Meet the Leopard

Meet the Leopard
Mac Tip #312/24-Oct-2007

Apple’s latest version of Mac OS X, 10.5 or Leopard, arrives on 26 October 2007.

Once again, this will be a leap forward in what you can do with your Mac. It introduces hundreds of new features, big and small.

But it’s not for everyone. For starters, you need a reasonably recent Mac computer with an Intel, PowerPC G5, or PowerPC G4 (867MHz or faster) processor.

Some people prefer to let the ‘early adopters’ work with the first version of the operating system upgrades and find all the problems. They upgrade a bit later on after Apple release an update (to 10.5.1) with fixes for issues that have come up.

If you are thinking of upgrading though, you can look forward to some very appealing new features.

I’ll be receiving my copy of Leopard within the next few days and will be upgrading straight away. In the next tips I’ll write about how to use some of what’s new.

Here are a few of the items Apple have told us about so far.

• Quick Look provides a preview for almost any type of file, without having to actually open it.
• Time Machine (requires an external hard drive) automatically keeps backup copies of all your files. Easily go back through all the old versions to find items you’ve lost.
• Spaces is like having a separate desk for separate activities. For example, have all your Internet activities (web browser, mail, RSS feeds, etc) on one desktop, all your photos on another, and keep another for movies and music. Or arrange what you’re working on some other way.
• (With permission) view and interact with another person’s screen.
• The Dictionary now includes Wikipedia. (Hooray!)
• The Finder becomes more like iTunes.
• Various cool things in iCal, Mail, iChat, PhotoBooth, Preview, Safari and other software — even the screensavers.

By the way: even though upgrading is as simple as putting in the DVD and clicking, do back up your whole computer before you start.