WWDC: Mac OS X Leopard Round-up

While some of the features Steve demo’d at WWDC were the same as ones we’d previously seen, there were a few new ones thrown in there.

First, new desktop. The menu bar is going to be transparent. I am not sure that’s jaw dropping, I actually think it makes OS X look like a Windows user who tried to get Windows to look like OS X. The dock now looks like a flat surface as the icons reflect off it. It has a more 3D feel to it. The dock will also reflect any windows you drag near it for some an great eye candy experience. Stacks is another new part of the desktop. it’s great for when you have downloaded tons of files, Stacks will neatly arrange them for you. You can create Stacks from anything you want. I can this being a really nifty application launcher. I could stack all my internet applications in one stack, all my office applications in another stack and all my photography, photo editing and graphic applications in another stack!

The next feature is a completely new Finder. It has an iTunes look and feel to it. Cover Flow is built-in the Finder so you browse your documents and folders that way. The sidebar has also changed and takes on the appearance of the sidebar in iTunes. As much as I like the current Finder, I think these new additions are really going to make it a lot better.

QuickLook the 3rd feature talked about at WWDC is something that I didn’t understand at first. QuickLook lets you preview a document before actually opening it with an application. For example you could preview a PDF before opening it with Adobe Acrobat. Movies, images, keynotes, Word and Excel files are just a few of the document types you can preview.

Steve’s keynote also covered, Spaces, Dashboard, Time Machines and iChat. You can see videos and get more information about OS X Leopard on Apples website.