Terminal (OS X)

Terminal (Terminal.app) is the terminal emulator included in the OS X operating system by Apple. Terminal originated in NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP, the predecessor operating systems of OS X.

As a terminal emulator, the application provides text-based access to the operating system, in contrast to the mostly graphical nature of the user experience of OS X, by providing a command line interface to the operating system when used in conjunction with a Unix shell, such as bash.

The preferences dialog for Terminal.app in OS X 10.8 (Mountain Lion) and later offers choices for values of the TERM environment variable. Available options are ansi, dtterm, nsterm, rxvt, vt52, vt100, vt102, xterm, xterm-16color and xterm-256color, which differ from the OS X 10.5 (Leopard) choices by dropping the xterm-color and adding xterm-16color and xterm-256color. These settings do not alter the operation of Terminal, and the xterm settings do not match the behavior of xterm.

Terminal includes several features that specifically access OS X APIs and features. These include the ability to use the standard OS X Help search function to find manual pages and integration with Spotlight. Terminal was used by Apple as a showcase for OS X graphics APIs in early advertising of Mac OS X, offering a range of custom font and coloring options, including transparent backgrounds.

OS X

OS X (pronounced /oʊˌɛsˈtɛn/, oh-ess-TEN; originally Mac OS X) is a series of Unix-based graphical interface operating systems (OS) developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is designed to run on Macintosh computers, having been pre-installed on all Macs since 2002. OS X is the fourth most popular general purpose OS; within the market of desktop, laptop and home computers, and by web usage, OS X is the second most widely used desktop OS after Windows.

OS X was the successor to Mac OS 9, released in 1999, the final release of the "classic" Mac OS, which had been Apple's primary operating system since 1984. The first version released was Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999; a desktop version, Mac OS X v10.0 "Cheetah" followed on March 24, 2001. All consumer releases of OS X up to 2013 were named after big cats; for example, OS X v10.8 was referred to as "Mountain Lion". However, with the announcement of OS X Mavericks in June 2013, this was dropped in favor of Californian landmarks.

OS X, whose X is the Roman numeral for 10 and is a prominent part of its brand identity, is built on technologies developed at NeXT between the second half of the 1980s and Apple's purchase of the company in late 1996. The 'X' is also used to emphasize the relatedness between OS X and UNIX. UNIX 03 certification has been achieved for versions 10.5 for Intel CPUs, and versions 10.6 through 10.11.iOS, the mobile OS for the iPhone, iPod Touch,iPad, and the 2nd and 3rd generation Apple TV, shares the Unix-based core and many frameworks with OS X. An unnamed variant of v10.4 powers the first generation Apple TV. Apple also formerly issued a separate line of editions for server use.

Mac OS X 10.1

Mac OS X version 10.1, code named Puma, is the second major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system. It superseded Mac OS X 10.0 and preceded Mac OS X 10.2. Version 10.1 was released on September 25, 2001 as a free update for Mac OS X 10.0 users. The operating system was handed out for no charge by Apple employees after Steve Jobs' keynote speech at the Seybold publishing conference in San Francisco. It was subsequently distributed to Mac users on October 25, 2001 at Apple Stores and other retail stores that carried Apple products. The operating system was better received than Mac OS X 10.0, although critics claimed that the operating system was still lacking some features and was plagued with bugs.

System requirements

Supported computers:

RAM:

Hard Drive Space:

Features

Apple introduced many features that were missing from the previous version, as well as improving overall system performance.

Mac OS X Snow Leopard

Mac OS X Snow Leopard (version 10.6) is the seventh major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers.

Snow Leopard was publicly unveiled on June 8, 2009 at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. On August 28, 2009, it was released worldwide, and was made available for purchase from Apple's website and its retail stores at the price of US$29 for a single-user license. As a result of the low price, initial sales of Snow Leopard were significantly higher than that of its predecessors. The release of Snow Leopard came nearly two years after the introduction of Mac OS X Leopard, the second longest time span between successive Mac OS X releases (the time span between Tiger and Leopard was the longest).

Unlike those of previous versions of Mac OS X, the goals of Snow Leopard were improved performance, greater efficiency and the reduction of its overall memory footprint. Addition of new end-user features was not a primary consideration: its name signified its goal to be a refinement of the previous OS X version, Leopard. Much of the software in Mac OS X was extensively rewritten for this release in order to take advantage fully of modern Macintosh hardware. New programming frameworks, such as OpenCL, were created, allowing software developers to use graphics cards in their applications. This is also the first Mac OS release since System 7.1.1 that does not support Macs using PowerPC processors, as Apple now intends to focus on its current line of Intel-based products. As support for Rosetta was dropped in OS X Lion, Snow Leopard is the last version of Mac OS X that is able to run PowerPC-only applications.

OS X El Capitan

OS X El Capitan (el-KAP-ɪ-TAN) (version 10.11) is the twelfth major release of OS X, Apple Inc.'s desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. It is the successor to OS X Yosemite and focuses mainly on performance, stability and security. Following the California landmark-based naming scheme introduced with OS X Mavericks, El Capitan was named after a rock formation in Yosemite National Park.

The first beta of OS X El Capitan was released to developers shortly following the 2015 WWDC keynote on June 8, 2015. The first public beta was made available on July 9, 2015. There were multiple betas released after the keynote. OS X El Capitan was released to end users on September 30, 2015, as a free upgrade through the Mac App Store.

System requirements

All Macintosh computers that can run OS X Mavericks or Yosemite can run El Capitan, although not all of its features will work on older computers. For example, Apple notes that newly available Metal API is available on "all Macs since 2012".

Mac OS X Lion

Mac OS X Lion (version 10.7; marketed as OS X Lion) is the eighth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers.

A preview of Lion was publicly unveiled at the "Back to the Mac" Apple Special Event on October 20, 2010. It brings many developments made in Apple's iOS, such as an easily navigable display of installed applications, to the Mac, and includes support for the Mac App Store, as introduced in Mac OS X Snow Leopard version 10.6.6. On February 24, 2011, the first developer's preview of Lion (11A390) was released to subscribers to the Apple Developer program. Other developer previews were subsequently released, with Lion Preview 4 (11A480b) being released at WWDC 2011.

Lion was released to manufacturing on July 1, 2011, followed by its final release via the Mac App Store on July 20, 2011. Apple reported over one million Lion sales on the first day of its release.As of October 2011, Mac OS X Lion has sold over six million copies worldwide.

Mac OS X 10.0

Mac OS X version 10.0, code named Cheetah, is the first major release of OS X, Apple’s desktop and server operating system. Mac OS X 10.0 was released on March 24, 2001 for a price of US$129. It was the successor of the Mac OS X Public Beta and the predecessor of Mac OS X 10.1.

Mac OS X 10.0 was a radical departure from the previous classic Macintosh operating system (Mac OS) and was Apple’s long awaited answer for a next generation Macintosh operating system. It introduced a brand new code base completely separate from Mac OS 9's, as well as all previous Apple operating systems. Mac OS X introduced the new Darwin Unix-like core and a completely new system of memory management. Cheetah proved to be a rocky start to the Mac OS X line, plagued with missing features and performance issues, although it was praised for being a good start to an operating system still in its infancy, in terms of completeness and overall operating system stability. Unlike later releases of Mac OS X, the cat-themed code name was not used in marketing the new operating system.