Apple News, Analysis and Podcasts

When Steve Jobs introduced us to Lion (OS X 10.7) back in October, there were a few items that were certainly interesting to note:

• Lion OS X 10.7

  Lion will be the next giant step away from computing as we have known it for the past 25 years.

  App Store was a Lion Feature but will be available four-five months before Lion is released — We should mark our calendars for January 20th, which will be 90 days since Jobs' announcement. Will Apple will release iWork 11 on that date and make it available only via the App Store? Expect Apple to move this way to make their Apple Store shelves less filled with software (I mean how many iPhone Apps can you buy at an Apple Store? Answer: Zero) and more filled with accessories and Mac/iPhone gear that is tangible.
• Lion is a move away from the Finder — The Finder was Apple's original way of helping us technical neophytes understand directory structures and files. It is clear that Steve wants to move to the next step which is to make us less dependent on files and where they are stored. Instead we are just use them in the appropriate application. For example, think of Mail.app. Do you deal with files per se? No, you are dealing with an App called Mail.app and it helps you organize "files" called E-mails. A better example is iPhoto. Few of us rarely ever see the actual files in iPhoto but instead manipulating those files through the application. Never must one go to ~/Pictures/iPhoto Library/ and so on. My bet is Steve would like to make our computing day file-and-directory-structure-free. Apps just handle everything for us, in a more useful way.
• Lion is a move away from the Dock — We were introduced to the Dock (in its current form) with OS X 10.0 (sure there were previews of it in OS 9 and 8). But the Dock is limiting. There are only so many items one can fit on the Dock until it becomes so small that you need a magnifying glass to understand what is in there. You should see Mark (Guy #1's) dock. It is so small and so busy, only he can use his computer. If you think about it, the iOS has a dock, but it is far more flexible and far more customizable... yes the main screens (or windows) we swipe through to find,.... what? Apps. See the previous point. Apps become center stage and Lion will make this more evident.
• Lion will make files, not apps, cloud-centric — In Lion expect to see that auto-save also means auto-save to the cloud. For those of you who use IMAP as your e-mail protocol or MobileMe (based on IMAP), you can quickly picture how all files could work that way — not just e-mail. This makes sense with Apple's massive data center in North Carolina. So with Lion I can work on a presentation, then continue when I get on the plane with my iPad.... because all files are synced (like IMAP e-mail). Apps on the other hand are not. They must be installed on each device. In the future, I'm sure if you buy an app for the Mac (through the App Store) it will also have an iOS flavor as well (like iWork does).

A lot more is in-store for us with Lion. Steve said he only had a limited amount of time to share with us some key features. What I think that really meant is he wasn't quite ready to reveal the massive change (and improvements) Lion will bring to our computing lives. Lion will be the next giant step away from computing as we have known it for the past 25 years.

9 Comments

1. Neil ~ November 29, 2010 20:15
   Right now Snow Leopard is a mixed bag. Most apps use old-school grey Finder-style windows and some have snazzy interfaces such as Quicktime. A few minutes with W7 and you see just how dated the Mac OS looks. W7 has far better window management and frankly I'm beginning to resent having to find a tiny triangle in the bottom right of a Finder window to resize it. My hope was for SL to sport a more modern UI but it didn't happen. If Lion is more lipstick-on-the-pig design 'updates' it might be the first OS refresh I will take a pass on. Don't get me wrong, OS X kicks Windblows' tush, but it could be so much better. Hopefully Lion will be that and more.
2. @Neil ~ November 29, 2010 21:15
   Neil, just a gentle reminder that Snow Leopard was never meant to be a redesign of the user interface. Its focus was totally under da hood, on enabling technologies that modernized the core underpinnings of OS-X. On the other hand, Lion is focused on the user interface. That makes sense. No matter how big your team of programmers and systems analysts, it's smart not to do too much at once. Otherwise, you end up with Windows Vista. The persecution rests its case.
3. BDR ~ November 29, 2010 21:19
   Man, I hope these secrets are correct. What a great way to use the NC facility and further tighten the Mac integration experience while distancing itself from Open Sores systems. Brilliant. To the author: if these are guesses more than inside scoop, would you mind forwarding this heat little piece to Apple? These ideas need to implemented! Peace all.
4. Mike ~ November 29, 2010 21:56
   I fail to see user advantages to most of these items. Sure, Apple would love to manage the app store to muscle out MacUpdate.com or Download.com, but most applications self-check for updates already and users have never had a problem finding out about new programs. Sad reality is that the Finder and the Dock are indispensible for "old school" users who have managed their systems in a very orderly way. Seach functions, especially to someone else's computer in a "cloud" will NEVER be as quick and easy as jumping directly to your folder (which takes a simple click or keystroke). "The Cloud" is a marketer's wet dream of subscription-based computing, and I don't trust anyone else -- not Microsoft, not Apple, not Google, not Oracle, NOBODY -- to store my data securely for me. It will remain where I archive it myself, thank you. As for the "snazzy look" of Windows 7 - yippy skippy. Apple's Spaces is just as good if not better. Moreover, adding a dual monitor for more screen real estate solves the problem of window shuffling. Arguably, it's also cheaper than the pain of maintaining Windows computers.
5. Bry ~ November 29, 2010 22:25
   I'm afraid I shall never be convinced by this saving data to the cloud. Companies come and go, how often have we seen a company set up with grand vision, we start using their services, then they decide they're not making anything from it and they shut the service down. I think this is what is going to happen with cloud based data storage services, we will see a raft of storage service providers come and go. One such service I've seen disappear, albeit minor has been XMarks that allowed my cross-browser syncing of my bookmarks -- oh how I will miss this service once it goes in January.
6. Tim ~ November 30, 2010 04:24
   The main problem with all this is that the Mac has been the haven for creators and the direction Lion appears to be going is for consumers. For the most part consumers still prefer Windows, if nothing but for the reason that cheap sells. Loosing Finder access for such actions like dragging a photo out of iPhoto (not out of the library folder as the article suggests, which would be insane) and opening it in another application is key to many workflows. As far as the cloud goes, well that's great for some. The infrastructure across the US is still not there, the number of people still on dial-up is very depressing. Many of those on DSL get unacceptably low speeds and may even face limits in the near future if they already don't. For the first time ever, I'm not really looking forward to the next update of the Mac OS.
7. Butch ~ November 30, 2010 19:40
   Lion sounds scary for the reasons given above. Simplicity (on the surface) and elegance are what brought me to Apple. Please don't ruin it! Lion sounds like Vista - lots of crap under the covers to make things slower and messier. If done well, as in iOS or iPhoto, maybe- but I still have tons of crap buried in iPhoto that I would love to easily prune - not easy when it is all mysteriously hidden. And I will NEVER trust anything outside of my walls - as stated, those well intentioned clouds vanish with no trace.
8. Dale ~ December 1, 2010 00:46
   No cloud for me, and managing files through apps sounds horrendous to me. I'm thinking of a project I'm dealing with now, with a text file and multiple image files in multiple formats. All have to pulled together in InDesign, but first I have to be able to work on each. Now all I have to do is open the project folder and then open whatever files I need. In Lion, it sounds as if I have to first open any app—if I can remember which ones I need to open—then navigate to the project folder, etc., etc., etc. That's a non-starter for me.
9. larry martin ~ December 2, 2010 18:54
   Hope 10.7 Lion incorporates some the Compiz-Fuzion OpenGL 3D technology that is only available on many Linux O/S(s) such as Ubuntu. Linux in some ways to much further ahead of Windows and O/S X.

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