Mountain Lion: Gatekeeper

The most controversial feature of Mountain Lion has to be Gatekeeper.

Gatekeeper allows Apple and the owner the ability to limit what software can be installed on a given Mac. There a three different levels of security.

  1. First is how it is now: you can install everything and anything in your machine.
  2. Second is that you can install only programs that are on the App Store or programs that have been signed digitally by Apple (more on this later).
  3. Last is that you can only install software from the App Store.

Now, if you are the paranoid type, you’d probably expect that Apple would set #3 as the default setting for Mountain Lion. I’d probably have agreed with you because it would bring OS X in-line with iOS.

However, Apple has not done it that way. Instead, they are using #2 as the default setting and enabling code-signing through their developer program to add security to the platform while still allowing developers to sell their applications outside of the App Store.

That’s good. No, that’s great.

However, it does mean that instead of fielding questions about whether the program they are installing is safe, I will be fielding questions about why they can’t install an application they had on Lion or prior.

I’ll try and consider it a learning experience.

Personally, I think it is the correct balance to strike for security and flexibility. Even better because it was completely unexpected.

Mountain Lion: Decoupling Software

I’ll be posting my thoughts on Mountain Lion over the next months so I thought I’d just preface each of the posts with “Mountain Lion”. This is the first of those posts.

With the announcement of OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, Apple seems to be shifting away from tossing more and more features into the apps they already have. The first indication of this might have been a separate FaceTime application from iChat. Now, we see them take it to another level.

Here is some of the “decoupling” going on:

  • Separate Reminders app (taking them out of Calendar/iCal)
  • Separate Notes app (taking them out of Mail)
  • Separate FaceTime app (not baking into Messages/iChat)

The last one was already done, and you could argue that Messages/iChat has actually been added onto by tossing iMessage capability onto it, but it would have “made sense” to add FaceTime as well. That is not to mean there is no integration, but that there are separate apps.

Perhaps this is the start of a longer-term trend for the Mac? Will we see Music and Video coming soon as they try to decouple all of iTunes’s functionality into smaller, more nimble applications?

Regardless, it is a change to see more focused applications. That is on aspect of iOS I am happy to see coming over.

Apple Announces Mountain Lion

Apple has pulled a fast one on the entire internet (which is a pretty good feat these days) and announced that the next version of OS X is going to be released this summer and it is named … Mountain Lion.

Mountain Lion

I’ll have some thoughts on what has been announced soon (and I’ll be grabbing the Messages beta), but until then, I leave you with my reading list for Mountain Lion coverage:

It just feel so strange.

Categories
Life

My Quick Review of Clear

Everyone else seems to be talking about Realmac Software’s newest app, Clear for iPhone, that I thought I should chime in with one of my quick reviews! I’ve only used it for the past day … but there really isn’t too much to the app that I’m pretty confident I have it nailed.

Feature-wise, you’ll be saying “meh” quite a bit. There is no syncing, no sharing, no times, no dates, no places, etc. This is simply a list app. You make lists, you sort lists, you mark things off of your lists and … well, that’s about it. If you are looking for a task management app, go somewhere else.

However, after the “meh”, if you just use it for lists, is where people get a little excited (maybe a little too excited). Clear has almost no buttons and the interaction design in the application is pretty great. Here are some things you can do:

  • Swipe right to mark an item as complete
  • Swipe left to delete an item
  • Pull down a little to create a new item at the top of your list
  • Pull down a lot to go “back”
  • Pull fingers together to go “back”
  • Push fingers apart between items to create a new item between items
  • Pull up to clear completed items
  • Tap and hold to grab an item and then move it where you want it

That’s all I’ve got right now. It is very pretty, has some nice sounds, and is fun to use.

That’s about it. There isn’t much more to the app which is going to limit its appeal to many people and I could see the interaction being quite tricky for some people. I know that buttons are considered a “hack” on touch screens by some, but they are an enlightened hack. Having the interaction explicit can be considered good as well.

Verdict

It’s $0.99, you owe it to yourself to play with it. However, you’re probably going to go elsewhere after a day or two.

Good Job Microsoft

The title has no hint of sarcasm, honestly.

The Mobile IE team just posted a follow-up to their decision to implement a subset of Webkit’s vendor prefixes and it is nothing but good news:

After hearing the community’s feedback on this issue (and a couple of face-palms when we realized the broader implications of implementing other browser vendors’ CSS properties), we’ve decided that it’s best to only implement the -ms- prefixed version and not the -webkit- one.

That is music to my ears. Good job Microsoft, I applaud you.