Filed under: Software
OS X is 5 years young
Happy 5th birthday to OS X! That's right Apple shipped OS X 5 years ago today, and if you don't believe me feel free to read the original press release.
John Siracusa is taking a stroll down memory lane over at Ars Technica, and as always his column is worth a read.
The image accompanying this post is a screenshot of the OX Public Beta (remember when the Apple menu was in the middle of the menu bar?) from GUIdebook's OS X Public Beta page.
Update: I have been reminded that the OS X Public Beta didn't have an Apple menu at all! The Apple was just decoration. How could I forget that? I think I still have my Public Beta Disk somewhere... I should install it on my iMac.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Ireland said 2:21PM on 3-24-2006
I'm excited about Leopard!
I would love among other things to see something like Skypeout in the next version of iChat. So I could ring regular telephones from my computer. I feel it would be a smart move for apple, providing the cost of calls were competitive with Skype. If this was the case I would no longer use Skypeout, and would be happy to apple the money instead!
Looking forward to some cool thing in Leopard!
Switched last year, and was a fan straight away.
I'm not biased towards Microsoft, but I no longer live in the past, I live for the future!
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Ireland said 2:23PM on 3-24-2006
more typos, I need sleep!
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icerabbit said 2:28PM on 3-24-2006
I switched to OS X back in the day. 5 pretty good years :)
Too bad not all of those small annoyances have been fixed in the mean time.
Like Finder cut/copy/paste, offline network shares still take the finder hostage, no standard window maximization, fax still lacks a few basic features and suffers from the Addressbook autocomplete bug, lack of login items order & menu icon ordering, some apps do not start in hidden state ...
I hope 10.5 will take care of those.
Apart from the autocomplete fax # bug. That should have been fixed in 10.4.1.
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Dan Siercks said 2:31PM on 3-24-2006
I recently worked on a machine that needed to have its PMU reset to boot. Finally get the machine to boot, sit down and wait for the login screen.
OSX Server
10.0.2
It hurt my eyes.
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icerabbit said 2:34PM on 3-24-2006
PS: by the maximization I mean that I do not like the "zoom state" switch which more often than not happens when you hit the green (+) button like in for instance Safari, Finder, iTunes ... I prefer (+) like in Mail, iPhoto etc to fill the screen. Rather than having to drag the bottom right corner to maximize the window.
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Chris Coleman said 2:35PM on 3-24-2006
About a year or so ago, while reformatting and reinstalling OS X on my Pismo PowerBook, I decided to have some fun and install the Public Beta on it for a while.
Well, it wasn't fun, but it was good for some late-2000 nostalgia.
Oh, and the Apple in the center of the menubar was never a menu. It was purely decorative. Which reminds me -- the OS X Apple Menu is WAY more useful than OS 9's ever was. Anybody still crying for the OS 9 menu, or installing things like Fruit Menu needs a good slap.
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Steve said 3:12PM on 3-24-2006
Time to look back and look ahead. Some new rumors came out about Leopard today, one being that it would fully support Intel's virtualization and be able to run OS X and XP (or Linux) concurrently, allowing you to switch between them with, in effect, a software KVM.
Also read some MSFT insiders speculating about Leopard having a full DBFS (database file system).
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tr said 3:25PM on 3-24-2006
"(remember when the Apple menu was in the middle of the menu bar?)"
if i remember correctly, that wasn't the apple menu in the middle of the menu bar. it was just a decorative apple. it looked cool, but it didn't do anything.
man, i remember how strange and different the Public Beta was when i installed; i remember getting home really late at night, seeing it in my mail, and reading every little bit of the package/booklet while it installed.
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Billy K said 4:33PM on 3-24-2006
Even in the dark days of the 90s, when everyone was wondering when Apple would collapse, I was never really worried. It wasn't until I saw the beta of OSX that I began to think maybe it was over.
"They're gonna replace my OS with THAT!?"
they came a LONG way in a short time. Despite a few nagging issues I still have, I couldn't live without OSX.
Happy Birthday to the best and most advanced OS in the world!
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Morgan Aldridge said 4:35PM on 3-24-2006
The Apple Menu, in fact, did not exist back then. There was lots of discussion about it, but they did bring it back.
I switched to OS X the day the Public Beta arrived. I occasionally booted back into Mac OS 9, but I was even doing all my web server software development on the Public Beta. I almost miss those days... and my Pismo. {sniff}
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ChrisM70 said 6:15PM on 3-24-2006
If i'm not mistaken, the OS X beta also didn't allow you to drop files on the desktop. People liked the simplicity of the new OS, but they still wanted the ability to clutter up their desktop with oodles of haphazardly dropped files!
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Jona said 1:57PM on 3-25-2006
"(remember when the Apple menu was in the middle of the menu bar?)"
"(if i remember correctly, that wasn't the apple menu in the middle of the menu bar. it was just a decorative apple. it looked cool, but it didn't do anything.
man, i remember how strange and different the Public Beta was when i installed; i remember getting home really late at night, seeing it in my mail, and reading every little bit of the package/booklet while it installed.)"
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the Apple was centered in the menu bar to sort of act as the "digital sun," i.e. it was the source that casts the shadows on windows, buttons, etc. (notice how OS X's drop shadows are centered).
More discussion on the digital sun:
http://www.urbanhonking.com/universe/archives/2006/02/computers_are_i_1.html
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John Siracusa said 5:06PM on 3-26-2006
Please correct the spelling of my name.
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Scott McNulty said 5:48PM on 3-26-2006
The misplaced 'h' has been found!
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Jan Weir said 12:40PM on 3-28-2006
Unfortunate Apple doesn't devote more time to fix the Fax capabilities such as the address book auto complete. Small businesses are trying for the paperless office. Sending and receiving faxes on the computer without the need for 3rd pary sofware might help in sales to that market.
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