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Friday, June 26, 2009, 10:25 pm
Apple posts new Snow Leopard, 10.5.8 seeds
Apple has reportedly issued new seeds of Mac OS X Snow Leopard and of Leopard 10.5.8 to developers that, at least in the former case, add functionality that was previously only shown at WWDC.People familiar with the updates to the two in-development releases say the Snow Leopard seed, 10A394, officially provides just compatibility, reliability and security fixes but appears to give developers access to Expose's integration with the Dock.
As demonstrated by Apple executive Phil Schiller earlier this month, the feature lets users click and hold on an app's Dock icon to show the windows relating to that app in equal-sized, organized tiles. The simple change makes it much easier to find a particular window for a project, for example, without having to invoke a specific Expose shortcut. They can also choose to view a selected window at full size to determine if the content inside is what they want.
It's also said that a new Xcode 3.2 build has been released in tandem with the Snow Leopard build.
Those aware of the new seed for 10.5.8 claim that it's now advanced four builds from its previous state, to 9L20. The company appears to be quickly winding up development as it supposedly hasn't mentioned any remaining known bugs and has fixed just a few prior issues, such as problems with using auto-complete on CalDAV servers in iCal, Image Capture's support for large files, and syncing Address Book with MobileMe.
The Mac maker now seems to be asking developers to focus their testing on low-level components like graphics drivers, power management and storage.
Recently, AppleInsider learned that Apple is giving interim Leopard patches nicknames based on ancient gods and refers to 10.5.8 as Loki, though those in the know say Apple hasn't mentioned the name to developers.
On Topic: Mac OS X
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- Apple seeds OS X 10.8.4 beta build 12E47 to developers with no known issues
Previous Comments View All
The new SL seed is quite nice, indeed. While I think the overall system performance has improved I can't be certain, but I can tell that Exposé has gotten a lot more useful... and I don't mean just the in-app Exposé feature.
The speed in which Exposé executes is faster and the way it groups windows is incredibly more intelligent than before. No longer will a smaller window be scaled down to a point which makes it impossible to read. Now all the windows will smaller or larger to allow for a more organized look.
Also, the text is now at the bottom of each window and a bright blue border appears with a mouse-over. As you can see in the picture minimized windows will appear as large thumbnails under non-minimized windows. If you look closely you can see a very subtle line dividing the active windows from the minimized windows.
(click image for 1280x800 screenshot)
It is indeed very nice, Solipsism.
I haven't downloaded yet. Will do so when I get a persistent internet connection for my MacBook Pro.
Looking forward to the changes, and am glad to see its at a later bug-fixing stage. It seems they were just consolidating Dock Exposé before they released it to the general developer community.
Overall, I'm quite impressed with Snow Leopard.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jonnyboy 
PLEASE get 10.5.8 done and dusted asap! these bluetooth connection lost issues are killing me!
PLEASE get 10.5.8 done and dusted asap! these bluetooth connection lost issues are killing me!
Which issues are these? What's losing connection?
Did you apply the bluetooth firmware update?
Too bad Snow Leopard isn't coming out till September. Sounds like it is ready now. I'd be a beta tester if they allow non-ADC users to download and install it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PG4G
It is indeed very nice, Solipsism.
I haven't downloaded yet. Will do so when I get a persistent internet connection for my MacBook Pro.
Looking forward to the changes, and am glad to see its at a later bug-fixing stage. It seems they were just consolidating Dock Exposé before they released it to the general developer community.
Overall, I'm quite impressed with Snow Leopard.
It is indeed very nice, Solipsism.
I haven't downloaded yet. Will do so when I get a persistent internet connection for my MacBook Pro.
Looking forward to the changes, and am glad to see its at a later bug-fixing stage. It seems they were just consolidating Dock Exposé before they released it to the general developer community.
Overall, I'm quite impressed with Snow Leopard.
Frequent Exposé users can probably tell from my image that much has improved with the layout, but you'll notice the change in speed and motion is far superior than before.
Also, it updates through Software Update as ~665MB file. I hope that continues until GM.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
Frequent Exposé users can probably tell from my images that much has improved with the layout, but you'll notice the change is speed and motion right away.
Also, it updates through Software Update as ~665MB file. I hope that continues until GM.
Frequent Exposé users can probably tell from my images that much has improved with the layout, but you'll notice the change is speed and motion right away.
Also, it updates through Software Update as ~665MB file. I hope that continues until GM.
Yay solip! good good to hear, that's always been a thought of mine when using Exosé...
Hopefully 10.5.8 fixes problems with sleeping MacBooks and MB Pros that have 3rd party SSDs installed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by solipsism
Frequent Exposé users can probably tell from my image that much has improved with the layout, but you'll notice the change in speed and motion is far superior than before.
Also, it updates through Software Update as ~665MB file. I hope that continues until GM.
Frequent Exposé users can probably tell from my image that much has improved with the layout, but you'll notice the change in speed and motion is far superior than before.
Also, it updates through Software Update as ~665MB file. I hope that continues until GM.
Regarding going through software update, I agree. I saw that and was very glad I didn't have to download another 6GB file.
And regarding Exposé, I can see the much improved layout, yes.
I'm suspecting that a) their layout algorithm wasn't quite up to scratch when they disked the WWDC version and b) they would have just built the implementation.
With the ramp-up to WWDC, the Apple guys have a lot of work on their plate and testing a new feature wasn't exactly easy under the constraints. I can appreciate that, and am glad as a developer they held back.
Quote:
Too bad Snow Leopard isn't coming out till September. Sounds like it is ready now. I'd be a beta tester if they allow non-ADC users to download and install it.
Yes, in all honesty, I haven't found any bugs. SL is very, very stable. I moved my MacBook Pro and Air to it, and all iPhone development is now done with it.
Nevertheless, a two month bug-find-and-fix party seems like a brilliant idea, and you'll be pleased with the improved quality. Leopard's release was, sadly, somewhat premature. Until 10.5.3, Leopard was close to unusable. Apple's current movements seem focused on "better, faster, smaller, simpler, stabler." In a software sense, each of these complement each other. Wait, and they may never have to release 10.6.1
As for why they don't allow non-ADC testers? Perhaps that's due to Apple trying to ensure that they don't release a product until they believe its good enough in their eyes. They won't want people complaining about software they installed, blaming Apple, when Apple clearly placed a "BETA" tag on it.
Some self-righteous idiots never learn.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PG4G
Yes, in all honesty, I haven't found any bugs. SL is very, very stable. I moved my MacBook Pro and Air to it, and all iPhone development is now done with it.
Yes, in all honesty, I haven't found any bugs. SL is very, very stable. I moved my MacBook Pro and Air to it, and all iPhone development is now done with it.
I find it stable enough to use as my main OS, but there enough bugs that keep it from going gold.
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PLEASE get 10.5.8 done and dusted asap! these bluetooth connection lost issues are killing me!