Some Observations On Leopard's 300+ Feature List
So... Leopard's full feature list is out. It's a fairly large page of information about the additions/changes in OS X, and it even covers detailed changes within specific apps. I wrote some notes about the interesting ones, in case you don't want to sift through all 300 of them (or you enjoy reading my commentary).
Automator
UI Recording and Playback
Add even more capabilities to your workflows. Use a new action called Watch Me Do that lets you record a user action (like pressing a button or controlling an application without built-in Automator support) and replay as an action in a workflow.
This is a really great addition to Automator, but I'm afraid it's success rate will be much like the rest of the app in Tiger: the action has to be done just right, or it won't register at all. This is one of the main reasons I avoid Automator: I'll tell it to do something basic, but if I'm not holding it's hand throughout the entire process, it'll just stop and not finish the workflow.
Workflow Variables
Automate more productively by creating workflows that can store and retrieve data during execution. Workflow Variables let you use the same information at different steps of the workflow, giving you added functionality and flexibility.
Workflow Looping
Repeat a workflow for a specified number of times or a specified time duration. No more need to save as an iCal plug-in or use the Automator Loop Utility.
Very nice additions. These changes seem like the kind of things that can make nerdy-non-coder Mac users (like myself) happy to integrate Automator into their workflow.
Boot Camp
Copy Files Between Mac OS X and Windows
Copy, open, modify, or delete files in Mac OS X that you saved to your Windows partition. Leopard understands the Windows FAT32 disk format.
This isn't new. Mac OS X has been able to recognize and format disks in FAT32 format at least since Panther.
Dashcode
Widget Templates
Hit the ground running by choosing one of Dashcode's included templates, each a fully functioning widget ready for customization. No need to write any code.
Back when Web Clips were announced at last year's WWDC, widget developers began to worry that this would cause Apple's widget directory to be flooded with superfluous, one-trick pony widgets. The truth is, it probably won't happen- submitting widgets requires a developer account and all sorts of geeky information about your widget (product download URL, icon, etc.) that would scare your average joe away from doing this. Still, it's nice for personal use, and something I'll take advantage of occasionally.
Now here's the problem with templates. Dashcode is presented to be the Xcode for widgets, not "Dashboard Development for Dummies". I'm not opposed to people who want to learn how to code and design and need an extra push- providing flip code, standard buttons, etc. But templates encourage novice developers to just build around Apple's designs, and not divulge into writing and designing their own stuff.
Dictionary
Wikipedia in Dictionary
Harness the power of Wikipedia when you're connected to the Internet -- built right into it's Dictionary. You get a great Mac OS X user interface with super-fast searching and beautifully laid out-results.
Huge addition to an otherwise-useless application- in Tiger I just use the Dictionary widget, so I'm glad I now have the incentive to keep this in my Dock.
Front and Back Matter
Access a wealth of content found in the front and back matter for the New Oxford American Dictionary, such as grammar, spelling, and pronunciation guides. Or access reference materials such as the chemical elements, weights and measure, and conversions.
Apple Dictionary
Get to know your Mac even better. A dictionary of Apple terms is built into Dictionary.
Two very good ideas, and good Leopard sales pitches for markets Apple lusts over: students and Windows converts.
Finder
Cover Flow
Flip through your files in the Finder just like you flip through your album art in iTunes. Cover Flow displays the first page of every document. You can also click through multipage documents and play movies.
The document and movie-viewing is nice and all, but a lot of icons are going to look blurry until they're Leopardized, given the Tiger icon size was 128x128 and Leopard supports up to 512x512.
New Folder of Options
Take control your view options. Adjust the grid spacing to move icons closer together or further apart for the currently viewed folder, or with one click make this view the default for all your folders.
You saw it here first- whoever wrote the copy for Finder's features is bit a sleepy.
Font Book
System Font Protection
Never worry about accidentally deleting a system font. Leopard will warn you when you're about to perform an action that will remove a required font.
Well that's just great- deleting system fonts will present a dialog box that probably should have in the app all along!
New Fonts
Use new built-in fonts such as Arial Unicode, Microsoft Sans Serif, Tahoma, Papyrus Condensed, and Wingdings.
I can see how Arial would be a good addition for web development, since Helvetica isn't included with Windows, but why Microsoft Sans Serif, Tahoma, Papyrus, and, for heaven's sake, Wingdings?
Front Row
AppleTV like interface
Sit back and be amazed. Front Row works just like Apple TV. You control it from a distance using the elegant six-button Apple Remote that came with your Mac. Simple menus, elegant transitions, and beautiful content previews make your digital media shine.
Appreciated update. I was kind of wondering how Apple pulled off labeling the free Front Row as a new feature until I read this.
Movie Previews
Watch previews of Hollywood blockbusters directly from Front Row.
Like the FAT32 thing, this isn't a new feature. In fact, it's two years old this month, having been introduced at Apple's 2005 iPod/iMac media event.
iChat
Backdrop effects
Drag an Apple-designed backdrop or your own photo or video into the video preview window to create an effect that will fool your buddies into thinking you're chatting from your living room, the beach, or the moon.
Sounds fun. I don't think any of my buddies will be fooled into thinking I'm actually on the moon, but that's okay.
Invisibility
Change your status to "invisible" in iChat, and you won't be seen by anyone. But you can still see the status of anyone on your buddy list.
Multiple Logins
In Leopard, iChat allows you to log in to all your chat accounts simultaneously, whether you use .Mac, AOL, Google Talk, or Jabber.
Persistent Chat Windows
Pick up right where you left off by choosing to have iChat remember open chat windows and their contents even if you quit and restart.
These three are all reasons I switched over to Adium about a year ago; I might be tempted to move back to iChat since I can also do AV conferencing.
Tabbed Chat
Consolidate your chat windows into a single tabbed window. Each chat is represented by a tab on the left side of the iChat window. Turning on tabbed chats is as easy as selecting "Collect chats into a single window" in iChat preferences.
That's more of a list of sidebar links than tabs. Oh well.
RSS
Subscribe to an RSS feed in Mail and you'll know the moment an article or blog post hits the wire. Even better, you can choose to have new articles appear in your inbox.
Good feature addition, but the whole "articles in your inbox" idea is a dumb idea. They're articles, not emails: keep 'em separate.
Archive Mailbox
Create an archive of your mailbox to back up important messages or to transfer your mail to another computer.
This will work splendidly for Mac-to-Mac transfers, but what about Mac-to-Windows transfers? Are there any other email clients besides Mail.app that support .emlx format- Apple's proprietary message format created in 2005 so messages could be searched with Spotlight?
Simple Mail Setup
Automatically configure new email accounts. Just enter your email address and password. Mail knows the email settings for 30 leading email providers, including Yahoo!, AOL, Gmail, Verizon, British Telecom, and Comcast.
Smart on so many levels, I don't know why this concept hasn't been popularly adopted yet.
Notes
Write handy notes you can access from anywhere -- including graphics, colored text, and attachments. Group notes into folders or create Smart Mailboxes that automatically group them. Your notes folder acts like an email mailbox, so you can retrieve notes from any Mac or PC or access them from your iPhone.
So what's the fate of Stickies.app? This seems like a more integrated solution anyway.
Preview
Smooth Zoom and Scroll
Smoothly zoom and scroll through even the largest image files. Preview uses the power of Core Animation.
If there's any indication to how Apple wants 3rd-party developers to embrace Core Animation, it's like this- use it to practically make applications more intuitive, not through superfluous animations.
Instant Alpha Background Removal
Easily remove the background from an image, leaving just the subject. Simply select Instant Alpha from the Tool Select button on the toolbar and click and drag in the area of the background you wish to remove. You can also use the Extract Shape tool to select a specific area of the image to keep, automatically excluding the rest.
Like Automator's "Watch Me Do" feature, I bet it'll require a relatively high level of precision, and too high for average-consumer consumption.
Update: John writes in to remind me that Instant Alpha is already in Keynote, and that it works great, no skill required (I don't own iWork at all, having bought my iBook and Microsoft Office before the suite was released).
Auto Levels
See the best picture. Preview will intelligently analyze your image and apply the appropriate white and black level corrections.
Good, but I really want all of the adjustment tools of iPhoto to be integrated in Preview: sometimes I don't need to have my whole library in front of me when I want to make adjustments.
Safari
Fastest Web Browser
Browse briskly. Safari is the fastest web browser on any platform.
Funny how this statement is put here without any outgoing links to evidence of said speed. On my two PCs I find Firefox generally runs better, but I've never actually conducted formal speed tests.
Warning Before Closing Tabbed Window
Have Safari warn you before closing a window with multiple tabs, just in case you meant to close a single tab.
This is one of those crucial behaviors that, for some dumb reason, wasn't in Safari 1 or 2. One of the key reasons I switched to the Safari 3 beta on my Mac was due to how often I accidentally quit Safari when I simply meant to close the frontmost window. (Command-Q instead of Command-W. Easy mistake, right?)
Spotlight
Calculations in Spotlight
Find answers fast. Just activate Spotlight and type in a simple or sophisticated equation, and Spotlight will instantly show you the result. Enjoy support for over 40 functions ranging from simple math to logarithms to trigonometry.
One of those fun little interface ideas Apple throws into the OS each version. Possibly Google-inspired, too (try a calculation in Safari's or Firefox's search field).
System
Live Partition Resizing in Disk Utility
You may be able to gain disk space without losing data. If a volume is running out of space, simply delete the volume that comes after it on the disk and move the volume's end point into the freed space.
This is, like, one of the main reasons people buy apps like PartitionMagic- I would lay down a third of Leopard's price just for this functionality.
Help Menu Search
Enjoy more helpful Help. A new search field in the Help menu displays all relevant menu items in the active application. Highlight one and Leopard opens the menu and highlights the command.
Useful, but does Help Viewer have to be open to get the results? Or will it just read the HTML files directly from the filesystem?
Guest Log-In Accounts
Allow anyone to surf the web and check email as a guest on your Mac. When they log out of the guest account, Mac OS X purges the account, removing any trace of their activity. So each time someone logs in as a guest, he or she gets a fresh, unused account.
Sounds like a good idea, but how is this different from Tiger guest accounts? The Apple Stores have adopted this behavior, too.
TextEdit
Autosave
Ensure that your edits aren't lost. Have TextEdit automatically save copies of your document at a specified time interval.
OpenDocument and Word 2007 Formats
Take advantage of TextEdit support for the Word 2007 and OpenDocument formats for reading and writing.
Print Header and Footer
Print page numbers, the date, and the document title on each page of a TextEdit document.
All signs that TextEdit's relevance in the OS has changed from "the obligatory included notepad app" to "viable replacement Word for casual writers".
Time Machine
Back Up Everything
Automatic backup, built right into your Mac. Never worry about losing a file again. Time Machine stores an up-to-date copy of all your Mac's files on an external hard drive, personal file sharing volume, or Mac OS X Server. That includes system files, applications, accounts, preferences, music, photos, movies, and documents.
I would like to see backup supported on iPods, too. I have an 80GB 5G, my library is about 16GB and my system and user folders combined are about 50GB.
Endnotes
I spent most of the time covering specific app UI changes and not so much the big new features: this is why I didn't talk as much about, say, the Finder, Time Machine, Spaces, or the new Dock. If you see something interesting, drop me an email and I'll be happy to add it (if it's relevant- you'll get credit, too).
Copyright © 2007-2008 Austin Heller.
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