Where to Now for OS X?
Leopard is upon us and is described by most reviewers as a mature operating system. So where does that leave the future of OS X? Does OS XI beckon?
Overall, to paraphrase the reviews I’ve read, “Leopard is a pretty impressive release, albeit evolutionary, not revolutionary like Steve had tantalizingly hinted.”
So where to from here? Will we see those “top secret” features that never made it into this release surface in subsequent dot upgrades of Leopard? Or will they have to wait until the king of the operating system jungle, Lion?
OS X is a winning brand for Apple, but one that is now seven years old, and if 10.6 follows in another couple of years, OS X would be well over a decade old by the time 10.7 would arrive. Mac OS survived some 16 years but was never tied to a numeral that dated it. The other difference is that technological change was much slower during Mac OS’s time. It’s not unreasonable to expect that early next decade GUIs could begin to take on a radically different form from today’s. Will we still want OS X, the year 2000’s operating system, in 2011?
In this day and age—as emphasized by Apple’s incessant regeneration of the iPods—new is very much preferred, and sooner or later, the OS X brand will get old.
In Leopard, OS X has matured, especially under the hood, but there’s still a bit of room in the front end. This could bode well for the Finder and GUI in Leopard’s successor, which surely must be named Lion, especially if it is to be the last of the OS X family. (Of course, Apple could keep releasing OS X upgrades for another 20 years, as it is not bound to a single digit; the dot is not a decimal point, that is, in 2020 we could be using version 10.12.)
Will OS X 10.6, Lion, take OS X as far as Apple would like to, particularly in the GUI?
Three things in Leopard make me curious about the future of OS X’s front end, and many reviewers have criticized two of those. They are the translucent menu bar, the 3D Dock, and the much longer shadow cast by the front window. Together, these create the illusion that your screen has depth, and that you could almost reach into it.
What do these tell us about the future? If you were developing the subsequent operating system, and you wanted to condition users to a new way of thinking and working, wouldn’t you begin introducing some small elements now to make that transition easier?
The translucent menu bar, the 3D Dock, and the longer front window shadows condition people to think more three dimensionally about the GUI. And all around there are developers working on three dimensional interfaces, albeit simulated. Until we get 3D displays, that’s all that is possible. And then those pseudo-3D interfaces will condition us for that day in the future where we’ll reach into our screens and grab the document we want.
So in Leopard we see a tiny hint of the future, one that will probably be fully revealed early in the second decade of the 21st century. And one that, although still built on an OS X base, will present such a revolutionary front end that it will require the renaming of the Mac operating system to Mac OS XI. Before then, though, we will see one last OS X, 10.6 Lion, sometime in 2009.
And the ideal date for the launch of Mac OS XI will be 11-11-2011, at 11am of course.
So, will 10.6 Lion be the end of the line for OS X?
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Comments
Not such a great launch date. Apple’s done some pretty arrogant things, but usurping Remembrance Day? That would be the worst PR in the world.
Interesting thoughts on the 3d moves. I’m still not sure if the 3d is a look into the future, or Apple trying to be cool.
However - there are some other moves that may be related. They want to make touch screens pressure sensitive… is it possible to have an interface where you push a window into the background?
Also, the AppleTV screen saver shows photos at 3 distances. My parents have often commented that they’d like to pull one of the photos from the back to the front, or push something out of the way.
Stacks are 3d representations too, as is coverflow.
So yeah, maybe there is something in a 3d model.
oops, fair point, simo
Chris, Apple under the reigns of Steve Jobs was never fond of the number 6. We only went as far as the G5, the 5th Generation iPod (which turned into an iPod Classic and although it’s technically the 6th Generation iPod, Apple never refers to it publicly as the 6th gen iPod) and now Mac OS X 10.5.
Just because something has been around for a while and has matured (like me, for example) doesn’t mean it needs to be replaced. If you waste time fixing things that aren’t broken, you might neglect fixing things that are. Microsoft is a case in point. They “fixed” the menus, but…
We’re used to very rapid change in computer technology, but that’s because it’s new. We will reach the point where changes will be very slow, or where can’t improve some things because they are already optimal. For example, wheels have been round for a long time--even longer than software has had menus. Should we fund R&D;to find a different shape for wheels?
One more thing, as Steve Jobs would say. We are very proud of the fact that Leopard is UNIX 03 certified. But UNIX has been around for 38 years! When UNIX was first conceived, offices had dictaphones and used carbon sets.
So why is there no clamor for replacing UNIX? Because it doesn’t need to be replaced, that’s why.
Great article but I am happy enough with the changes in Leopard ( TimeMachine is the app that decided for me ) that I am not already clamoring for more.
Hugmup,
OS-X’s UNIX underpinnings are what got me to switch from Windows and Linux.
I started my engineering career working with HP-UX, SunOS and AIX.
“Evolutionary, not revolutionary”? Its feels revolutionary to me!
Leopard makes my iMac G5 feel like a new machine, its much faster, snappier and stable as hell, and I feel more productive with Spaces and Stacks, plus Time Machine is amazing. XP/Vista feels six years old, OS X 10.5 does not.
My 2 cents on this article and where I could imagine the 3D technology going. Thanks for the article Chris.
http://www.jlindenbaum.de/2007/10/31/applematterscom-where-to-now-for-os-x/
Hugmup, I wasn’t suggesting replacing OS X, rather just a name change given I expect the front end to change so significantly when XI comes out.
As I said of XI, “although still built on an OS X base, will present such a revolutionary front end that it will require the renaming of the Mac operating system to Mac OS XI”
I think it will be a very long time before we see Apple replace the backend of the Mac operating system again.
I thought rememberance day was 9/11?
MacGlee, was just repeating reviewers, but I reckon Time Machine is revolutionary too, not so much because of the technology behind it, but that it will actually get people doing backups. Albeit, not off-site, but at least people will have some form of backup.
And if you could afford two external drives you could rotate them anyway, storing the one not being used, off-site.
jl, thanks.
Some interesing ideas there.
Chris
No, I am not “just repeating reviewers” I am talking from hands on experience. Leopard has already changed the way I approach the GUI, with Spaces I keep Safari in one space, Mail in another, System Preferences in a third, and I have the Finder in the fourth. In the Finder I can search for images quickly and preview them in Quicklook. I have a Hot Corner set up to quickly move from one Space to another, its a beauty. Time Machine works in the background, the only indication that it is working is the external drive winds up. (BTW the moving starfield and vortex in TM is visually stunning!)
I had one small glitch, my Keychain was a little problematic, which I think is due to the fact I may have inadvertently changed a password during installation. The only thing it affected was accessing my .Mac account which was resolved by re-entering the password. Big deal. That’s it! Otherwise smooth sailing.
So from personal experience I can say, there is no reason to NOT upgrade to Leopard. My iMac G5 definitely feels faster, more responsive, and stable. All my software works just fine, no compatibility issues, and the new features are a “must have”.