DACS General Meeting
September 2010
Meeting Review:
Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6)
By Patrick Libert
There is no doubt in my mind that Dave Marra, Apple Inc. Senior Systems Engineer, is one of the best presenters I have seen in my life.
His return visit to DACS on September 7 did not disappoint me.
Dave began his presentation with a historical review of all the Mac OS X operating systems from Puma to the latest, Snow Leopard. Instead of being a major upgrade from Leopard (OS X 10.5), Snow Leopard is a refinement and it is priced accordingly at $29. The emphasis is on refinements of each component, maximizing the use of the latest technology such as that of the latest Intel 64-bit processor, and optimizing the exchange capabilities of the OS with the Windows OS.
Dave pointed out that 90 percent of the Leopard components were refined in Snow Leopard leading to a faster and more responsive Finder, a 50% increase in Java performance and a marked speed increase with the use of the browser, Safari.
Regarding the use of the latest technologies, Snow Leopard is optimized for the Intel dual core and quad core 64-bit processors. This allows developers to use all the available cores and to create applications that will use the RAM on video cards if needed (OpenCL).
Dave went on to demonstrate many of the latest Mac OS capabilities such as:
- Exposé – the ability to maneuver between open windows using the function keys.
- Trash – SL has a “put back” function to replace a deleted item/file to its origin.
- Services Menu –has been expanded and offers many new options in the open application.
- Speech Capabilities – Dave gave an example where a spoken track can be added to iTunes.
- Preview – Dave showed all the capabilities of this application and how it can be easily used as a pdf reader.
- TextEdit – This app can be used for transformation of text and to set up automatic text correction/substitution.
- Safari – The latest version of this browser can display bookmarks as a wall of sites rather than as a simple list. A new “reader” function in the address bar, allows one to read an article or web page with all the extraneous material removed.
- QuickTime X – the latest version has multiple recording capabilities: video, voice audio, and screen. It also allows one to use video trimming of a recorded segment.
There were many other references to other applications of this refined OS. As Dave mentioned, his presentation was the condensed version of what he presents to schools and businesses over several hours.
Even though I have been a Mac user for almost twenty years, I was amazed at how much I learned from Dave’s presentation. Bravo!
|