files in the dock, which has been updated to be more useful without forcing users to enter the Finder. In Leopard, the amount of thumbnail previews of files shown in a stack was limited, and to see the all files, you had to go into the Finder. Now in Snow Leopard, all items in Stacks can be viewed simply by dragging the scroll bar, precluding the need to open the Finder. That might seem like a small change, but it's important if you're browsing with just a finger on a touch-sensitive surface.

Quicktime X The new version of Apple's video application QuickTime is also more touch-friendly. The player controls (play, pause, forward, backward) are now quite similar to what's found on the iPhone. Also, in order to edit videos, there's a ribbon timeline of scenes from the video that appears under the player. The ribbon can be moved forward and backward in time for editing just by dragging. The same interface is what users of the new iPhone 3G S will be using when they want to trim video clips they've captured on the device. Prior to this, you had to set the beginning and end points with little arrows that provided no indication of what segment of the clip you were editing besides the time.

Freehand drawing And then there's the addition of freehanding via the touchpad. Apple said Snow Leopard will allow users to draw Chinese characters freehand onto a Mac notebook track pad, and the OS will predict characters for faster writing. This feature could clearly transfer from trackpad input to direct onscreen input if Apple engineers wanted. They already have a similar feature in the iPhone for Chinese characters based on the .

Snow Leopard allows Chinese characters to be drawn freehand on the trackpad.

(Credit: Apple)

Safari 4 updates New Safari 4 features would also accommodate easier navigation by touch. The new Coverflow option to browse through past sites visited as well as sites you visit most often would be easy with the drag of a finger. And on a screen larger than an iPhone, the effect would work marvelously.

These are just a few of the feature upgrades of OS X 10.6 that seem it indicate a trend toward touch capabilities.

True, Steve Jobs said at an Apple event last fall that putting touchscreens on traditional laptops "hasn't made a lot of sense" to Apple. His point is a good one: even companies that embrace touchscreen laptops admit that it's an awkward posture to sit and point at a laptop screen. HP's CTO of its PC group, Phil McKinney, has indicated that's why the company's Windows touchscreen laptops are convertible to tablet PCs. But Jobs' comment doesn't rule out a different form factor with a touchscreen, like a tablet.

While it would seem like Apple could use the ready-made iPhone operating system for a tablet instead of a touch-friendly version of Mac OS X users, that could limit the device. Most users expect the freedom of having a Finder and the ability to download directly from the Web and not through the App Store only, as with the iPhone and iPod Touch.

If Apple does end up making a tablet that were to run Snow Leopard or some version of it, that means it probably wouldn't be announced until after Snow Leopard's official release in September. Others have speculated that it won't be ready until at least early 2010.

CNET's Josh Lowensohn contributed to this story.

Apple reportedly is gearing up to offer location and multi-touch developer tools in its Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system, according to a report in AppleInsider

The geolocation tools will take a page from the iPhone software development kit (SDK), by way of the CoreLocation framework, according to AppleInsider. The CoreLocation works inconjunction with the Mac's networking hardware, aiming to provide a GPS-like experience.

Apple's next generation OS will also provide developers with programing interfaces that are Cocoa-based, as a means to maximize the use of the multi-touch features within the MacBook and MacBook Pro applications, AppleInsider notes.

Updated 3:44 p.m. PDT: Apple PR formally issued the press release in question that went out inadvertently earlier Monday.

Apple quickly retracted a few Mac OS X 10.6 tidbits leaked out by its Canadian subsidiary following the Worldwide Developers Conference keynote, but the Internet misses nothing.

Bertrand Serlet, Apple's senior VP of software engineering, told WWDC 2008 attendees about Snow Leopard Monday afternoon.

(Credit: Apple)

Scores of sites picked up on a press release that went out from Apple Canada and was pulled at some point after it went live. According to the release, Snow Leopard--which Apple CEO Steve Jobs confirmed is the code name for 10.6--will focus more on improving the basic plumbing of the operating system than adding any catchy new features, as The Unofficial Apple Weblog reported last week.

Apple's Bertrand Serlet was scheduled to address Apple's developers in a session closed to the press Monday afternoon to go over 10.6, and now we have some idea of what he's telling them; much to the chagrin of Apple PR, I suspect. Snow Leopard will improve support for multicore processors and allow developers to exploit powerful graphics processors, as we reported last week.

The release will also come with a new version of Quicktime that improves video playback, and a faster version of Safari. According to the reports, Apple expects to ship 10.6 "in about a year."