Apple Announces Mac OS X Mountain Lion Update 'Inspired By iPad'

Although the fundamental changes are rather minimal—Mountain Lion is to Lion what Snow Leopard was to Leopard—the arrival of the latest version of Mac OS X represents a major shift for Apple towards a new multi-platform strategy.  It no longer makes software for Macs: (i)OS X is the new game in town.

Apple had already made its intentions to create a consistent user experience across all of its products ever since Lion, with LaunchPad coming straight from its mobile devices, but the new Mountain Lion is set to go a lot further.

Game Centre, Messages, iCloud and Notes

Game Centre, another iOS feature, has now arrived in OS X, and many of titles are likely to be ported to HD as a result.  Rather than just providing an easy way to access games, it will also make online gaming easier.

iChat will disappear, replaced by a new version of Messages which brings together both text-based instant messaging and video calling from Facetime.  The app also supports the XMPP, Yahoo and AIM protocols, and users will be able to pick up conversations started on a computer on a mobile device and vice versa.

A new notes app also borrows heavily from it iOS equivalent, and is integrated into iCal and offers synchronisation via iCloud.  Once again, everything is kept incredibly simple for the end user, who can access their content from any device.  iCloud—the free version, at least—is the easiest way for users to share content.  Like Dropbox and other similar services, iCloud allows users to access text documents, spreadsheets and presentations from their iPhone, iPad or OS X computer.  Synchronisation is entirely automatic, but users can also choose to push a new version of a document to other locations if they wish.

Notification Centre, GateKeeper and Mac App Store

Mac App Store is now the only way to update software—including the OS itself—which although is a perfectly logical change, might leave some long-term Mac users confused.

Another change is the new GateKeeper security system, which works a lot like User Account Controls in Windows.  Depending on how tightly users choose to lock their system down, they'll be able to block the installation of new apps or limit downloads only to signed apps.  That's a sensible way of keeping things shipshape, especially for business users, but there will also likely be some (reasonable) complaints about Apple taking control over the way users install software.

The last new element at the heart of the interface will be a new notification centre.  With a scrolling vertical interface bringing together updates from multiple apps, it should avoid multiple pop-ups from web browsers, downloads apps, games and other interruptions.  But there's a catch: it will only accept notifications from apps downloaded via the Mac App Store.  That's something else that might annoy some users.

Social Networks and AirPlay

OS X is set to become more social, too, with the AirPlay system allowing users to broadcast their computer display onto a TV (or to a projector) via iTV.  The entire solution is wireless, making things much easier.


Social networks are now supported natively, meaning that you only need to provide your Twitter credentials once, and then you can use it from any app you like.

A new API will make it easier to share data between applications and sign up to online services.  For instance, users will be able to send a photo they've just edited in Photo Booth to Flickr.  Developers won't need to build in the compatibility themselves, and can simply plug into OS X which will make the link for them.

On sale this summer

Mac OS X Mountain Lion is set to go on sale in the Mac App Store this summer, and such updates are normally reasonably priced.  Not everybody will be able to get it though, as there's no support for Macs with GMA 950 or 3100 graphics cards, 32 bit extensions or Carbon.  That's going to take some getting used to ...

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