The arrival of OS X 10.7 “Lion” is a significant step forward for many reasons. For some, it will be the point at which Apple starts to integrate the desktop/laptop experience with the tablet/iPad one. For others, it might be their first experience of Apple’s platform – it’s clear that sales are being gained as customers who’ve bought iPads or iPhones start to examine their options to move on from older Windows machines (which puts OS X into the frame in a way that Linux isn’t).
For me, though, what’s significant is that Apple hasn’t given up and shut up shop on the OS X family.
Without a doubt the arrival of first the iPod, then the iPhone and lastly the iPad, have had a truly dramatic effect on the company’s fortunes, an effect that’s amplified by the explosion in the number and the success of its retail operation – at a time when everyone was predicting that e-sales were the only way to go. And of course this has been helped along by Microsoft’s inept dropping of the ball with Windows Vista, from which it has only partly recovered through Windows 7.
Lion is a significant release - it’s Apple’s Windows 8 moment, but a whole year earlier
I’m not denying for a moment that Windows 7 has been a success for Microsoft in terms of units sold, the rebuilding of corporate image and a refocusing of energies for the future, but we know today that the platform we’ve been waiting for – the true successor to the hearts-and-minds success of Windows XP – will be Windows 8, due out next year. At that point, many strands will come together: a revamped UI experience that finally acknowledges the existence of touch interfaces; a shift to supporting very low power consumption ARM CPUs; and an admission that much of the old legacy software is now beyond its sell-by date, locked in a time warp and not really fit for the forthcoming decade.
That the company could keep getting it so wrong for most of a decade and still be in business is a testament to its colossal market share and importance. I cruelly joke to friends inside Microsoft that this is all the ill-gotten rewards of a convicted monopolist, which has managed to cling onto the market share it obtained through means both fair and foul. Their reaction – namely, to choke into their pint-sized paper mugs of milky coffee – suggests that my view isn’t the one currently prevailing in Redmond, even though there’s a sniff of truth hidden away in the acidity of the comment.
Nevertheless, Apple has made steady progress with OS X, with a new release every year or two, each of which tends to bring better features without breaking the recent past. We must try to remember that the 2000s were the decade when Apple managed the near impossible: killing off its old OS line, which culminated with OS 9, and replacing it with something far more solid and with an equally long history.
Never forget that the underpinnings of OS X came straight from NeXTStep, the OS developed for the company Steve Jobs set up during his time away from Apple. Comparisons with the early days of Windows NT are entirely valid, and some people will argue quite cogently that NeXTStep both came before, and was superior to NT. But that’s a topic more suitable for one of our regular ITTU (IT Tweet Up) meetings, which we hold either in a London pub or the pub next door to my house, near Huntingdon.
So Lion is a significant release. It’s Apple’s Windows 8 moment, but a whole year earlier. It isn’t only a pretty face, although the cosmetic improvements it brings are welcome. For example, finally we can resize a window by dragging on any side or corner. Yes, I know that Windows 2.x did this back in the 1980s. As any long-term reader will understand, there are few truly new ideas in the world, only different, and better or worse implementations of common sense.
What else makes Lion worthy of attention? Well, this is the OS release where the kernel goes 64-bit across the board. Apple has managed to create an OS architecture that could have a 32-bit kernel running both 32-bit and 64-bit apps. Nothing new there, you might think – Windows has done this for ages. Indeed, it did, but OS X allowed 32-bit and 64-bit drivers to be intermixed on the same kernel, whether that be 32-bit or 64-bit. That’s why OS X hasn’t suffered from Windows’ 32-bit vs 64-bit differentiation, which has inevitably led to slower uptake of 64-bit driver writing than might have been ideal. With Lion it’s a 64-bit kernel push, and a corresponding push for 64-bit drivers and apps.
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I'm looking at getting into OS X development so I'm interested in this subject. You are very biased though Jon. Your claim that this is Apple's Windows 8 but a year earlier is utter rubbish. You said in the paragraph earlier that Windows 8 will be a complete revamp with the ability to run on ARM processors and a totally new interface. How is OS X Lion matching up to that?? It can't run on ARM and it doesn't have a new interface. It's an iterative update. I'll read on but you should use some brains when you write these comments
Why the Lion what?
Sorry, did I open Mac Pro by mistake? This article is just so glaringly flawed I don't even know where to start. Any company that still believes that a single button on a mouse is ok is so far behind the curve it just isn't funny. Yeah yeah popularity yawn yawn, but that just because they're trendy, shiny and expensive (read under engineered and over priced) so idiots line up to pass over their hard earned cash to crApple with glazed expressions.
OS X will be just the same experience after this patch (because that's all it is) as before; i.e. awfull.
Windows 7 is a far superior product, much nicer to use, easier to fix and rock solid stable unless you do something really stupid to it... OS X has no advantages over it.
As for the iCloud... oh please. I won't even bother commenting on downloading your whole OS from the cloud... No, wait, I can't help it; plain dumb and impracticle for 60% plus of broadband users.
Windows 8 will come along and bury OS X forever... and rightly so.
Huh?
"...snip this umbilical cord and move over to a pure PPC environment..."
Shouldn't that be a pure "Intel" enviroment or have I completely misunderstood?
"The time has come ...
Is that really what you meant to say? It really would be news (and suicide) if Apple decided to do that!
I begin to suspect this entire web site is a cunning plot by PC Pro to crowd-source the proof-reading for the magazine!
... like I say, crowd-sourcing!
Even though my comment was justified in my head I don't want to be part of the anti Apple thing. The OS is very good. I just felt that the comment on Apple's Windows 8 was wrong. OS XI will be their Windows 8
I totally agree with your comment.
Jon Honeyball do you think that we are all so gullible to really believe Apple is so good? For goodness sake give your readers some credit Jon we are fully aware of all the failings of Apple so called attractions
First off, PC stands for Personal Computer, which makes OS X no less valid a computing option as Windows. I wonder if you'd be so quick to complain if the article focussed on a Linux distro??
Second I'm sick of what is blatant trolling in the comments on this website. Microsoft has made some major advances with Windows after the debacle that was Vista. Windows 7 is a big improvement, but Windows 8 will be the big release for Microsoft.
OS X Lion is here right now and is a great operating system. Whether it is an iterative update or not, the simple fact is that right now OS X along with the cloud integration puts it ahead of the field. To dismiss it purely because it carries an Apple logo is both naive and pointless.
The whole point of PC Pro is to cover all aspects of computing and frankly I get fed up of seeing ill thought out comments detracting from the points raised in the original article
The article was clearly written for one purpose. Don't feed the troll!!
If you'd noticed, the title of the column now indicates it covers Apple issues.
PPC error. Sorry, my fault -- not enough coffee that morning. Still, it shows you read it ;-)
As for "How is OS X Lion matching up to that?? It can't run on ARM and it doesn't have a new interface" -- if you had done your homework you'd know that IOS is a derivative of OSX. And it runs on ARM.
I agree with you in most respects, but...
A lot of the new features of OS X (Ful Screen Mode, launcher etc.) are aimed very much at replicating the tablet experience on a PC, which doesn't work on a desktop.
It might work on a MacBook Air or 13" MacBook Pro, but on a 24" or 27" iMac or dual head set-up, it doesn't make any sense at all - just like the "Metro" mode in Windows 8, as it has been described so far or ChromeOS.
These environments work well on smaller displays, but on a "power" desktop, they are more of a hinderance, than a help.
Don't get me wrong, I love my WP7 phone and its Metro interface. I like the new start screen in Windows 8, but I currently have half a dozen windows lined up in vertical stripes across my 2 monitors, I work in one window, the rest are there to provide information and give me reference information for what I am working on in my main window.
Yes, the Tweetdeck window isn't necessary, I could do without it, but the Word document, web pages (mainly leo.org for translation), PowerPoint and Excel windows need to be visible all the time, so that I can refer to them as I type, without breaking my workflow.
OS X's Full Screen mode slows me down, and the apps look silly on a 24" display. I haven't tried Windows 8 yet, and I haven't seen anybody tackle this aspect of use, yet. Everybody seems to be concentrating on how good it is on tablets and ultrabook style laptops. All well and fine, but if it is going to hinder me and make me less productive, I am not going to want to upgrade.
I hope this concentration on tablet functionality is a red-herring and Windows 8 will still be productive for power users, but until the reviewers get out of the "people only use a PC to update Facebook" mentality and actually tackle Windows 8 in the real, business, world, I am still left with a lot of doubts as to Windows 8's suitability, which is a shame, because I like it, a lot, in its basic style. I just want to be able to work productively.
As to Lion, I like it a lot, but it has turned my iMac into a real sloth! After the last update, it took over 10 minutes to log back in, not to boot, just from entering my password to the desktop being displayed!
First of all, thanks to those who pointed out the PPC error. Now corrected.
Some of the other comments, however, could be cut and paste from any other Mac story on this site, by the small band of commenters who want to turn every single Apple story into a pointless Mac vs PC debate.
As Hjupton points out - the PC in our name stands for personal computer. The Mac is in every sense a personal computer, and will be covered here on PC Pro.
As I suggested to one commenter last week: if you're mortally offended at the very mention of Apple on this website, I respectfully suggest you read your tech coverage elsewhere.
We've never moderated comments on PC Pro for anything other than foul language, personal abuse or spam, but we may start to moderate more carefully - not to stamp out dissent (which we actively welcome), but the pathetic attempts to reduce every piece of Apple/Mac coverage to a flame war.
It bores us, and I know it bores a good many other regular readers who've commented or written to me about this issue.
Perhaps the most revolutionary thing about Lion is the price. £20 for what is, clearly, a major OS upgrade. I can't imagine windows 8 will be offered at that price.
Having recently spent hours resurrecting a Vista (aargh) laptop, I'd have happily plugged it into my broadband connection and allowed it to reinstall that way. Although that would, of course, mean reinstalling Vista so perhaps a bad example....
the fact that a debate bores you, or is not of sufficient quality is no justification for curtailing free speech. Where genuinely valid Mac vs PC debate ends and a flame war begins is not an absolute, it is a subjective value judgement by one individual - you. In a democracy it is wrong for you to impose that on the debate. Because you cannot be sure you are drawing the line in the right place. That principle is the foundation of democracy, trial by jury, our entire society.
Comments sections are here for us all, and although technically your Ts and Cs may give you the right to moderate in this way, if you go down this route you may find yourself with a few tents popping up outside PC Pro Towers.
Mac and PC haters, people who write letters to you complaining about them, PC Pro editors, and jumped up know-it-alls like me - we are all individuals with an opinion, and our voices must all be allowed to be heard - provided they don't get abusive.
I am frankly a bit surprised that I need to explain this to you.
Flame comments that fail to add anything constructive to the debate are worse that worthless: they detract from the real issues that most of us read PCPro for.
I for one welcome the possibility that such comments may be moderated.
p.s. If word got around that you were censoring comments in this way, I can't imagine it doing the PC Pro brand a whole lot of good!
p.p.s. Looking over these comments, where's the flame war? I don't see one!
p.p.p.s. your current approach of challenging perceived guilty individuals through the medium of debate by commenting to them, rather than censoring them, is totally the right approach in my view - transparent, democratic, informative. Just keep doing that. In the words of Kate Winslet, we all love a good row! Fill your boots!
Comment moderations are present on many other websites whose size (and frankly, importance) dwarf the PCPRO website.
The PCPRO website also doesn't have an obligation to uphold democratic principles. We don't live in the nation of PCPRO, we don't even pay to read the website, so what obligations can we demand of it? As far as i'm concerned, PCPRO can do whatever it wants, because if i disagree with it, i can simply choose to stop reading it.
Nevertheless, i felt compelled to support Barry since I would LOVE to see a bit less trolling and flaming on the usual topics. And...i bet many many others would too.
"PCPRO website also doesn't have an obligation to uphold democratic principles" oh really? who should we leave democracy to?
Re stopping reading, ...
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