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Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

mashable.com

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Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#11

Post by CoolGuySteve »

taligent wrote: post #2

Something very odd is happening at Apple. Either there is a massive shortage of developers (unlikely) or developers have been moved to a new project (AppleTV ?). Because Mountain Lion and iOS6 are by far the most underwhelming updates yet in terms of features.

After Snow Leopard, they changed to a development cycle consistent of two week sprints followed by a one week convergence period. Stuff that can't get in by the specified milestone gets pushed back, moved, or cancelled.

It actually makes for a nicer development model than the 'everything doesn't work for a year and then miraculously comes together 4 months before release' development model. For example, with Snow Leopard, XCode became garbage collected and was unusable for like 50 releases in a row.

Ultimately, while you get a slightly less buggy release that comes out on time more or less, the features seem less ambitious.

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#12

Post by Zirro »

dr42 wrote: post #6
chrisdroukas wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh. OS X has been on somewhat of a tick-tock update cycle since Leopard. Add features then refine them. Also, it's twenty bucks .

The cost has nothing to do with the product, that's determined based on other factors, like how many Mac's OSX sells. There's no straightforward relationship between price number of features. The direction appears to be cheap upgrades, and merging feature sets between IOS and OSX so eventually there's one operating system that changes in unison.

"The direction appears to be cheap upgrades, and merging feature sets between IOS and OSX so eventually there's one operating system that changes in unison."

It is believed by some that Apple will not be pushing their operating systems in this direction:

http://daringfireball.net/2012/02/mountain_lion

Specifically: "Mountain Lion is not a step towards a single OS that powers both the Mac and iPad, but rather another in a series of steps toward defining a set of shared concepts, styles, and principles between two fundamentally distinct OSes."

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#13

Post by dylanvee »

bstar77 wrote: post #10

Can anyone comment if airplay is disabled on pre 2011 macs? I'm going to be royally pissed if airplay is disabled because I'm missing some BS drm chip. Hopefully the era of "Jailbreaking" macs has not started.

AirPlay mirroring relies on Intel Quick Sync Video support in your CPU: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Quick_Sync_Video

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#14

Post by zdw »

bstar77 wrote: post #10

Can anyone comment if airplay is disabled on pre 2011 macs? I'm going to be royally pissed if airplay is disabled because I'm missing some BS drm chip. Hopefully the era of "Jailbreaking" macs has not started.

If anything it may be a CPU/GPU restriction that holds you back.

Modern Intel CPU's have a quicksync feature which is H.264 encode assist in the HD 3000 and 4000 GPU. These features may be required to make airplay mirroring work.

Similar hardware is in the A5 chip in the iPad 2 and up, and iPhone 4S and up.

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#15

Post by st3fan »

bstar77 wrote: post #10

Can anyone comment if airplay is disabled on pre 2011 macs? I'm going to be royally pissed if airplay is disabled because I'm missing some BS drm chip. Hopefully the era of "Jailbreaking" macs has not started.

DRM Chip? What did that crazy rumour come from?

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#16

Post by taligent »

chrisdroukas wrote: post #3
taligent wrote: post #2

Something very odd is happening at Apple. Either there is a massive shortage of developers (unlikely) or developers have been moved to a new project (AppleTV ?). Because Mountain Lion and iOS6 are by far the most underwhelming updates yet in terms of features.

Eh. OS X has been on somewhat of a tick-tock update cycle since Leopard. Add features then refine them. Also, it's twenty bucks .

I think I might have been misunderstood. I have no complaints with Mountain Lion and think it offers tremendous value.

My point was whether there had been a movement of developers to a new iOS/OSX based project e.g. like an AppleTV. Because it seems that iOS6 and Mountain Lion combined seem to lack the combined punch of previous releases.

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#18

Post by gte910h »

bstar77 wrote: post #10

Can anyone comment if airplay is disabled on pre 2011 macs? I'm going to be royally pissed if airplay is disabled because I'm missing some BS drm chip. Hopefully the era of "Jailbreaking" macs has not started.

Are you talking about being an Airplay source or destination?

AirServer functions as a destination already: http://www.airserverapp.com/

For a source, Airfoil works for audio: http://rogueamoeba.com/airfoil/mac/

It looks like a hardware limitation if you don't have the ISQV, you're SOL.

Re: Apple Releases Final Mac OS X Mountain Lion to Developers

#20

Post by bluthru »

taligent wrote: post #2

Something very odd is happening at Apple. Either there is a massive shortage of developers (unlikely) or developers have been moved to a new project (AppleTV ?). Because Mountain Lion and iOS6 are by far the most underwhelming updates yet in terms of features.

Over 200 new features and plenty of behind-the-scenes refinements, all for $20 and 12 months after Lion. Sounds like they're firing on all cylinders in Cupertino.

http://www.apple.com/osx/whats-new/features.html

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