Since the times of version 10.2, the internal code name of OS X major releases has become public knowledge and Apple has started using it in marketing. While there is a whole series of arguments for and against the usage of a non-sequential version numbering, I would say that in the case of operating systems it works just fine. After all, people only have to remember what the current release’s name is, and maybe the names of the two that came before it. Not a big deal.
The current version of OS X, 10.6, is called Snow Leopard, while 10.5 was Leopard. Biologically, they are indeed different animals, but Apple’s goal was to make it clear that 10.6 was visually not too different from its immediate predecessor, and that many of the improvements happened under the hood.
As is common in the world of Apple-related rumors, much speculation about the code name of the still-unannounced 10.7 release. It seems that Apple is running out of big cats:
- 10.0 — Cheetah
- 10.1 — Puma
- 10.2 — Jaguar
- 10.3 — Panther
- 10.4 — Tiger
- 10.5 — Leopard
- 10.6 — Snow Leopard
So will we have Lion, or maybe Lynx? Certainly not Ocelot, since it’s not a big/wild cat.
Is Apple saving the name “Clouded Leopard” for a subsequent release that will be focused on, well, cloud computing? That would be neat indeed.
Cougar, of course, would seem out of place, given its sexual implications in American English. But keep in mind that we’re talking about a company who actually named a product iPad, which kind of proves that don’t have any women in their marketing department. Not that iPod makes much sense either, but come on, iPad?
Yet… think about it: OS X is quite a mature operating system at this point, and it will certainly love new machines. So bring it on, OS X 10.7 Cougar!
For me, the best operating system is Linux because it rarely hangs.’;-
Well, OS X is a UNIX-based operating system. Its kernel — Darwin — is a fork of FreeBSD’s, and it’s actually open source. Having used Linux for a long time, though, I’d rather stick to using it for server tasks only. 😉
I hope they’ll soon start doing stuff like, 10.8 Lion or 10.9 Wolf. I really will be happy when we make it to Mac OSXI! 😀
Well, they may very well do 10.10, the dot is not a decimal separator. Usually the second number is the “minor release number”, but in the case of OS X it’s actually the major release number (as the first 10 is the same across all of them); the minor release number is the last one. Apple did have two-digit minor release numbers, with OS X 10.4.10 and 10.4.11, both released in the second half of 2007.
Still, I’m afraid we won’t even reach 10.9. I am strongly against a tighter integration of iOS and OS X, but it seems that that’s where we’re headed.
What about the iPods? I think the new nano should be called the iPod Mini Touch. It looks kinda, weird, don’t you think? I prefer iPod Nano 5g.