Apple has released its latest version of OS X: Mountain Lion. Among its many new features is a tighter integration with iCloud, which keeps your mail, calendars, contacts, reminders, documents, notes, and more up to date wherever you use them. Simply sign in with your Apple ID and iCloud automatically sets up your apps to us it.
Hundreds of features have been added or updated, including:
- Reminders
- Notes
- Messages
- Notification Center
- Power Nap
- Dictation
- Sharing
- AirPlay
- Game Center
- Gatekeeper
- Safari
- … and 200 other features.
One item we here at ClearCode Software are particularly excited about is AirPlay Mirroring. This allows you to wirelessly mirror what is on your screen to your TV via an AppleTV. We currently use a product called AirParrot for wireless screen mirroring and this has been an invaluable tool for presentations and web site development.
AirParrot can also extended the desktop onto a remove AppleTV, a feature that is not specifically listed as part of OS X Mountain Lion. While Mirroring simply duplicates a local screen to a remote TV, running an extended desktop is more akin to having a true second screen. This mode is what we use for web site development as we throw programs back and forth between our local desktop and a remote AppleTV. We hope Apple has included desktop extending as part of their latest OS update.
OS X Mountain Lion is an exciting new update and is available now in the App Store for $19.99.