In Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, Apple added a very realistic new voice named Alex for text to speech features. In Lion, Apple provides dozens of even better quality voices in more than forty languages and dialects.
Mac OS X 10.7 Lion makes a conceptual leap away from the Mac's original focus on opening apps to create files, launching a new task-centric interface borrowed from iOS. Lion apps can also auto save multiple Versions of the document for Time Machine-like recovery of previous iterations of a file.
In Mac OS X Lion Server, Apple brings iOS-like remote management features to the Mac, including "Find My Mac," remote wipe, and remote software and profile settings via push notifications.
In Mac OS X Lion, Apple has completely revamped FileVault, removing it as a simple encryption of users' Home folders and reinstating it as full disk encryption solution, with an apparent option to save disk encryption keys with Apple, likely via MobileMe.
Developers have noted two interesting features in progress within the Mac OS X Lion release, one being the ability to continue an application poised to crash, and a second being the foundation of push notifications in Mac OS X.
Apple has enhanced its Font Book app for managing installed font faces, and has added a new Emoji font commonly used in chat to express ideograms.
In Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, Apple has enhanced Spotlight search within Finder windows, while also adding new item arrangement view options to organize files within icon, list, column and Cover Flow views.
In Mac OS X Lion Apple has integrated Spotlight search features with Quick View for previewing results, allowing users to see documents and metadata inline while performing a search.
Apple has added support for Yahoo Messenger to Mac OS X Lion's iChat app, reportedly enabling text, voice and video chat over Yahoo's instant messenger protocol.
The latest developer release of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion excludes support for Rosetta (used to run PowerPC code on Intel Macs), Front Row, and Oracle's Java runtime, although Apple includes a mechanism to automatically download an updated Java runtime for Lion.
After converted Mac OS X's Apple Menu to link to the new Mac App Store market rather than just linking to its "Mac OS X Software" web page, Apple has now turned its attention to the pedestrian "About This Mac," providing easy access to system details.
Apple has added a new option in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion to simplify the process of switching from a Windows PC to a Mac via network import of old files.
Apple is finally letting go of old windowing conventions that date back to the original Macintosh, allowing users in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion to fluidly interact with windows any way they like.
Apple is inviting security experts to examine its developer preview of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, apparently the first time it has expanded beyond its core developers to expose its new software to community scrutiny.
Apple has added limited TRIM support to the latest developer release of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, which should enhance the long term performance of Solid State Drives.
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AppleInsider Staff
Daniel Eran Dilger
