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Desktops (Apple)

Apple Announces macOS Big Sur With a Brand-New Design (theverge.com) 92

Posted by msmash from the up-next dept.
Apple has unveiled the next version of macOS: Big Sur. From a report: The new operating system brings the biggest redesign since the introduction of macOS 10, according to Apple. Big Sur borrows a number of elements from Apple's iOS, including a customizable Control Center, where you can change brightness and toggle Do Not Disturb, and a new notification center, which groups related notifications together. Both interfaces are translucent, like their iOS counterparts. A number of apps have received streamlined new redesigns, including Mail, Photos, Notes, and iWork. Apple has introduced a new search feature to Messages (which organizes results into links, photos, and matching terms), as well as inline replies for group chats, a new photo-selection interface, and Memoji stickers. There's a new version of Maps for Mac that borrows features from the iOS app, including custom Guides, 360-degree location views, cycling and electric vehicle directions (which you can send directly to an iPhone), and indoor maps. Apple introduced a number of new Catalyst apps as well. Dock buttons have also been redesigned to look more similar to their iOS counterparts, in an effort to "be more consistent with icons across Apple's ecosystem while retaining their Mac personality," according to the company.

Apple also announced the biggest update to Safari since the browser was first introduced. The company claims its browser is 50 percent faster than Chrome and can show more tabs on-screen. Hovering over a tab now gives users a preview of its page, and right-clicking on the tab will give you the option to close all the tabs to its right. The new Safari also has a customizable start page and a built-in automatic translation feature that can interpret entire webpages in seven languages, Apple says. Safari is also getting support for extensions made for other browsers, and a dedicated extension store. (Unlike many other browsers, Safari will allow you to customize which sites your extensions run on). And there are new privacy features, including a Privacy Report that details actions the browser has taken to prevent tracking on the websites you visit.
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Apple Announces macOS Big Sur With a Brand-New Design More

Apple Announces macOS Big Sur With a Brand-New Design

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  • Random (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    right-clicking on the tab will give you the option to close all the tabs to its right

    Is that a common thing to want to do?

    • Firefox has that too.

      • so does Chrome, so that's three browsers that have some random "feature" I don't need and don't want. Proving the world is driven by sales and marketing wanks that copy fads rather than listen to users.

    • The only right-click option I've ever wanted for browser tabs is "open a new window with only this tab".

      • In Firefox, you can simply left-click and drag the tab outside its parent window. Firefox will create a new containing window for just that tab.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by mccalli ( 323026 )
        Just drag it out - works fine on Safari (and others I believe).

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by otuz ( 85014 )

        You mean like right clicking the tab and selecting "Move Tab to New Window"? That's Safari do.

    • right-clicking on the tab will give you the option to close all the tabs to its right

      Is that a common thing to want to do?

      That's a rather silly question.

      The one thing common with most of our software and hardware these days, is they're full of profit-driving feature-creep bullshit that no one actually asked for.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Merk42 ( 1906718 )
      Right click? on a Mac???

      • Yes. Middle button too. Even on touch pad you can get a right click. If you don't have an external mouse with a right button you can use control-click. But all the Apple mice seem to have a left vs right "button", even the ones with the touch surface.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gtall ( 79522 )

        Stuck in the 1980's I see. Use a logitech mouse with a right button, Macs handle it just fine.

        • Use a logitech mouse with a right button, Macs handle it just fine.

          Even Mac mice can do it. On the Magic Mouse it does take a little getting used do - since it's a single surface, you have to make sure to pick up your left finger off the mouse before clicking on the right side.

          Nowadays I prefer Apple's trackpad, even with a desktop Mac. On their trackpads (both standalone and the built-in laptop versions), a two-finger click can be configured to act as a "right click".

      • Seriously? That is probably the stupids question ever ...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by otuz ( 85014 )

        More than 3 buttons even, such as my 12-button trackball and I can assign all kinds of functions to them with an utility that relies on the Apple driver. Windows can't do that, the same device requires special drivers there that assign the buttons to keyboard keys and such retardry.

    • I use it fairly often.

      If I've already got a few tabs open and then a new search ends up as a 10+ tab rabbit hole of related articles, "close tabs to the right" is a quick way to get back to where I started.

      With sufficient foresight, one can eliminate the need for the feature entirely by starting that "rabbit hole" search in a new window.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by EvilSS ( 557649 )
      Yes? I know I use it quite a bit in Firefox. Researching something, got a ton of tabs open, get all the info I need from them, and right-click close all to right.

  • Big Sur? Almost sounds like "Big Sir" to most non-english speakers.

    And "sûr" in french means sour. To me, macOS 11.0 will always be "Big Sour".

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Arkham ( 10779 )

      Well in French without the accent, Sur means "on top of" -- so if you are picking random crap in other languages at least go with the one that's mildly relevant.

      Big Sur is a proper noun. It's a place name. No different than "Grand Canyon" or "Côte de Beaune".

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by fermion ( 181285 )
      I was expecting some kind of penis joke here, you know Oh Myyy, Big Sir
    • It was either Big Sur or Mt. St. Helens.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by EvilSS ( 557649 )

      Big Sur? Almost sounds like "Big Sir" to most non-english speakers.

      Big Sur is your laptop OS. Big Sir is your prison husband.

    • Wonderful name. When I first read it I read it as Big Slur.

      Apple, I know you think California is the center of the US, the world, and the universe, but how about a return to naming their OS versions from things that people other than in shitty California might be familiar with?

      There are still lots of unused cat names.

      • Apple, I know you think California is the center of the US, the world, and the universe, but how about a return to naming their OS versions from things that people other than in shitty California might be familiar with?

        This. One million times this.

        There are still lots of unused cat names.

        Well they already did feline names, so they would have had to pick something different. And macOS 11 was the perfect place to start a new naming scheme but they blew it.

  • Coming soon (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ArhcAngel ( 247594 ) on Monday June 22, 2020 @03:57PM (#60213996)
    Next year Mac OS will introduce the OS App store and remove the ability to install third party software by any other means.

    • No, they wont.
      Or do you think software developers upload Eclipse or other developer tools into an App Store?
      Apple would annihilate half of its customer base if the did that (and why would they do that anyway?)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        They will push people towards the app store. People who buy a Macbook Air to browse and do some word processing on, maybe play a few games will be driven to the app store.

        • More "push" than now?
          I doubt it.

          My point basically is: it will never be "App Store only"

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            Maybe. Signed binaries though? They do it already on iOS and have work-arounds for developers. Maybe the low end Macs like the Mini and Macbook Air will only run signed stuff or only use the app store in future, with only more expensive machines allowed out of jail on parole.

    • Given that it will take two years for the transition to complete, Apple will most likely wait at least three years before doing this. They're not stupid enough to pull this until all of their users have completed the transition and all of the developers have ported their apps.
      • Agreed, it will be a phased approach. They need to get everyone comfortable with the new model before yanking the rug out.
    • There's been an Mac App Store since OS X came out. Installing third party software is still available along with the usual cautions given if the software you are installing is not signed.

      • They've been ratcheting it up slowly though. The warning became a "no" until you changed the setting in gatekeeper to "anywhere" then "anywhere" disappeared and you had to know to right click and say "open" before you could say okay to the warning. Then Signed became Signed+Notarised so now all your signed binaries have to be fed through the automated notarisation system that rejects anything that doesn't pass the rules for what they'll notarise. Meanwhile Xcode makes it VERY difficult to figure out how to

    • Every f_ing year someone claims this, despite Apple repeatedly saying it is not the plan, and still it hasn’t happened.

    • Next year Mac OS will introduce the OS App store and remove the ability to install third party software by any other means.

      You seem to be unaware that macOS has had an App Store for nearly a decade. It arrived in OS X 10.6 in 2011. We're currently at macOS 10.15, with Big Sur apparently set to be macOS 11.0.

      Now, there is a "Gatekeeper" security setting that gives you the option to only allow apps from the Mac App Store, and it may even be the default setting these days, but Gatekeeper also has a setting that additionally allows apps from "identified developers", which in my experience ends up being about 90% of the random apps

  • According to a Phoronix article is there a new Number One at the Top500 and it's an Arm-based machine.

    Phoronix: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.... [phoronix.com]

    Directly: https://top500.org/news/japan-... [top500.org]

    Apple seems to have timed their announcement well.

    • According to a Phoronix article is there a new Number One at the Top500 and it's an Arm-based machine.

      Yeah but this isn't the ARM you think it is.

      This is the Fujistu machine, and in this case ARM didn't replace x86, it replaced UltraSparc. It has little bearing on mobile; there hasn't been a comparable laptop since the Tadpole SPARCLE in 2004 (if after hearing that exists you don't immediately want one, then please hand in your nerd card at the door).

      The SPARC64 XIfx was really just a thing to feed a very w

      • Yeah but this isn't the ARM you think it is.

        I don't know what you thought it would be, but I didn't expect Apple to switch to Arm as a matter of fact. But I do know there are many Arm-based CPU designs.

        It is one thing to claim that Arm CPUs can be powerful, it's another to build a super computer with them. The later has much more weight than any claim could ever have. I'm sure this will make sense to you. And my point was that Apple seems to have timed their announcement with the fact that there now is an Arm-based super computer as the new Number On

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Bert64 ( 520050 )

          I do remember many of the previous ones, such as Sun Sparc, MIPS, Dec Alphas, HP-PA, Itanium, etc.. Many look promising, but x86 mopped the floor with them one after another.

          These architectures were all superior to x86, but they were also very expensive. x86 was cheap and crap, so it benefitted from economies of scale selling millions of units where the other processors had to make do with smaller numbers of higher margin sales.
          ARM on the other hand does have the high volume already, it is effectively doing to x86 what x86 did to those other processors.

          The other thing holding back alternative processor architectures has always been closed source software...
          Anything that comes w

        • The primary difference between now and then is Apple's volume and control of the platform. In the PowerPC days, they were basically the junior partner of Motorola, IBM and Apple. Their sales volume just wasn't all that large.

          Today, they sell more than 100 million ARM CPUs/year. They have control of the design of those CPUs (due to licensing with ARM) so that they are capable of customising them to their needs. They also have the budget and economies of scale to be able to invest whatever they need. Somethin

        • I don't know what you thought it would be,

          Sorry it was a more general comment, I've read far too many "ApPlE ArE uSiNg a SuPeR CoMpUtEr ChIP" comments, and jumped to unjustified conclusions about your post.

          For instance can nobody claim that Arm-based designs don't scale well.

          Yesbut.

          I mean yes, but most people's understanding of scaling up is pretty far off.

          It's pretty hard to design a competitive desktop/laptop sized CPU. Eventually AMD and Intel pulled ahead of the competition, and the field shrunk very fa

  • Does anyone really care that there's convergence between elements the desktop, an iPad, and an iPhone? Differing platforms call for different UIs. One size does NOT fit all, so I really can't figure out what problem they're trying to solve with that.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by rho ( 6063 )

      Because if you run iOS apps on your Mac you want them to look like they function more or less the same. It's not a terrible idea.

      • It is a terrible idea. IOS is ugly, flat, and the apps are designed for small screens that people touch with their fingers, not a 27" screen with a keyboard and mouse.

        Who wants or needs to run these dinky, one-function-per-app IOS apps on their Mac?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rho ( 6063 )

          We all know the iOS compatibility is mostly for games, not productivity apps.

      • Because if you run iOS apps on your Mac you want them to look like they function more or less the same. It's not a terrible idea.

        Who asked to run iOS apps on their Macs?

    • apple is just copying ChromeOS. You dont really think apple has had an original idea since like forever?

      • Apple has rarely been about "original ideas", but rather "implementations of original ideas".

        Just like the most powerful computer in the world is useless without software to run on it, the best idea in the world is basically useless if it's badly implemented.

    • I'll never see it - I use almost none of the Apple apps for anything (even the Apple calculator isn't that great, but I use it anyway). Honestly, I get the feeling most Mac owners don't know what they could have, and so settle for the craptastic, but good looking Apple stuff.

      Mail -> Thunderbird
      Safari -> Firefox (or Chrome)
      Officy stuff -> Libreoffice
      Messages -> Slack
      terminal -> iterm2
      text editor -> Atom

      I'd swap out "finder" for something better if I could - just give me a "go up one level"

  • Damn, this looks terrible. I mean, it's pretty - but it's very flat, bright, low-contrast, full of transparencies. So I think the legibility looks absolutely terrible. If I still used a Mac, I'd be desperately clinging to Snow Leopard, it's been going downhill since then.

    • Yeah, but it's "completely redesigned*"

      * where completely redesigned really means that they've flattened it even more, and made every single corner rounded. Functionally, it's still exactly the same Dock and Finder with none of the shortcomings addressed at all, from the presentation.

    • Agree.

      Like iOS?

      Do. Not. Want.

  • Let me guess Finder is going to remain a turd? File management is one of the primary features I associate with a desktop OS. Finder absolutely sucks in almost every single way.
  • I used to love rounded corners. I've designed and built my share of UIs with them. But now, maybe because I'm older, please just give me back the option for squared corners while I still have to support and do some work on this platform. If this new OS includes it, awesome, but I really doubt it given the past few updates.

    It's really annoying that with later versions of OS X, Apple removed the option to disable rounded corners in the terminal -- now the command I used for years doesn't do jack shit. (

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Megane ( 129182 )
      Actually, how about some actual UI theme options for people who don't want flat shit or transparent shit or hyper-skeuomorphic shit whatever the stupid trend is in the particular year an OS version comes out?
  • This sounds suspiciously like the Windows 8 press releases: everything's getting redesigned, slimmed down, streamlined, and tablet-ified.
    Which probably sounded good to some users at first, but it usually means hiding all the useful important stuff 3 menu layers deep, and conveying significantly less information per-screen.
    • Many of the more useful important stuff has actually made more accessible as demonstrated in the new Control Center.

  • The next update will be called Little Sur
      *ducks*

  • The last time they changed the interface on Mail they damned near chased me away from the platform. I want it to do what it's done for all these years, the way I'm used to it working. New features are fine, I suppose -- if they're hidden away behind some menu pull-down.

    That, and it's getting harder and harder to sit down and have a chunk of the screen where I can just pretend it's old UNIX when I need to do a piece of software. How long has the tkinter that Apple ships leaked memory?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Megane ( 129182 )

      They've been breaking the way I prefer to use Mail since at least 10.9 (I skipped 10.7 and 10.8 completely). I like to have new mail initially scanned for junk using some extra rules, and left in the main folder marked and pre-deleted so I have a chance to notice if they are false positives, then I completely delete the rest. So far my only jumps have been 10.6 -> 10.9 -> 10.13, but each one is noticeably worse in refusing to work my way. (actually, I think there was even some trouble going from 10.5

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