Mac OS X v10.6
Encyclopedia
Mac OS X Snow Leopard is the seventh major release of Mac OS X
, Apple's desktop and server operating system
for Macintosh computers.
Snow Leopard was publicly unveiled on June 8, 2009 at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. On August 28, 2009, it was released worldwide, and was made available for purchase from Apple's website and its retail stores at the price of US$29 for a single-user license. As a result of the low price, initial sales of Snow Leopard were significantly higher than that of its predecessors. The release of Snow Leopard came nearly two years after the introduction of Mac OS X Leopard (version 10.5), the second longest time span between successive Mac OS X releases.
Unlike previous versions of Mac OS X, the goals with Snow Leopard were improved performance, greater efficiency and the reduction of its overall memory footprint
. Addition of new end-user features was not a primary goal. Much of the software in Mac OS X was extensively rewritten for this release in order to fully take advantage of modern Macintosh
hardware. New programming frameworks, such as OpenCL
, were created, allowing software developers to use graphics cards
in their applications. This is also the first Mac OS release since System 7.1.1
that does not support the PowerPC
architecture, as Apple now intends to focus on its current line of Intel-based products.
Snow Leopard was succeeded by Mac OS X Lion
(version 10.7) on July 20, 2011. The earlier version continues to be sold for the benefit of users that require Snow Leopard in order to upgrade to Lion, which is primarily sold through the Mac App Store
introduced in the Snow Leopard 10.6.6 update.
Mac OS X Snow Leopard was the last release of Mac OS X to support the 32-bit Intel Core Solo and Intel Core Duo CPUs.
Additional requirements to use certain features:
Snow Leopard does not support PowerPC
-based Macs (e.g., Power Macs, PowerBook
s, iBook
s, iMac
s (G3-G5), all eMac
s, plus pre-February 2006 Mac minis and the Power Mac G4 Cube
), although PowerPC applications are supported via Rosetta
, which is now an optional install.
Since Apple moved to using Intel processors in their computers, the OSx86
community has developed and now also allows Mac OS X Tiger and Leopard to be installed and run successfully on non-Apple x86-based computers, albeit in violation of Apple's licensing agreement for Mac OS X. A variety of installation processes can be used, the most common being to use Darwin-based bootloaders commonly known as "Boot 132" designed to emulate an EFI
which Intel Macs use instead of a BIOS
. This method of installation allows the use of an unmodified Apple installation DVD and the updating of the operating system from the built-in Software Update utility, but will work only on modern Intel-based PCs, unless a modified kernel is added to the pre-boot CD. Modified installation DVDs are also available illegally which offer a more outdated approach to installing. A hardware device capable of being attached to a PC's motherboard
has also been released, EFI-X
, but it is essentially a USB mass storage device with the needed bootloader.
computers. Single-user licenses and "family pack" licenses for up to five computers are available. For qualifying Mac computers bought after June 8, 2009, Apple offered a discounted price through their "up to date" program provided that customers' orders were faxed or postmarked by December 26, 2009. The standalone retail version of Snow Leopard is marketed as being restricted to users of Mac OS X Leopard, while the recommended upgrade path from Apple for Mac OS X Tiger is through the "Mac Box Set", which includes Mac OS X Snow Leopard and the current versions of iLife
and iWork
.
There are three licenses available. These licenses differ in their requirements for pre-installed versions of Mac OS X:
It is not entirely clear which license is offered with the retail version of Snow Leopard. As noted above, Apple's website advertised this version as an "upgrade from Mac OS X Leopard for $29" and suggest that others upgrade using the Mac Box Set, implying the stand-alone retail version to be a "Leopard Upgrade" license. On the other hand, some Apple press materials appear to indicate that this version is, in fact, the "Single Use" license:
However, even if the retail edition of Snow Leopard is in fact a "Leopard Upgrade", the company has acknowledged that there is no technical barrier in that edition preventing a direct upgrade from Mac OS X "Tiger".
The Leopard Upgrade license explicitly applies to the Up-To-Date Program (US$9.95) for Macs bought between June 8 and December 26, 2009 and the installation discs provided through this program are clearly marked as upgrades unlike either of the retail editions.
. Despite significant changes in the software, users will experience almost no changes in the user interface. Snow Leopard includes the following changes:
, it did not receive a major user interface overhaul. Instead, the interface has been modified in several areas to promote ease of use. These changes include:
s), Plants and Black and White sub-folders under the Apple folder. Furthermore, there are new Apple wallpaper sub-folders with multiple wallpapers:
New solid colors can be used as wallpapers as well. There is a new blue and gray, as well as a solid kelp which serves as the "green wallpaper." The default "space nebula" wallpaper has been updated as well.
applications on machines with 64-bit processors; Leopard extended the support for 64-bit applications to include applications using most of Mac OS X's libraries and frameworks.
In Snow Leopard, most built-in applications have been rebuilt to leverage the 64-bit x86-64
architecture (excluding iTunes
, Front Row, Grapher
and DVD Player
applications). They will run in 32-bit
mode on machines with 32-bit processors, and in 64-bit mode on machines with 64-bit processors.
In addition, the Mac OS X kernel
has been rebuilt to run in 64-bit mode on some machines. On those machines, Snow Leopard supports up to 16 terabyte
s of RAM. Newer Xserve
and Mac Pro
machines will run a 64-bit kernel by default; newer iMac
and MacBook Pro
machines can run a 64-bit kernel, but will not do so by default. Users wishing to use the 64-bit kernel on those machines must hold down the numbers 6 and 4 on the keyboard while booting to get the 64-bit kernel to load. A change to the com.apple.Boot.plist will also enable users with compatible computers to permanently boot into 64-bit for those wishing to do so.
Stuart Harris, software product marketing manager at Apple Australia, said, "For the most part, everything that they experience on the Mac, from the 64-bit point of view, the applications, the operating system, is all going to be 64-bit, but that at this stage there were very few things, such as device drivers, that required 64-bit mode at the kernel level".
With Mac OS X Snow Leopard only the following Apple computers run or are capable of running the 64-bit kernel:
Amit Singh has reported that the early 2009 Mac Mini and MacBook may be capable of running the 64-bit kernel; however, Apple has set these models to boot into the 32-bit kernel. With some tweaking, the Unibody MacBook can be set to boot the 64-bit kernel.
Grand Central Dispatch shifts thread handling focus to itself rather than leaving it to specific applications to distribute jobs evenly across cores and clears up unused memory created by inactive or old threads to achieve maximum performance. Apple is also releasing APIs for Grand Central Dispatch for developers to use in their applications and also to analyze specific blocks of code running on Grand Central Dispatch.
A new C
and Objective-C
language feature named "Blocks
" facilitates creation of code that will easily optimize to take advantage of Grand Central Dispatch.
(Open Computing Language) addresses the power of graphics processing unit
s (GPUs) to leverage them in any application, and not just for graphics-intensive applications like 3D games. OpenCL automatically optimizes for the kind of graphics processor in the Mac, adjusting itself to the available processing power. OpenCL provides consistent numeric precision and accuracy, fixing a problem that has hampered GPU-based programming in the past.
OpenCL is a C
-based programming language
with a structure that is already familiar to Mac OS X programmers, who can use Xcode
developer tools to adapt their programs to work with OpenCL. Only the most process intensive parts of the application need to be written in OpenCL C without affecting the rest of the code. OpenCL is an open standard that has been supported by AMD, Intel, and Nvidia
; it is maintained by Khronos Group
.
It serves a similar purpose to Nvidia
's C for CUDA
and Microsoft
's Direct3D 11 compute shaders.
It only works with the following Mac GPUs: NVIDIA GeForce 320M, GT 330M, 9400M, 9600M GT, 8600M GT, GT 120, GT 130, GTX 285, 8800 GT, 8800 GS, Quadro FX 4800, FX 5600 and ATI Radeon HD 4670, HD 4850, HD 4870, HD 5670, HD 5750, HD 5770, HD 5870, HD 6490M, HD 6750M, HD 6770M, HD 6970M. If the system does not possess one of these compatible GPUs, OpenCL code will instead execute on the system's CPU.
(the printing system used in many Unix-like
operating systems) has been updated to version 1.4 which provides improved driver, networking, and Kerberos support along with performance improvements. CUPS 1.4 is also the first implementation of the Internet Printing Protocol
version 2.1.
implemented in AirPort
and Time Capsule
routers, so that the computer can sleep while the router responds to mDNS queries. Should the request require the host computer to wake up, the router sends the necessary special wake-up-packet to the sleeping computer.
more Mac OS X components such as the H.264 decoder
in QuickTime
and browser plug-ins as a separate process in Safari. An anti-malware
feature was also added to the system that alerts the user if malware is detected. Mac OS X 10.6.8 added daily malware definition updates.
Computer security researcher Charlie Miller
claims that OS X Snow Leopard is more vulnerable to attack than Microsoft Windows
for lacking full address space layout randomization
(ASLR) since Mac OS X Leopard, a technology that Microsoft
started implementing in Windows Vista
.
before 2.1.1, and versions of Keynote
before 2.0.2, among other software. Apple has also published a list of applications with known compatibility issues with Snow Leopard.
Printer and scanner drivers used by previous versions of Mac OS X are not compatible with Snow Leopard and will be replaced during Snow Leopard installation. Since the initial release of Snow Leopard many manufacturers have provided compatible drivers that are available via Software Update. If a native driver is not available Snow Leopard also includes CUPS and Gutenprint
open source drivers that may provide limited functionality.
10.6.0 introduced a bug that frequently prevented DNS
queries from returning IPv6 addresses
. This was resolved in 10.6.8.
OSNews reported that Mac OS X Snow Leopard was well-received by critics.
Engadget reviewed Snow Leopard and pointed out that the price of Snow Leopard dropped from the $129 Apple charged for previous versions of Mac OS X to $29. Engadget's opinion was that this could be largely because most users would not see a noticeable change in the look and feel of the system. However, most reviews commented on the large improvement in speed of the native Mac OS X applications Finder, iCal
, Mail
, etc.
CNET
editors gave it 4 stars out of 5, stating "Intel Mac users will like Snow Leopard's smartly designed interface enhancements, and its Exchange
support is a must-have (especially with Outlook
for Mac on the way). With a ton of technological improvements, Snow Leopard is worth the $29 upgrade fee."
On 21 October 2009, SFGate blogger Yobie Benjamin wrote that the "MacBook Pro that came preloaded with Snow Leopard kicks butt and is a screaming fast machine", but "when I tried to upgrade one of my 'older' MacBooks, it was a fricking disaster from hell". Apart from upgrading, Benjamin also tried a clean install. But he complained of slowness even after his clean install. He wrote, "I ended up downgrading back to OSX 10.5.8" then he concluded by writing, "I might try to do it again but it won't be till Apple releases at least 2 major fix updates. If you want to roll the dice and try, go ahead... your upgrade might work however random installs not working is not good for me. Lesson learned --- I'll wait."
The single-user upgrade and Family Pack units of Snow Leopard ranked 1 and 2 respectively on Amazon.com
's software bestseller charts when Apple announced it would release it within the week.
Testmac.com highlighted other unexpected improvements including the release of a new version of Boot Camp, version 3.0, a cleaner, popup software update process and screen and video recording in the new QuickTime Player.
The BBC reported that a bug in Mac OS X versions 10.6.0 and 10.6.1 which, in rare cases, caused loss of user account data after use of a previously-existing guest account by users who had upgraded from a previous version of Mac OS X, received wide publicity. The bug was fixed as of version 10.6.2.
announced Snow Leopard at WWDC on June 9, 2008, and it was privately demonstrated to developers by Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet
. On Monday, 11 May 2009, after build 10A354, Apple issued a code freeze
on Snow Leopard's API
s. The first public demonstration was given at WWDC 2009 by Serlet and Vice President of Mac OS Engineering, Craig Federighi.
Mac OS X Server includes these features and other server-related features. Apple initially stated that Server would include ZFS
support, but mention of this feature later disappeared from Apple's website and it was not included in the final release due to licensing issues.
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
, Apple's desktop and server operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
for Macintosh computers.
Snow Leopard was publicly unveiled on June 8, 2009 at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. On August 28, 2009, it was released worldwide, and was made available for purchase from Apple's website and its retail stores at the price of US$29 for a single-user license. As a result of the low price, initial sales of Snow Leopard were significantly higher than that of its predecessors. The release of Snow Leopard came nearly two years after the introduction of Mac OS X Leopard (version 10.5), the second longest time span between successive Mac OS X releases.
Unlike previous versions of Mac OS X, the goals with Snow Leopard were improved performance, greater efficiency and the reduction of its overall memory footprint
Memory footprint
Memory footprint refers to the amount of main memory that a program uses or references while running.This includes all sorts of active memory regions like code, static data sections , heap, as well as all the stacks, plus memory required to hold any additional data structures, such as symbol...
. Addition of new end-user features was not a primary goal. Much of the software in Mac OS X was extensively rewritten for this release in order to fully take advantage of modern Macintosh
Macintosh
The Macintosh , or Mac, is a series of several lines of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. The first Macintosh was introduced by Apple's then-chairman Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984; it was the first commercially successful personal computer to feature a mouse and a...
hardware. New programming frameworks, such as OpenCL
OpenCL
OpenCL is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of CPUs, GPUs, and other processors. OpenCL includes a language for writing kernels , plus APIs that are used to define and then control the platforms...
, were created, allowing software developers to use graphics cards
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
in their applications. This is also the first Mac OS release since System 7.1.1
System 7
System 7 is the name of a Macintosh operating system introduced in 1991.System 7 may also refer to:* System 7 , a British dance/ambient band* System 7 , 1991 album* IBM System/7, a 1970s computer system...
that does not support the PowerPC
PowerPC
PowerPC is a RISC architecture created by the 1991 Apple–IBM–Motorola alliance, known as AIM...
architecture, as Apple now intends to focus on its current line of Intel-based products.
Snow Leopard was succeeded by Mac OS X Lion
Mac OS X Lion
Mac OS X Lion is the eighth and current major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers....
(version 10.7) on July 20, 2011. The earlier version continues to be sold for the benefit of users that require Snow Leopard in order to upgrade to Lion, which is primarily sold through the Mac App Store
Mac App Store
The Mac App Store is a digital distribution platform for Mac OS X applications developed by Apple Inc.. The platform was announced on October 20, 2010 at Apple's "Back to the Mac" event. Apple began accepting app submissions from registered developers on November 3, 2010 in preparation for its launch...
introduced in the Snow Leopard 10.6.6 update.
Mac OS X Snow Leopard was the last release of Mac OS X to support the 32-bit Intel Core Solo and Intel Core Duo CPUs.
System requirements
Apple states the following basic Snow Leopard system requirements are:- Mac computer with an Intel processor (IA-32IA-32IA-32 , also known as x86-32, i386 or x86, is the CISC instruction-set architecture of Intel's most commercially successful microprocessors, and was first implemented in the Intel 80386 as a 32-bit extension of x86 architecture...
). "Yonah" processors such as Core Solo and Core Duo can run only 32-bit applications; later x86-64X86-64x86-64 is an extension of the x86 instruction set. It supports vastly larger virtual and physical address spaces than are possible on x86, thereby allowing programmers to conveniently work with much larger data sets. x86-64 also provides 64-bit general purpose registers and numerous other...
architecture processors such as Core 2 Duo are also able to run 64-bit applications. - 1 GB of RAMRam-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...
- 5 GB of free disk space
- DVD drive (also accessible via Remote Disc) or external USB or FireWire DVD drive for installation
Additional requirements to use certain features:
- QuickTimeQuickTimeQuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
H.264 hardware acceleration support, requires an Nvidia GeForce 9400M, 320M, or GT 330M graphics card - OpenCLOpenCLOpenCL is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of CPUs, GPUs, and other processors. OpenCL includes a language for writing kernels , plus APIs that are used to define and then control the platforms...
, requires a supported NvidiaNVIDIANvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...
or ATIAtiAs a word, Ati may refer to:* Ati, a town in Chad* Ati, a Negrito ethnic group in the Philippines* Ati-Atihan Festival, an annual celebration held in the Philippines* Ati, a queen of the fabled Land of Punt in Africa...
graphics card
Snow Leopard does not support PowerPC
PowerPC
PowerPC is a RISC architecture created by the 1991 Apple–IBM–Motorola alliance, known as AIM...
-based Macs (e.g., Power Macs, PowerBook
PowerBook
The PowerBook was a line of Macintosh laptop computers that was designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1991 to 2006. During its lifetime, the PowerBook went through several major revisions and redesigns, often being the first to incorporate features that would later become...
s, iBook
IBook
The iBook was a line of laptop computers sold by Apple Computer from 1999 to 2006. The line targeted the consumer and education markets, with lower specifications and prices than the PowerBook, Apple's higher-end line of laptop computers....
s, iMac
IMac
The iMac is a range of all-in-one Macintosh desktop computers built by Apple. It has been the primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since its introduction in 1998, and has evolved through five distinct forms....
s (G3-G5), all eMac
EMac
The eMac, short for education Mac, was a Macintosh desktop computer made by Apple Inc. It was originally aimed at the education market, but was later made available as a cheaper mass market alternative to Apple's second-generation LCD display iMac....
s, plus pre-February 2006 Mac minis and the Power Mac G4 Cube
Power Mac G4 Cube
The Power Mac G4 Cube was a small form factor Macintosh personal computer from Apple Inc. It was sold from 2000 to 2001. Its cube shape is reminiscent of the NeXTcube from NeXT, acquired by Apple in 1996. The machine was designed by Apple industrial designer Jonathan Ive...
), although PowerPC applications are supported via Rosetta
Rosetta (software)
Rosetta was a lightweight and dynamic binary translator for Mac OS X which Apple released in 2006 when it transitioned the Macintosh from PowerPC to Intel processors. It allowed pre-existing software to run on the new systems without modification....
, which is now an optional install.
Use on unsupported hardware
Some ways of running Mac OS X Snow Leopard on certain unsupported hardware have been discovered. Users who have access to supported hardware have installed Snow Leopard on the supported machine then simply moved the hard drive to the unsupported machine. Alternatively, the Snow Leopard Installation DVD can be booted on a supported Mac, then installed on an unsupported Mac via the Firewire Target Disk Mode.Since Apple moved to using Intel processors in their computers, the OSx86
OSx86
OSx86 is a collaborative hacking project to run the Mac OS X computer operating system on non-Apple personal computers with x86 architecture and x86-64 compatible processors...
community has developed and now also allows Mac OS X Tiger and Leopard to be installed and run successfully on non-Apple x86-based computers, albeit in violation of Apple's licensing agreement for Mac OS X. A variety of installation processes can be used, the most common being to use Darwin-based bootloaders commonly known as "Boot 132" designed to emulate an EFI
Extensible Firmware Interface
The Unified Extensible Firmware Interface is a specification that defines a software interface between an operating system and platform firmware...
which Intel Macs use instead of a BIOS
BIOS
In IBM PC compatible computers, the basic input/output system , also known as the System BIOS or ROM BIOS , is a de facto standard defining a firmware interface....
. This method of installation allows the use of an unmodified Apple installation DVD and the updating of the operating system from the built-in Software Update utility, but will work only on modern Intel-based PCs, unless a modified kernel is added to the pre-boot CD. Modified installation DVDs are also available illegally which offer a more outdated approach to installing. A hardware device capable of being attached to a PC's motherboard
Motherboard
In personal computers, a motherboard is the central printed circuit board in many modern computers and holds many of the crucial components of the system, providing connectors for other peripherals. The motherboard is sometimes alternatively known as the mainboard, system board, or, on Apple...
has also been released, EFI-X
OSx86
OSx86 is a collaborative hacking project to run the Mac OS X computer operating system on non-Apple personal computers with x86 architecture and x86-64 compatible processors...
, but it is essentially a USB mass storage device with the needed bootloader.
License
Snow Leopard is available as an upgrade for Intel-based MacintoshMacintosh
The Macintosh , or Mac, is a series of several lines of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. The first Macintosh was introduced by Apple's then-chairman Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984; it was the first commercially successful personal computer to feature a mouse and a...
computers. Single-user licenses and "family pack" licenses for up to five computers are available. For qualifying Mac computers bought after June 8, 2009, Apple offered a discounted price through their "up to date" program provided that customers' orders were faxed or postmarked by December 26, 2009. The standalone retail version of Snow Leopard is marketed as being restricted to users of Mac OS X Leopard, while the recommended upgrade path from Apple for Mac OS X Tiger is through the "Mac Box Set", which includes Mac OS X Snow Leopard and the current versions of iLife
ILife
iLife is a suite of software applications developed by Apple for organizing, editing, and publishing photos, movies, and music. The suite comprises five applications: iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, GarageBand, and iWeb, all of which run on the Mac OS X operating system....
and iWork
IWork
iWork is an office suite of desktop applications created by Apple for the Mac OS X and iOS operating systems. The first version of iWork, iWork '05, was released in 2005. The suite originally bundled Keynote, a presentation program which had previously been sold as a standalone application, and...
.
There are three licenses available. These licenses differ in their requirements for pre-installed versions of Mac OS X:
- Leopard Upgrade: requires that Mac OS X Leopard already be installed.
If you have purchased an Upgrade for Mac OS X Leopard license, then subject to the terms and conditions of this License, you are granted a limited non-exclusive license to install, use and run one (1) copy of the Apple Software on a single Apple-branded computer as long as that computer has a properly licensed copy of Mac OS X Leopard already installed on it.
- A "Family Pack Upgrade for Mac OS X Leopard" license is also mentioned as a subset of the Leopard Upgrade.
- Single Use: places no restriction on which (if any) version of Mac OS X should already be installed. Used for the non-upgrade and Mac Box Set versions of Snow Leopard.
Subject to the terms and conditions of this License ... you are granted a limited non-exclusive license to install, use and run one (1) copy of the Apple Software on a single Apple-branded computer at a time.
- Family Pack: identical to the Single Use license in this respect.
It is not entirely clear which license is offered with the retail version of Snow Leopard. As noted above, Apple's website advertised this version as an "upgrade from Mac OS X Leopard for $29" and suggest that others upgrade using the Mac Box Set, implying the stand-alone retail version to be a "Leopard Upgrade" license. On the other hand, some Apple press materials appear to indicate that this version is, in fact, the "Single Use" license:
The Snow Leopard single user license will be available for a suggested retail price of $29 (US) (emphasis added)
However, even if the retail edition of Snow Leopard is in fact a "Leopard Upgrade", the company has acknowledged that there is no technical barrier in that edition preventing a direct upgrade from Mac OS X "Tiger".
The Leopard Upgrade license explicitly applies to the Up-To-Date Program (US$9.95) for Macs bought between June 8 and December 26, 2009 and the installation discs provided through this program are clearly marked as upgrades unlike either of the retail editions.
New or changed features
Mac OS X Snow Leopard is intended to be a release aimed to refine the existing feature set, expand the technological capabilities of the operating system, and improve application efficiency. Many of the changes involve how the system works in the background and are not intended to be seen by the user. For example, the Finder application was completely rewritten in the Cocoa application programming interfaceCocoa (API)
Cocoa is Apple's native object-oriented application programming interface for the Mac OS X operating system and—along with the Cocoa Touch extension for gesture recognition and animation—for applications for the iOS operating system, used on Apple devices such as the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and...
. Despite significant changes in the software, users will experience almost no changes in the user interface. Snow Leopard includes the following changes:
- Boot Camp now allows WindowsMicrosoft WindowsMicrosoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
partitions to read and copy files from HFS+ partitions. The new version also adds support for advanced features on Cinema Displays and a new command-line version of the Startup Disk Control Panel. - The Finder has been completely rewritten in CocoaCocoa (API)Cocoa is Apple's native object-oriented application programming interface for the Mac OS X operating system and—along with the Cocoa Touch extension for gesture recognition and animation—for applications for the iOS operating system, used on Apple devices such as the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and...
to take advantage of the new technologies introduced in Snow Leopard. - A much smaller OS footprint, taking up about 7 GB less space than Mac OS X Leopard. Some of the recovered disk space (~250 MB) is because printer drivers are now downloaded or installed only as needed, rather than being pre-installed. The default install only contains those drivers needed for existing printers and a small subset of popular printers.
- iChatIChatiChat is an instant messaging software application developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its Mac OS X operating system. It has audio, video and screen-sharing capabilities as well as text messaging...
enhancements include greater resolution video chats in iChat Theater and lowered upload bandwidth requirements. - Microsoft ExchangeMicrosoft Exchange ServerMicrosoft Exchange Server is the server side of a client–server, collaborative application product developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Servers line of server products and is used by enterprises using Microsoft infrastructure products...
support is now integrated into the MailMail (application)Mail is an email program included with Apple Inc.'s Mac OS X operating system. Originally developed by NeXT as NeXTMail, a part of their NeXTSTEP operating system, it was adapted, following Apple's acquisition of NeXT, to become OS X's Mail application.Mail uses the SMTP, POP3, and IMAP protocols,...
, Address Book, and iCalICaliCal is a personal calendar application made by Apple Inc. that runs on the Mac OS X operating system. iCal was the first calendar application for Mac OS X to offer support for multiple calendars and the ability to publish/subscribe calendars to WebDAV server....
applications. However, only Microsoft Exchange 2007Microsoft Exchange ServerMicrosoft Exchange Server is the server side of a client–server, collaborative application product developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Servers line of server products and is used by enterprises using Microsoft infrastructure products...
is supported and customers using prior versions of Exchange must either upgrade or use Microsoft EntourageMicrosoft EntourageMicrosoft Entourage was an e-mail client and personal information manager developed by Microsoft for Mac OS 8.5 and higher. Microsoft first released Entourage in October 2000 as part of the Microsoft Office 2001 office suite; Office 98, the previous version of Microsoft Office for Mac OS included...
. - Full multi-touchMulti-touchIn computing, multi-touch refers to a touch sensing surface's ability to recognize the presence of two or more points of contact with the surface...
trackpad support has been added to notebooks prior to those introduced in October 2008. While the original MacBook AirMacBook AirThe MacBook Air family is a line of Apple ultraportable Macintosh notebook computers.The first-generation MacBook Air was a 13.3"-only model, previously promoted as the World's Thinnest Notebook, introduced at the Macworld Conference & Expo on January 15, 2008. It featured a custom Intel Merom CPU...
and other early multi-touch trackpad enabled notebooks had support for some gestures, they were unable to use four-finger gestures. This limitation has now been removed in Snow Leopard. - PreviewPreview (software)Preview is Mac OS X's application for displaying images and Portable Document Format documents. Like Mac OS X itself, it comes from NeXT's OPENSTEP operating system....
can infer the structure of a paragraph in a PDF document. - QuickTime XQuickTimeQuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
, the next version of QuickTimeQuickTimeQuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
player and multimedia framework, has been completely rewritten into a full 64-bit Cocoa application and builds on the media technologies in Mac OS X, such as Core AudioCore AudioCore Audio is a low-level API for dealing with sound in Apple's Mac OS X and iOS operating systems. It includes an implementation of the cross-platform OpenAL library....
, Core VideoCore VideoCore Video is the video processing model employed by Mac OS X. It links the process of decompressing frames from a video source to the rest of the Quartz technologies for image rendering and composition...
, and Core AnimationCore AnimationCore Animation is a data visualization API used by Mac OS X 10.5 and later as well as iOS to produce animated user interfaces.-Overview:Core Animation provides a way for developers to produce animated user interfaces via an implicit animation model as well as an "explicit" model...
, to deliver playback. Apple has redesigned the QuickTime user interface to resemble the full-screen QuickTime view in prior versions, where the entire window displays the video. The titlebar and playback controls fade in and out as needed. QuickTime X also supports HTTP live streamingPush technologyPush technology, or server push, describes a style of Internet-based communication where the request for a given transaction is initiated by the publisher or central server...
and takes advantage of ColorSyncColorSyncColorSync is Apple Inc's color management API for the Mac OS and Mac OS X.-Version history:Apple developed the original 1.0 version of ColorSync as a Mac-only architecture, which made it into an operating system release in 1993. In the same year, Apple co-founded the International Color Consortium...
to provide high-quality color reproduction. If Snow Leopard is installed on a Mac with an nVidia GeForce 9400M, 320M or GT 330M graphics card, QuickTime X will be able to use its video-decoding capabilities to reduce CPU load. - Safari 4Safari (web browser)Safari is a web browser developed by Apple Inc. and included with the Mac OS X and iOS operating systems. First released as a public beta on January 7, 2003 on the company's Mac OS X operating system, it became Apple's default browser beginning with Mac OS X v10.3 "Panther". Safari is also the...
features Top Sites, Cover Flow, VoiceOver, expanded standards support, and built-in crash resistance, which prevents browser crashes caused by plug-ins by running them in separate processes. Safari 4 is bundled with Snow Leopard but does not require it, as it is available for free for Mac OS X Tiger, Leopard as well as Windows. - Time MachineTime Machine (Apple software)Time Machine is a backup utility developed by Apple. It is included with Mac OS X and was introduced with the 10.5 "Leopard" release of Mac OS X. The software is designed to work with the Time Capsule as well as other internal or external drives.-Overview:...
connection establishment and backups are now much faster. - VoiceOverVoiceOverVoiceOver is a screen reader built into Apple Inc.'s Mac OS X, iOS and iPod operating systems. By using VoiceOver, the user can access their Macintosh or iOS device based on spoken descriptions and, in the case of the Mac, the keyboard. The feature is designed to increase accessibility for blind...
has also been greatly enhanced in Snow Leopard. Reading of web pages is improved with Auto Web Spots — areas of a page automatically designated for quick access. On newer Apple portables, trackpad gestures can be used to control VoiceOver functions, including the "rotor" gesture first seen in VoiceOver for the iPhone 3GSIPhoneThe iPhone is a line of Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones marketed by Apple Inc. The first iPhone was unveiled by Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, on January 9, 2007, and released on June 29, 2007...
, allowing for the changing of certain VoiceOver navigation options by rotating fingers on the trackpad. Braille DisplayRefreshable Braille displayA refreshable Braille display or Braille terminal is an electro-mechanical device for displaying Braille characters, usually by means of raising dots through holes in a flat surface. Blind computer users, who cannot use a normal computer monitor, use it to read text output...
support is also improved, with BluetoothBluetoothBluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security...
displays supported for the first time.
Refinements to the user interface
While the Finder was completely rewritten in CocoaCocoa (API)
Cocoa is Apple's native object-oriented application programming interface for the Mac OS X operating system and—along with the Cocoa Touch extension for gesture recognition and animation—for applications for the iOS operating system, used on Apple devices such as the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and...
, it did not receive a major user interface overhaul. Instead, the interface has been modified in several areas to promote ease of use. These changes include:
- ExposéExposé (Mac OS X)Exposé is a feature of the Mac OS X operating system. First previewed on 23 June 2003 at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference as a feature of the then forthcoming Mac OS X v10.3, Exposé allows a user to quickly locate an open window, or to hide all windows and show the desktop without the need...
can now display windows for a single program by left clicking and holding its icon in the dock. Windows are arranged in a new grid pattern. - Contextual menus which come out of Dock icons now have more options and have a new look, with a semi-transparent charcoal background and white text.
- An option has been added to the Finder preferences that allows the user to modify search behavior. The default setting can be selected to (1) search the entire computer, (2) search only the current folder from which the search was initiated, or (3) perform the search based on the previously used scope.
- Dock StacksStacks (software)Stacks are a feature first found in Apple's operating system, Mac OS X v10.5 "Leopard". As the name implies, they "stack" files into a small organized folder on the Dock...
, when viewed as a grid, allow viewing of a subfolder as a new stack, rather than launching a Finder window, in a manner similar to "tunnelling". When viewed as grids or lists, scroll-bars are provided to navigate folders with more items than the current screen resolution will accommodate, as the program does not scale the icons to show as many as possible the way it did in OS X 10.5. - The default gammaGamma correctionGamma correction, gamma nonlinearity, gamma encoding, or often simply gamma, is the name of a nonlinear operation used to code and decode luminance or tristimulus values in video or still image systems...
has been changed from 1.8 to 2.2 to better serve the color needs of digital content producers and consumers. - Windows can now be minimized directly onto their application's icon in the dock.
- Faster PDF and JPEGJPEGIn computing, JPEG . The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality....
icon refreshes. - When searching for a network, the AirPortAirPortAirPort and AirPort Extreme are local area wireless networking products from Apple Inc. based on the IEEE 802.11 standard ....
menu-bar icon animates until it finds a network and shows network strength of available networks in the drop down menu. - PrefixesNumerical prefixNumber prefixes are prefixes derived from numbers or numerals. In English and other European languages, they are used to coin numerous series of words, such as unicycle – bicycle – tricycle, dyad – triad – decade, biped – quadruped, September – October – November – December, decimal – hexadecimal,...
for byteByteThe byte is a unit of digital information in computing and telecommunications that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, a byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the basic addressable element in many computer...
s are now used in strictly decimal meaning (as opposed to their binary meaningBinary prefixIn computing, a binary prefix is a specifier or mnemonic that is prepended to the units of digital information, the bit and the byte, to indicate multiplication by a power of 2...
) when describing disk space, such that an indicated file size of 1 MB corresponds to 1 million bytes, as commonly used by hard disk manufacturers. - Snow Leopard shuts down and goes to sleep faster.
New wallpapers
As with most upgrades of Mac OS X, new wallpapers are available. There are new wallpapers in the Nature (two of which are of snow leopardSnow Leopard
The snow leopard is a moderately large cat native to the mountain ranges of South Asia and Central Asia...
s), Plants and Black and White sub-folders under the Apple folder. Furthermore, there are new Apple wallpaper sub-folders with multiple wallpapers:
- Art: Dancer on the Stage, NighthawksNighthawksNighthawks is a 1942 painting by Edward Hopper that portrays people sitting in a downtown diner late at night. It is considered Hopper's most famous painting, as well as one of the most recognizable in American art...
, Poppies Blooming, Sunday Afternoon, SuprematismSuprematismSuprematism was an art movement focused on fundamental geometric forms which formed in Russia in 1915-1916. It was not until later that suprematism received conventional museum preparations...
, The Great Wave, and Water LiliesWater LiliesWater Lilies is a series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionist Claude Monet . The paintings depict Monet's flower garden at Giverny and were the main focus of Monet's artistic production during the last thirty years of his life...
. - Patterns: Pinstripe and Saree.
New solid colors can be used as wallpapers as well. There is a new blue and gray, as well as a solid kelp which serves as the "green wallpaper." The default "space nebula" wallpaper has been updated as well.
Dropped features
- AppleTalkAppleTalkAppleTalk is a proprietary suite of protocols developed by Apple Inc. for networking computers. It was included in the original Macintosh released in 1984, but is now unsupported as of the release of Mac OS X v10.6 in 2009 in favor of TCP/IP networking...
is no longer supported. - It is no longer possible to change an application's language using the Finder "Get Info" dialogue. While there are workarounds for some applications, others (such as Adobe After Effects CS4) will not be able to be run in a different language than the one installed without using Terminal commands or 3rd party software.
- Creator codeCreator codeA creator code is a mechanism introduced in pre-Mac OS X versions of the Macintosh operating system to link a data file to the application program which created it, in a manner similar to file extensions in other operating systems. Codes are four-byte OSTypes. For example, the creator code of the...
s, which are per-file metadataMetadataThe term metadata is an ambiguous term which is used for two fundamentally different concepts . Although the expression "data about data" is often used, it does not apply to both in the same way. Structural metadata, the design and specification of data structures, cannot be about data, because at...
attributes that define, for a file that has a creator code, what application should open that file, regardless of its extension, have had their priority in the application selection process reduced.
64-bit architecture
Mac OS X Tiger added limited support for 64-bit64-bit
64-bit is a word size that defines certain classes of computer architecture, buses, memory and CPUs, and by extension the software that runs on them. 64-bit CPUs have existed in supercomputers since the 1970s and in RISC-based workstations and servers since the early 1990s...
applications on machines with 64-bit processors; Leopard extended the support for 64-bit applications to include applications using most of Mac OS X's libraries and frameworks.
In Snow Leopard, most built-in applications have been rebuilt to leverage the 64-bit x86-64
X86-64
x86-64 is an extension of the x86 instruction set. It supports vastly larger virtual and physical address spaces than are possible on x86, thereby allowing programmers to conveniently work with much larger data sets. x86-64 also provides 64-bit general purpose registers and numerous other...
architecture (excluding iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
, Front Row, Grapher
Grapher
Grapher is a software program bundled with Mac OS X since version 10.4 that is able to create 2D and 3D graphs from simple and complex equations. It includes a variety of samples ranging from differential equations to 3D-rendered Toroids and Lorenz attractors. It is also capable of dealing with...
and DVD Player
DVD Player (software)
DVD Player is the default DVD player in Mac OS X. It supports all the standard DVD features such as multiple audio, video & subtitle tracks as well as Dolby audio, DVD@ccess URLs and closed captions. In some instances, users can choose which VOB file to open. It is found in /Applications/DVD...
applications). They will run in 32-bit
32-bit
The range of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295. Hence, a processor with 32-bit memory addresses can directly access 4 GB of byte-addressable memory....
mode on machines with 32-bit processors, and in 64-bit mode on machines with 64-bit processors.
In addition, the Mac OS X kernel
Kernel (computing)
In computing, the kernel is the main component of most computer operating systems; it is a bridge between applications and the actual data processing done at the hardware level. The kernel's responsibilities include managing the system's resources...
has been rebuilt to run in 64-bit mode on some machines. On those machines, Snow Leopard supports up to 16 terabyte
Terabyte
The terabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. The prefix tera means 1012 in the International System of Units , and therefore 1 terabyte is , or 1 trillion bytes, or 1000 gigabytes. 1 terabyte in binary prefixes is 0.9095 tebibytes, or 931.32 gibibytes...
s of RAM. Newer Xserve
Xserve
Xserve was a line of rack unit computers designed by Apple Inc. for use as servers. When the Xserve was introduced in 2002, it was Apple's first designated server hardware design since the Apple Network Server in 1996...
and Mac Pro
Mac Pro
The Mac Pro is a workstation computer manufactured by Apple Inc. The machines are based on Xeon microprocessors, but are similar to the Power Mac G5 they replaced in terms of outward appearance and expansion capabilities...
machines will run a 64-bit kernel by default; newer iMac
IMac
The iMac is a range of all-in-one Macintosh desktop computers built by Apple. It has been the primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since its introduction in 1998, and has evolved through five distinct forms....
and MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro
The MacBook Pro is a line of Macintosh portable computers introduced in January 2006 by Apple. It replaced the PowerBook G4 and was the second model, after the iMac, to be announced in the Apple–Intel transition...
machines can run a 64-bit kernel, but will not do so by default. Users wishing to use the 64-bit kernel on those machines must hold down the numbers 6 and 4 on the keyboard while booting to get the 64-bit kernel to load. A change to the com.apple.Boot.plist will also enable users with compatible computers to permanently boot into 64-bit for those wishing to do so.
Stuart Harris, software product marketing manager at Apple Australia, said, "For the most part, everything that they experience on the Mac, from the 64-bit point of view, the applications, the operating system, is all going to be 64-bit, but that at this stage there were very few things, such as device drivers, that required 64-bit mode at the kernel level".
With Mac OS X Snow Leopard only the following Apple computers run or are capable of running the 64-bit kernel:
| Product | Model identifier | K64 status on client version | K64 status on server version |
|---|---|---|---|
| Xserve early 2008 and later | Xserve2,1 and higher | Capable | Default |
| Mac Pro early 2008 | MacPro3,1 | Capable | Default |
| Mac Pro early 2009 | MacPro4,1 | Capable | Default |
| Mac Pro mid 2010 | MacPro5,1 | Default | Default |
| MacBook Pro early 2008 | MacBookPro4,1 | Capable | Capable |
| MacBook Pro late 2008 | MacBookPro4,1 and 5,1 | Capable | Capable |
| MacBook Pro early 2009 | MacBookPro5,2 | Capable | Capable |
| MacBook Pro mid 2009 | MacBookPro5,3 and 5,4 and 5,5 | Capable | Capable |
| MacBook Pro mid 2010 | MacBookPro6,1 and 6,2 and 7,1 | Capable | Capable |
| MacBook Pro early 2011 | MacBookPro8,1 and 8,2 and 8,3 | Default | Default |
| iMac early 2008 and later | iMac8,1 and higher | Capable | Capable |
| Mac Mini mid 2010 | Macmini4,1 | Capable | Default |
Amit Singh has reported that the early 2009 Mac Mini and MacBook may be capable of running the 64-bit kernel; however, Apple has set these models to boot into the 32-bit kernel. With some tweaking, the Unibody MacBook can be set to boot the 64-bit kernel.
Grand Central Dispatch
Grand Central Dispatch uses the multiple processor cores now in every new Macintosh for more efficient performance. Due to the technical difficulties traditionally involved in making applications optimized for multicore CPUs, the majority of computer applications do not effectively use multiple processor cores. As a result, processing power often goes unused. Grand Central Dispatch includes APIs to help programmers efficiently use these cores for parallel programming.Grand Central Dispatch shifts thread handling focus to itself rather than leaving it to specific applications to distribute jobs evenly across cores and clears up unused memory created by inactive or old threads to achieve maximum performance. Apple is also releasing APIs for Grand Central Dispatch for developers to use in their applications and also to analyze specific blocks of code running on Grand Central Dispatch.
A new C
C (programming language)
C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system....
and Objective-C
Objective-C
Objective-C is a reflective, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.Today, it is used primarily on Apple's Mac OS X and iOS: two environments derived from the OpenStep standard, though not compliant with it...
language feature named "Blocks
Blocks (C language extension)
Blocks are a nonstandard extension added by Apple Inc. to the C, C++, and Objective-C programming languages that uses a lambda expression-like syntax to create closures within these languages...
" facilitates creation of code that will easily optimize to take advantage of Grand Central Dispatch.
OpenCL
OpenCLOpenCL
OpenCL is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of CPUs, GPUs, and other processors. OpenCL includes a language for writing kernels , plus APIs that are used to define and then control the platforms...
(Open Computing Language) addresses the power of graphics processing unit
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
s (GPUs) to leverage them in any application, and not just for graphics-intensive applications like 3D games. OpenCL automatically optimizes for the kind of graphics processor in the Mac, adjusting itself to the available processing power. OpenCL provides consistent numeric precision and accuracy, fixing a problem that has hampered GPU-based programming in the past.
OpenCL is a C
C (programming language)
C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system....
-based programming language
Programming language
A programming language is an artificial language designed to communicate instructions to a machine, particularly a computer. Programming languages can be used to create programs that control the behavior of a machine and/or to express algorithms precisely....
with a structure that is already familiar to Mac OS X programmers, who can use Xcode
Xcode
Xcode is a suite of tools, developed by Apple, for developing software for Mac OS X and iOS. Xcode 4.2, the latest major version, is available on the Mac App Store for free for Mac OS X 10.7 , and on the Apple Developer Connection website for free to registered developers Xcode is a suite of tools,...
developer tools to adapt their programs to work with OpenCL. Only the most process intensive parts of the application need to be written in OpenCL C without affecting the rest of the code. OpenCL is an open standard that has been supported by AMD, Intel, and Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...
; it is maintained by Khronos Group
Khronos Group
The Khronos Group is a not-for-profit member-funded industry consortium based in Beaverton, Oregon, focused on the creation of open standard, royalty-free APIs to enable the authoring and accelerated playback of dynamic media on a wide variety of platforms and devices...
.
It serves a similar purpose to Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...
's C for CUDA
CUDA
CUDA or Compute Unified Device Architecture is a parallel computing architecture developed by Nvidia. CUDA is the computing engine in Nvidia graphics processing units that is accessible to software developers through variants of industry standard programming languages...
and Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
's Direct3D 11 compute shaders.
It only works with the following Mac GPUs: NVIDIA GeForce 320M, GT 330M, 9400M, 9600M GT, 8600M GT, GT 120, GT 130, GTX 285, 8800 GT, 8800 GS, Quadro FX 4800, FX 5600 and ATI Radeon HD 4670, HD 4850, HD 4870, HD 5670, HD 5750, HD 5770, HD 5870, HD 6490M, HD 6750M, HD 6770M, HD 6970M. If the system does not possess one of these compatible GPUs, OpenCL code will instead execute on the system's CPU.
CUPS
CUPSCommon Unix Printing System
CUPS is a modular printing system for Unix-like computer operating systems which allows a computer to act as a print server...
(the printing system used in many Unix-like
Unix-like
A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....
operating systems) has been updated to version 1.4 which provides improved driver, networking, and Kerberos support along with performance improvements. CUPS 1.4 is also the first implementation of the Internet Printing Protocol
Internet Printing Protocol
In computing, the Internet Printing Protocol provides a standard network protocol for remote printing as well as for managing print jobs, media size, resolution, and so forth....
version 2.1.
Power management
Power management has been improved, with implementation of a new wake on demand feature supported on more recent Macintosh hardware. Wake on demand takes advantage of the sleep proxy serviceSleep Proxy Service
Apple's Bonjour Sleep Proxy service is an open sourcecomponent of zero configuration networking, designed to assist in reducing power consumption of networked electronic devices. A device acting as a sleep proxy server will respond to Multicast DNS queries for another, compatible device which has...
implemented in AirPort
AirPort
AirPort and AirPort Extreme are local area wireless networking products from Apple Inc. based on the IEEE 802.11 standard ....
and Time Capsule
Time Capsule (Apple)
The Time Capsule is a wireless network-attached storage device combined with a wireless residential gateway router made by Apple Inc. It is described as a "Backup Appliance", designed to work in tandem with the Time Machine backup utility, introduced in Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard".The device includes a...
routers, so that the computer can sleep while the router responds to mDNS queries. Should the request require the host computer to wake up, the router sends the necessary special wake-up-packet to the sleeping computer.
Security
Apple strengthened Mac OS X by implementing stack protection, and sandboxingSandbox (computer security)
In computer security, a sandbox is a security mechanism for separating running programs. It is often used to execute untested code, or untrusted programs from unverified third-parties, suppliers, untrusted users and untrusted websites....
more Mac OS X components such as the H.264 decoder
Decoder
A decoder is a device which does the reverse operation of an encoder, undoing the encoding so that the original information can be retrieved. The same method used to encode is usually just reversed in order to decode...
in QuickTime
QuickTime
QuickTime is an extensible proprietary multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The classic version of QuickTime is available for Windows XP and later, as well as Mac OS X Leopard and...
and browser plug-ins as a separate process in Safari. An anti-malware
Malware
Malware, short for malicious software, consists of programming that is designed to disrupt or deny operation, gather information that leads to loss of privacy or exploitation, or gain unauthorized access to system resources, or that otherwise exhibits abusive behavior...
feature was also added to the system that alerts the user if malware is detected. Mac OS X 10.6.8 added daily malware definition updates.
Computer security researcher Charlie Miller
Charlie Miller (security researcher)
Charles Miller is a computer security researcher with the consulting firm Accuvant LABS.Prior to his current employment, he spent five years working for the National Security Agency. Miller demonstrated his hacks publicly on products manufactured by Apple...
claims that OS X Snow Leopard is more vulnerable to attack than Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
for lacking full address space layout randomization
Address space layout randomization
Address space layout randomization is a computer security method which involves randomly arranging the positions of key data areas, usually including the base of the executable and position of libraries, heap, and stack, in a process's address space.- Benefits :Address space randomization hinders...
(ASLR) since Mac OS X Leopard, a technology that Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
started implementing in Windows Vista
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
.
Compatibility
Snow Leopard breaks compatibility with versions of some applications, including Parallels Desktop 3.0, versions of ApertureAperture (photography software)
Aperture is a photo editing and management software program that was developed by Apple for the Mac OS X operating system, first released in 2005 for $499 , dropped to $199, and now released on their App Store for $79...
before 2.1.1, and versions of Keynote
Keynote (software)
Keynote is a presentation software application developed as a part of the iWork productivity suite by Apple Inc. Keynote 5 was announced on January 6, 2009, and is the most recent version for the Macintosh. It adds new themes, transitions and animations, and the ability to control the slideshow...
before 2.0.2, among other software. Apple has also published a list of applications with known compatibility issues with Snow Leopard.
Printer and scanner drivers used by previous versions of Mac OS X are not compatible with Snow Leopard and will be replaced during Snow Leopard installation. Since the initial release of Snow Leopard many manufacturers have provided compatible drivers that are available via Software Update. If a native driver is not available Snow Leopard also includes CUPS and Gutenprint
Gutenprint
Gutenprint is a collection of free software printer drivers for use with UNIX spooling systems, such as CUPS, lpr and LPRng...
open source drivers that may provide limited functionality.
10.6.0 introduced a bug that frequently prevented DNS
Domain name system
The Domain Name System is a hierarchical distributed naming system for computers, services, or any resource connected to the Internet or a private network. It associates various information with domain names assigned to each of the participating entities...
queries from returning IPv6 addresses
IPv6 address
An Internet Protocol Version 6 address is a numerical label that is used to identify a network interface of a computer or other network node participating in an IPv6-enabled computer network....
. This was resolved in 10.6.8.
Reception
At the WWDC in 2009, Apple stated that Snow Leopard features no new major visual changes. Instead, the release focuses on refining the operating system to enable better performance.OSNews reported that Mac OS X Snow Leopard was well-received by critics.
Engadget reviewed Snow Leopard and pointed out that the price of Snow Leopard dropped from the $129 Apple charged for previous versions of Mac OS X to $29. Engadget's opinion was that this could be largely because most users would not see a noticeable change in the look and feel of the system. However, most reviews commented on the large improvement in speed of the native Mac OS X applications Finder, iCal
ICal
iCal is a personal calendar application made by Apple Inc. that runs on the Mac OS X operating system. iCal was the first calendar application for Mac OS X to offer support for multiple calendars and the ability to publish/subscribe calendars to WebDAV server....
Mail (application)
Mail is an email program included with Apple Inc.'s Mac OS X operating system. Originally developed by NeXT as NeXTMail, a part of their NeXTSTEP operating system, it was adapted, following Apple's acquisition of NeXT, to become OS X's Mail application.Mail uses the SMTP, POP3, and IMAP protocols,...
, etc.
CNET
CNET
CNET is a tech media website that publishes news articles, blogs, and podcasts on technology and consumer electronics. Originally founded in 1994 by Halsey Minor and Shelby Bonnie, it was the flagship brand of CNET Networks and became a brand of CBS Interactive through CNET Networks' acquisition...
editors gave it 4 stars out of 5, stating "Intel Mac users will like Snow Leopard's smartly designed interface enhancements, and its Exchange
Microsoft Exchange Server
Microsoft Exchange Server is the server side of a client–server, collaborative application product developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Servers line of server products and is used by enterprises using Microsoft infrastructure products...
support is a must-have (especially with Outlook
Microsoft Outlook
Microsoft Outlook is a personal information manager from Microsoft, available both as a separate application as well as a part of the Microsoft Office suite...
for Mac on the way). With a ton of technological improvements, Snow Leopard is worth the $29 upgrade fee."
On 21 October 2009, SFGate blogger Yobie Benjamin wrote that the "MacBook Pro that came preloaded with Snow Leopard kicks butt and is a screaming fast machine", but "when I tried to upgrade one of my 'older' MacBooks, it was a fricking disaster from hell". Apart from upgrading, Benjamin also tried a clean install. But he complained of slowness even after his clean install. He wrote, "I ended up downgrading back to OSX 10.5.8" then he concluded by writing, "I might try to do it again but it won't be till Apple releases at least 2 major fix updates. If you want to roll the dice and try, go ahead... your upgrade might work however random installs not working is not good for me. Lesson learned --- I'll wait."
The single-user upgrade and Family Pack units of Snow Leopard ranked 1 and 2 respectively on Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
's software bestseller charts when Apple announced it would release it within the week.
Testmac.com highlighted other unexpected improvements including the release of a new version of Boot Camp, version 3.0, a cleaner, popup software update process and screen and video recording in the new QuickTime Player.
The BBC reported that a bug in Mac OS X versions 10.6.0 and 10.6.1 which, in rare cases, caused loss of user account data after use of a previously-existing guest account by users who had upgraded from a previous version of Mac OS X, received wide publicity. The bug was fixed as of version 10.6.2.
Release history
Apple CEO Steve JobsSteve Jobs
Steven Paul Jobs was an American businessman and inventor widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution. He was co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Inc...
announced Snow Leopard at WWDC on June 9, 2008, and it was privately demonstrated to developers by Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet
Bertrand Serlet
Bertrand Serlet, born 1960, is a French researcher. PhD in Computer Science at Université d'Orsay , he worked first at the Institut national de recherche en informatique et en automatique . He left France for USA in 1985....
. On Monday, 11 May 2009, after build 10A354, Apple issued a code freeze
Freeze (software engineering)
In software engineering, a freeze is a point in time in the development process after which the rules for making changes to the source code or related resources become more strict, or the period during which those rules are applied...
on Snow Leopard's API
Application programming interface
An application programming interface is a source code based specification intended to be used as an interface by software components to communicate with each other...
s. The first public demonstration was given at WWDC 2009 by Serlet and Vice President of Mac OS Engineering, Craig Federighi.
| Version | Build | Date | OS name Uname uname is a software program in Unix and Unix-like computer operating systems that prints the name, version and other details about the current machine and the operating system running on it... |
Notes | Download |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10.6 | 10A432 | August 28, 2009 | Darwin Darwin (operating system) Darwin is an open source POSIX-compliant computer operating system released by Apple Inc. in 2000. It is composed of code developed by Apple, as well as code derived from NeXTSTEP, BSD, and other free software projects.... 10.0 |
Original retail DVD release | rowspan=2 |
| 10A433 | Server edition; Original retail DVD release | ||||
| 10.6.1 | 10B504 | September 10, 2009 | Darwin 10.1 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.1 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.1 Update |
| 10.6.2 | 10C540 | November 9, 2009 | Darwin 10.2 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.2 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.2 Update |
| 10.6.3 | 10D573 | March 29, 2010 | Darwin 10.3 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.3 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.3 Update |
| 10D575 | Second retail DVD release | ||||
| 10D578 | April 13, 2010 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.3 Update; v1.1 | Mac OS X v10.6.3 v1.1 Update (Combo) | ||
| 10.6.4 | 10F569 | June 15, 2010 | Darwin 10.4 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.4 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.4 Update (Combo) |
| 10.6.5 | 10H574 | November 10, 2010 | Darwin 10.5 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.5 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.5 Update (Combo) |
| 10.6.6 | 10J567 | January 6, 2011 | Darwin 10.6 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.6 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.6 Update (Combo) |
| 10.6.7 | 10J869 | March 21, 2011 | Darwin 10.7 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.7 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.7 Update (Combo) |
| 10J3250 | March 21, 2011 | For the early 2011 Macbook Pro | Mac OS X v10.6.7 Update for early 2011 MacBook Pro | ||
| 10J4138 | May 4, 2011 | For the early 2011 Macbook Pro | MacBook Pro Software Update 1.4 | ||
| 10.6.8 | 10K540 | June 23, 2011 | Darwin 10.8 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.8 Update | Mac OS X v10.6.8 Update (Combo) |
| 10K549 | July 25, 2011 | About the Mac OS X v10.6.8 Update; v1.1 | Mac OS X v10.6.8 v1.1 Update (Combo) |
Mac OS X Server includes these features and other server-related features. Apple initially stated that Server would include ZFS
ZFS
In computing, ZFS is a combined file system and logical volume manager designed by Sun Microsystems. The features of ZFS include data integrity verification against data corruption modes , support for high storage capacities, integration of the concepts of filesystem and volume management,...
support, but mention of this feature later disappeared from Apple's website and it was not included in the final release due to licensing issues.
External links
- Mac OS X Snow Leopard at Apple.com
- Mac OS X Server Snow Leopard at Apple.com
- Mac OS X Snow Leopard application compatibility list: a user-edited list of Mac applications that have been tested on Snow Leopard
- Mac OS X Snow Leopard review at Ars TechnicaArs TechnicaArs Technica is a technology news and information website created by Ken Fisher and Jon Stokes in 1998. It publishes news, reviews and guides on issues such as computer hardware and software, science, technology policy, and video games. Ars Technica is known for its features, long articles that go...