Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard arrives on Friday, and this issue is packed with as much information as we can reveal (while still under NDA) about Apple’s next operating system. Matt Neuburg sorts through Apple’s list of 300 features to pick the best and worst of the lot. Rich Mogull examines some specific under-the-hood security improvements that may make your Mac dramatically more secure. Sharon Zardetto passes on some advice for those who still have important fonts in Classic. Apple Remote Desktop 3.2 and QuicKeys X3 3.2 both provide bug fixes and Leopard compatibility. And we’ve started selling the early-bird edition of Joe Kissell’s “Take Control of Upgrading to Leopard,” with pre-orders also now open for Matt Neuburg’s “Take Control of Customizing Leopard;” both titles will ship in full as soon as Leopard becomes available. A few non-Leopard bits managed to sneak into the issue, too: Apple’s quarterly earnings call revealed a record number of Macs sold, Apple announced that Orange will be the exclusive iPhone provider in France, and Steve Jobs confirmed that an iPhone software development kit is in progress and will be available in February 2008. If that weren’t enough, Apple reduced the price of iTunes Plus tracks from $1.29 to $0.99, and Tonya shares some tips for those who have trouble with links in PDFs.
Apple ended the fourth fiscal quarter of 2007 with a profit of $904 million on revenue of $6.22 billion, led by record sales of 2,164,000 Macs, 10.2 million iPods, and 1.1 million iPhones.
Apple chooses Orange as the French carrier for the iPhone, but interesting questions remain.
Steve Jobs writes a short note assuring his interest in allowing third-party development of programs for the iPhone (and, by the way, iPod touch), reminding us sternly of how dangerous mobile phone viruses and malware are, and setting a date for release of the software toolkit: February 2008.
iTunes Plus songs now cost just 99 cents, probably due to competition from Amazon.com's recently launched MP3 store, which charges 89 to 99 cents for the same music.
Apple has released Apple Remote Desktop 3.2 Admin and Client, fixing a variety of nagging bugs, improving performance in several situations, and adding Leopard compatibility.
If you use QuicKeys and are planning to upgrade to Leopard, make sure to install QuicKeys X3 3.2 first to ensure compatibility. You'll also find some new features and welcome bug fixes.
Few people have trouble viewing a PDF, but clicking links in PDFs is another story. If you've ever had trouble clicking a link in a PDF to go to a Web site, or have been nagged incessantly by Adobe Reader about visiting Web sites, read on for how to take control of your PDF-reading software.
Our speculation was correct: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard will go on sale on Friday, October 26th, 2007. Read on to learn about the specific times, prices, system requirements, and a hint about a Take Control ebook that's coming very soon.
Leopard is about to pounce! Now that Apple has posted its list of 300 new features, I'm allowed to say which ones I like best (and which one I hate the most).
Apple has focused a lot of attention on making Leopard more secure, and security analyst Rich Mogull looks at each of the promised features to explain how it will keep your data, your online communications, and your Mac safe.
If you're still hanging on to Classic, and to fonts that exist only in Classic, this might be a good time to straighten out any old font suitcases that you want to bring forward into Leopard.
Now that Leopard's ship date has been announced, we can release "Take Control of Upgrading to Leopard: Early-Bird Edition" with 60 pages of advice on preparing for your Leopard upgrade and with a free update to the 100+ full ebook as soon as Leopard becomes available.
TidBITS readers are talking this week about Leopard, Leopard, and Leopard, which (have you heard?) ships on Friday. But a few other topics, such as the end of AppleWorks and its file formats, iTunes Plus price cuts, and 3G iPhones are also on the table.