Saturday’s release of Mac OS 9 dictates the tone for this issue, with in-depth coverage of Apple’s latest version of the Mac OS. Geoff Duncan first looks at Mac OS 9 installation and compatibility issues and then focuses on three major features in Mac OS 9: Sherlock 2, Multiple Users, and the Keychain. Tune in next week for more Mac OS 9 coverage. Also this week, we cover the releases of Action Menus 1.0, Microsoft Outlook Express 5.0, and iDo Script Scheduler 1.1.
Now Menus Reincarnated as Action Menus -- Power On Software has released Action Menus 1.0, a new component of the company's Action Utilities control panel that provides functionality equivalent to the defunct Now Menus (see "Living in the Now - Now Utilities 5.0, Newer and Better" in TidBITS-248 and "Now Utilities Turns 6-Point-Something" in TidBITS-345)
Microsoft Outlook Express 5.0 Ships -- Microsoft has released Outlook Express 5.0, a major upgrade to the company's free Internet email and Usenet news client
iDo Script Scheduler 1.1 -- Sophisticated Circuits has released version 1.1 of its iDo Script Scheduler, a system enhancement that enables users to schedule execution of AppleScript scripts
Poll Results: Appeal of Digital Video Editing -- We're getting together this week for a staff lunch of eating our hats, since none of us expected that digital video editing would be nearly as popular with TidBITS readers as last week's poll indicated
Poll Preview: Mac OS 9 Upgrade Plans -- You'll read about Mac OS 9's major features and compatibility in this issue, and our Mac OS 9 coverage will continue next week
Apple has released Mac OS 9 with fanfare, billing it as "the best Internet OS ever" and touting more than 50 new features. Some of these features add significant new capabilities (like file sharing over the Internet, encryption, support for multiple users, and automatic software updating via the Internet); other features mark the return of old ideas (the Keychain password management tool, a Sound control panel, and flexible PlainTalk speech recognition); and still other features are extensions of previous enhancements, like the almost unrecognizable Sherlock 2
Although Apple claims there are 50 new features in Mac OS 9, most people are likely to care about only a few. The question is: do Mac OS 9's new features make it compelling for you? This article takes quick looks at some major features in Mac OS 9, and next week we'll look at additional features, more subtle changes, and under-the-hood tweaks.
Sherlock 2 -- The most-hyped feature of Mac OS 9 is Sherlock 2, a significant revision to the Internet-enabled Find feature that debuted with Mac OS 8.5