Wednesday, June 15, 2016

New macOS Sierra release date & new features: Mac OS X renamed; beta available now with public preview coming

Apple has announed an update and new name to its Mac operating system at its massive WWDC 2016 event in San Francisco on 13 June. Read on for our full round up of what's new in macOS Sierra, as well as the macOS Sierra release date news, compatible Macs and the beta and preview schedule. Watch the video above for our first impressions of macOS Sierra's new features.

OS X is no more: Apple announced at WWDC 2016 that the operating system for the Mac is now known as macOS to keep it in line with its other OS names (tvOS, iOS, watchOS 3). This year's update will be called macOS Sierra, and it's rolling out officially this autumn. For now, though, you can find out all about what's coming to a Mac near you with macOS Sierra, and when to expect to be able to get your hands on it (it might be sooner than you think thanks to the public preview).


MACOS Sierra UK release date: When is macOS Sierra coming out?

macOS Sierra will be available in the Autumn for the general public, so around September, but the public beta will be available from this summer, in July.
In fact, the developer preview is available right now. This follows Apple's usual pattern of introducing macOS updates; WWDC is the introduction to developers (who get instant access) but then consumers must wait until the official release - this will be in the autumn, around September and most likely will coincide with the launch of iOS 10 and new iPhones, although Apple has been known to launch its Mac operating systems a bit later in October too.
There is the option of joining the public beta programme to get early access to macOS Sierra, which is likely to begin in July. If you join the public beta programme you'll be able to download and install a pre-release build of the software and try it out for yourself, but be warned that it's likely to be buggy and may cause problems with existing software. It would be wise to install the macOS Sierra beta on a secondary Mac rather than the machine you need for work.
We've taken a look at how to install macOS Sierra, so you can head over to our write up right now.

macOS Sierra price UK: How much will macOS Sierra cost?

macOS Sierra will be a free update to Mac users using compatible devices, following the pattern that Apple has stuck too since OS X Mavericks in 2013. For a full run down of the expected system requirements for macOS Sierra, read: which Macs can run macOS Sierra?

macOS Sierra new features: What's new in macOS Sierra?


Auto Unlock with Apple Watch


Apple is putting several new features into the OS. The first announced on the night was Auto Unlock which allows you to unlock your Mac using your Apple Watch. No more typing in lengthy passwords after the screen goes off! A small addition, but no doubt will prove useful to those who have invested in the Watch.

Universal Clipboard

Universal Clipboard was slightly overlooked, but it is a new, great way to sync your copy and paste data between devices. This could be best put into practice with an iPad Pro and a Mac: drawing direct onto the iPad before intelligently copying and pasting onto Mac documents. This is a great way of syncing information between devices and will stop the brain-hurt of emailing yourself pictures or even sticking stuff in the cloud to download to another device.

iCloud Drive and Optimised Storge

iCloud Drive is also receiving a much needed update. For those of us familiar with sprinkling our Mac desktops with files that we need, rejoice - those files are mirrored on your other Macs (if you're rich) and on your iPhone.
Optimised storage for iCloud will automatically back up older files, particularly those that you'll never use again like cache files. It'll make your storage go a lot further before you have to forl out for more, which is great news and nice to see Apple thinking about the smaller nuances of its services.


Apple Pay

A further excellent feature coming to macOS Sierra is Apple Pay for Mac. Apple Pay icons will now appear on the buy pages of certain merchants - all you need do is verify your purchases with Touch ID on your iPhone or using your Apple Watch. This will be initially supported in nine countries.
Ahead of Apple's keynote, rumours had suggested that at some point Apple will add a Touch ID fingerprint scanner to its Mac range. This more conservative way of introducing Apple Pay to the Mac still provides many of the benefits, and it's still possible that Touch ID will eventually come to the Mac, too. However, the introduction of Auto Unlock mentioned above seems to be the solution to unlocking the Mac securely without the need for Touch ID.

Tabs

Tabs have also been lovingly reimagined - no longer restricted to Safari, those apps that allow for tabs now (with no developer work needed) will allow you to multi-tab.

Picture-in-Picture

Picture-in-Picture mode allows you to thumbnail view photos and, more impressively, videos from certain apps while doing other things. So long, productivity! Although, for those who work in video editing, features like this will be another Godsend.

Siri for Mac


After all the little bits and pieces, Apple showed us what we were hoping for - Siri on a Mac. A particuarly useful and impressive feature that was demoed live on stage was searching through documents using Siri. The voice assistant will also let you be far more flexible with macOS Sierra - you'll be able to image search online with Siri, and have the ability to drag and drop those images directly into a plethora of apps.

Siri is already on iPhone, iPad and even the Apple TV, so it was only a matter of time before Siri came to Mac too. After all, Microsoft already has Cortana in Windows (and has done since Windows 8.1) and Chrome has Google Now.

Collected from : http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/mac-software/

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