Apple OS X Mountain Lion Available in July From Mac App Store

By michaels

Apple today announced that OS X Mountain Lion, the ninth major release of the world’s most advanced desktop operating system, will be available in July as a download from the Mac App Store. Mountain Lion introduces more than 200 innovative features including the all new Messages app, Notification Center, system-wide Sharing, Facebook integration (a Dictation, Power Nap, AirPlay Mirroring, Game Center and the enhanced security of Gatekeeper. With iCloud built into the foundation of OS X, Mountain Lion makes it easier than ever to keep your content up to date across all your devices. Note that Facebook integration will be available in an upcoming software update to Mountain Lion.


The new Gatekeeper feature is especially interesting, since it significantly increases the security of the operating system. It does this by making the downloading of software from the Internet safer by giving you control over which apps can be installed on your Mac. You can choose to install apps from anywhere, just as you do today, or for maximum security you can set Gatekeeper to allow only apps from the Mac App Store. The default setting allows you to install apps from the Mac App Store and apps from developers that have a unique Developer ID from Apple. In addition to checking daily for security updates, Mountain Lion includes app sandboxing to keep misbehaving apps from compromising your system, and kernel Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) for improved protection against buffer overflow attacks. Note that this last feature has been present in Windows since the much maligned Vista was released in 2006. Well done Apple, for finally catching up after over five years. The new OS requires the following core system specs to run properly: Lion or Snow Leopard (OS X v10.6.8 or later), 2GB of memory and 8GB of available space.

And the price for all these many improvements? A very reasonable $19.99. This looks like a must-have, no-brainer upgrade for any Mac user. Full details are available at the link below.

“The pace of innovation on the Mac is amazing, OS X Mountain Lion comes just a year after the incredibly successful launch of Lion,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “With iCloud built right in and the new Notification Center, Messages, Dictation, Facebook integration and more, this is the best OS X yet.”

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