The pace of Mac OS X releases
On the 19th of May 2004 Avie Tevanian, then Apple Chief Software Technology Officer told a technology conference that Apple would slow the pace of its operating system releases.
The next one, Mac OS X 10.4, codename Tiger, was not to follow the “one major release per year” rule kept in the past years and would be closer -in development and release- to a 20 month cycle.
Let’s take a look at the schedule Apple actually kept since march of 2001, when (not counting the public beta) the first version of Mac OS X was released to the public:
- 10.0 CHEETAH – Date of release: 24 March 2001
- 10.1 PUMA – Date of release: 25 September 2001
- 10.2 JAGUAR – Date of release: 23 August 2002
- 10.3 PANTHER – Date of release: 24 October 2003
- 10.4 TIGER – Date of release: 29 April 2005
- 10.5 LEOPARD – Date of release: 26 October 2007
The dates show us that it took only 6 months to go from 10.0 to 10.1 and that 10.2 was released the following year: this reinforces the common opinion of “Puma” as a quick and much-needed fix for a still incomplete and immature operating system. So we have 11 months between “Puma and “Jaguar” and 14 months until “Panther”.
Mac OS X 10.4, “Tiger”, was released after 18 months, more or less as stated by Tevanian. On the other hand it took 30 months for “Leopard” to come out and the wait for 10.6, codenamed “Snow Leopard”, could be in the same ballpark.
Apple has stated it will show and give an almost complete “developer release” of 10.6 at the 2009 WWDC which means the sixth version of Mac OS X won’t come out before 24 monthts: maybe even a bit longer if we take into account Apple’s fondness of releasing during Autumn or Spring.
The picture of Avie Tevanian (from the 1999 WWDC) is “courtesy of Apple”.
The Lombard Ad: words in motion
The launch of the Macintosh PowerBook G3 “Lombard” in 1999 marks a new stylistic direction for Apple television ads and animated movies.
The use of typography is a mainstay of Apple which has used it since the early Eighties to market products and most of all its brand. The ad for the Lombard PowerBook (also known as “Bronze Keyboard”) takes the use of typgraphy even further marrying the images of the laptop witha series of words in many languages (actually the same word and/or concept) alternating and speeding towards the viewer.
This style will be later used not only in promoting the follow-up, the PowerBook Pismo, but will also be part of all the intros to Apple’s operating systems.
In the 1999 ad “slim” and “slank” were Apple’s key words, still set in Apple Garamond as would the similar Mac OS 9 intro.
The last of the “classic” Mac OS also started the “Welcome” ritual which has been used (so far) in all of the Mac OS X intros since 2001 although set in the Lucida Sans and from 10.4 with an added 3D effect.
The little Quadra
The Macintosh Quadra 605 was the smallest and lowest-model from the high profile professional lineup when Apple still used 68k CPUs from Motorola.
Unlike the much bigger 700, 800 and 900 models, the 605 was offered in a horizontal slim “pizzabox” case, which closely resembled those of the LC line.
While the innards of the 605 were indeed shared with that of the Performa/LC 475 -featuring a 68040 and a floppy drive- on the other hand the design of the case was unique, a fact that many books and websites overlook, incorrectly reporting them as identical.
The design of the Quadra 605 is much rounder and stylish and looks like a slimmed down version of the Quadra/LC/Performa 630. Gone is the front hoof of the LCs and the 605 lies flat, not inclined, on the surface, sporting four cute “feet” similar to those that adorn the base of the 630, 800/840 and 7×00 models.
The 605 can be seen as the missing link between the LCs and the 630: thanks to its small width and a clean front panel without a second slot for the optical unit, it has a very appealing design, which is minimal and elegant at the same time.
Image taken from Wikipedia
The people behind the Macintosh
“The people who are doing the work are the moving force behind the Macintosh. My job is to create a space for them, to clear out the rest of the organization and keep it at bay. I can’t spend enough time here, unfortunately, because I have other responsibilities. But every spare moment I have, I dash back because this is the most fun place in the world.
This is the neatest group of people I’ve ever worked with. They’re all exceptionally bright, but more importantly they share a quality about the way they look at life, which is that the journey is the reward. They really want to see this product out in the world. It’s more important than their personal lives right now.
The Apple II had a magical feel about it. You couldn’t quantify it, but you could tell. The Macintosh is the second thing in my life that’s ever felt that way. Opportunities like this don’t come along very often. You know somehow that it’s the start of something great. So everyone wants it to be perfect and works really hard on it. Everyone feels a personal responsibility for the product.
The Macintosh is the future of Apple Computer. And it’s being done by a bunch of people who are incredibly talented but who in most organizations would be working three levels below the impact of the decisions they’re making in the organization. It’s one of those things that you know won’t last forever. The group might stay together maybe for one more iteration of the product, and then they’ll go their separate ways. For a very special moment, all of us have come together to make this new product. We feel this may be the best thing we’ll ever do with our lives.”
Steve Jobs in 1984 in the first issue of Macworld
