I watched the announcements and read many of the reports this past week from Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) and while it wasn’t everything I was hoping for prior to the conference, I thought it was very good over-all. I’d give it an 8 out of 10.
There were two announcements that stood out above all the rest for me.
First, that Apple has completed it’s transition to Intel processors with the introduction of it’s new desktop Mac Pro platform with two duel core Xeon 64 bit processors as a standard configuration. While using basically the same case as the replaced PowerMac G5 they increased the expandability with two additional hard drive bays and one additional CD/DVD drive bay. They also added some additional ports to the front and increased the internal bus speeds for additional performance.
In an announcement along with the Mac Pro, which is even more important for business customers, they are redesigning their X-Servers to included redundant power supplies and to contain up to two dual core Xeon processors all for an entry price of slightly under $3000. Both the Mac Pro and the new X-Server are much more attractive from both cost and performance for professional consumers now.
Also, as Apple pointed out not only did they introduce this new Intel based hardware this year between January and August, but they introduced an Intel version of Tiger OS X and have helped transition a large number of applications to universal versions.¬ This has been great work by Apple and Apple developers.
The second major item, which closely relates with the first, is that Leopard OS X will feature both 64 and 32 bit native support. This has been accomplished without any type of emulation and will provide 64-bit support on all levels.¬ This being an under-the-hood enhancement, it doesn’t seem such a major announcement from a users viewpoint. It is however a big deal for developers and speaks well for the future of both the professional desktops and servers.
I considered Core Animation for a position as a third major announcement. I feel this Core technology will provide amazing capabilities for future graphics and animations and will be a big plus for developers. I wouldn’t be surprised to see some of the hinted at “Top Secret” features of Leopard to be built utilizing this tool.
Other Leopard announcements were of varying degrees of enhancements: Time Machine will offer easy backup and restores; Spaces is a desktop manager allowing virtual desktops; Spotlight and iChat are being enhanced with new capabilities; Mail and iCal are being improved; There will be better universal access with a very good text-to-speech capability; Dashboard will have new features and tools that will give users the ability to customize their dashboard to their exact taste; and Boot Camp, Photo Booth, Front Row, will be bundled with Leopard.
There wasn’t a “one more thing” to this years announcement, but there was good progress in both hardware and software that positions Apple to move smartly into the future. There may still even be some surprises in the final release of Leopard.
Technorati Tags: Apple, Software, WWDC