New Apple operating system latest skirmish in war with Windows

The new Apple OS 'Tiger'

To Mac lovers, there's never been any argument about operating systems. It was their OS first, and Windows - nowhere.

They may have even more reason to gloat after this Friday.

Apple Computers Inc. have Mac lovers everywhere excited about the upcoming release this week of their revolutionary new operating system, which they have dubbed "Tiger".

"Tiger" has nothing to do with the famous sporting figure who is the world's no. 1 golfer - although its developers are expecting it to attain a position in the IT industry of equal esteem.

"Mac OS X Tiger will change the way you use a computer", Apple are saying.

"Breakthrough search technology, stunning graphics and media, unparalleled connectivity, an intuitive user interface and a virtual toolbox chock full of cleverly integrated features — all atop a rock-solid UNIX foundation — give you the most innovative, stable and compatible desktop operating system on the planet. Period."

In an industry already noted for puffery, one-upmanship and boasting, a big claim indeed.

The main feature of Tiger is Spotlight, which Apple says is "the lightning-fast search technology that illuminates every corner of your Mac, displaying results as fast as you type."

Spotlight searches everything on your system: files, emails, contacts, images, movies, calendars and applications appear instantly.

Just as tech-savvy music lovers are able to find songs on iTunes by name, artist or album, Spotlight searches take the user way beyond mere filename and location, to include all the metadata inside files — the "what, when and who" of everything on a Mac — including the kind of content, the author, edit history, format, size and many more details.

Because Spotlight is built right into the core of Mac OS X, it automatically updates results whenever files change.

Saved search results appear as a "Smart Folder" that automatically updates itself.

Apple advises: "Set up Smart Mailboxes according to Spotlight search queries and Mail files away your messages for you. Create Address Book Smart Groups using Spotlight search results. Even drag and drop Spotlight searches into new Automator Workflows to automate repetitive tasks. Everything on your Mac gets a chance to shine."

The other principle innovation of Tiger is a facility called Dashboard, which, to again quote the excited team at Apple marketing, "hosts nifty mini-applications called widgets that appear instantly and keep you up to date with timely information from the Internet.

"View stocks, check weather forecasts, track flights, convert currency and units of measure, even look up businesses in the phone book. Similar to Exposé, the Dashboard zooms across your Desktop at the click of a function key. Your favorite widgets appear with up-to-the-second information, then disappear just as easily, so you can get back to what you were doing", they say.

With the release of Tiger, Apple's CEO Steve Jobs has told industry commentators he confidently expects to trump Microsoft's planned 2006 release of "Longhorn", the new Windows operating system.

What strategy Microsoft plans to adopt as a counter, we will look to in coming months. In the face of Apple's new formidable release, the team at Redmond will certainly have to do extraordinarily well to grab this particular Tiger by the tail.

* Tiger will be available from licensed Apple retailers in New Zealand at 6pm this Friday 29 April.