Mac OS X ?

[Bushwacker]

Can anyone tell me how many versions of OS X there is?

 

[ex2bot]

How many versions have been released? Not including the public beta, there was 10.0, 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, and 10.4.

Of course, there were, what?, five versions of 10.0 (10.0 to 10.0.4), six versions of 10.1 (10.1 to 10.1.5), nine versions of 10.2 (10.2 yikes! to 10.2.8), ten versions of 10.3 (10.3 to 10.3.9), and thus far three versions of 10.4 (10.4 to 10.4.2).

Of course, 10.3.8 (I think) was pulled and re-released. And Java has been updated a few times, there have been dozens of security patches, and I personally updated my Flash plug-in for Safari to version 8 or whatever because someone said it was faster.

What else do you want to know?

dougbot

 

[RacerX]

Can anyone tell me how many versions of OS X there is?

As Mac OS X derives much of it's heritage from earlier NeXT releases, here is a list of the NeXT/Apple OS from version 0.8 to 5.6:

NeXTstep 0.8
NeXTstep 1.0
NeXTSTEP 2.0
NeXTSTEP 2.1
NEXTSTEP 3.0
NEXTSTEP 3.1
NEXTSTEP 3.2
NEXTSTEP 3.3
OPENSTEP 4.0
OPENSTEP 4.1
OPENSTEP 4.2
Rhapsody Developer Release (Rhapsody 5.0)
Rhapsody Developer Release 2 (Rhapsody 5.1)
Rhapsody Premier (Rhapsody 5.2- never released)
Mac OS X Server 1.0 (Rhapsody 5.3)
Mac OS X Server 1.0.1 (Rhapsody 5.4)
Mac OS X Server 1.0.2 (Rhapsody 5.5)
Mac OS X Server 1.2 (Rhapsody 5.6)
Mac OS X Server 1.2 v.3 (Rhapsody 5.6 also)​

After the release of Rhapsody 5.1 Apple started work on Mac OS X. The versions for Mac OS X are as follows:

Mac OS X Developer Preview
Mac OS X Developer Preview 2
Mac OS X Developer Preview 2.6 (aqua demo)
Mac OS X Developer Preview 3
Mac OS X Developer Preview 4
Mac OS X Public Beta
Mac OS X v. 10.0 (10.0.0-10.0.4)
Mac OS X v. 10.1 (10.1.0-10.1.5)
Mac OS X v. 10.2 (10.2.0-10.2.8)
Mac OS X v. 10.3 (10.3.0-10.3.5)
Mac OS X v. 10.4 (10.4.0-10.4.2)​

When Apple started Mac OS X they felt a need to relieve themselves of some undue licensing restrictions that had been following the NeXT/Apple OS from it's conception in the late 1980s. The new foundation was named Darwin. Here are the releases (that correspond to Mac OS X releases):

Mac OS 10.0 (Mac OS X Developer Preview)
Mac OS 10.0 (Mac OS X Developer Preview 2)
Darwin 1.0 (Mac OS X Developer Preview 3)
Darwin 1.1 (Mac OS X Developer Preview 4)
Darwin 1.2.1 (Mac OS X Public Beta)
Darwin 1.3.1 (Mac OS X v. 10.0)
Darwin 1.4.1 (Mac OS X v. 10.1)
Darwin 5.1-5.5 (Mac OS X v. 10.1.1-10.1.5)
Darwin 6.0-6.8 (Mac OS X v. 10.2.0-10.2.8)
Darwin 7.0-7.9 (Mac OS X v. 10.3.0-10.3.9)*
Darwin 8.0-8.2 (Mac OS X v. 10.4.0-10.4.2)​

I think that is a pretty complete listing to date. The Darwin list is the hardest to follow as Apple changed the version numbers with Mac OS X 10.1.1, and that the earliest developer previews displayed Mac OS 10.0 rather than Darwin.

Does that answer your question?


*for some reason 10.3.1 displays Darwin 7.0 when it should have been 7.1

 

[ex2bot]

Touche' RacerX!

Of course, all versions of OS X that I've seen have Classic running OS 9, preceeded by 8.x, etc.

And OS X owes important brains to Free BSD and UCLA's and CMU's work . . .

And the fine folks who developed OpenGL and Java and

All the way back to the dinosaurs. I mean the difference engine. Or the abacus. Or the first time a man counted to 21. Or something.

Alec

 

[Bushwacker]

Seems like a lot. What if I would of said "Estimated number of Titles" would that make a difference?

BTW thank you for such excellent replies.

 

[RacerX]

Touche' RacerX!

Well, I didn't know that you were posting... we posted at almost the same time.

Of course, all versions of OS X that I've seen have Classic running OS 9, preceeded by 8.x, etc.

That is an interesting thing to look at... what were the versions of the Mac OS used in the Mac OS compatibility environments... Well, this is what I have on that subject:

Rhapsody Developer Release... Mac OS 8.0*
Rhapsody Developer Release 2... Mac OS 8.1
Mac OS X Server 1.0... Mac OS 8.5
Mac OS X Server 1.0.1... Mac OS 8.5.1
Mac OS X Server 1.0.2... Mac OS 8.5.1
Mac OS X Server 1.2... Mac OS 8.6
Mac OS X Server 1.2 v.3... Mac OS 8.6
Mac OS X Developer Preview... Mac OS 8.6
Mac OS X Developer Preview 2... unknown (I think Mac OS 9)
Mac OS X Developer Preview 3... Mac OS 9
Mac OS X Developer Preview 4... Mac OS 9.0.4
Mac OS X Public Beta... Mac OS 9.0.4
Mac OS X v10.0... Mac OS 9.1
Mac OS X v10.1... Mac OS 9.2.x
Mac OS X v10.2... Mac OS 9.2.2
Mac OS X v10.3... Mac OS 9.2.2
Mac OS X v10.4... Mac OS 9.2.2​

* Blue Box was not released until months later as it was not ready at the same time as Rhapsody DR. All later releases of Rhapsody/Mac OS X Server came with Blue Box on the same installation CD... which is optional (only one of my three Rhapsody systems has Blue Box installed).

And OS X owes important brains to Free BSD and UCLA's and CMU's work . . .

Well, it start with 4.3BSD (with the original release of NEXTSTEP), and later 4.4BSD then 4.4BSD Lite. During the Rhapsody days many of the parts Apple used came from OpenBSD and NetBSD. It wasn't until Darwin that Apple started using mainly FreeBSD.

I think people should know that OpenBSD and NetBSD were used at one point (before Apple focused on FreeBSD).

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

Seems like a lot. What if I would of said "Estimated number of Titles" would that make a difference?

BTW thank you for such excellent replies.

If you wanna know how many final releases of OS X (as we know it) made it to the general public (i.e., you could buy a boxed set in a store), then that would be about 5:

10.0.x "Puma"
10.1.x "Cheetah"
10.2.x "Jaguar"
10.3.x "Panther"
10.4.x "Tiger"

 

[Mikuro]

Not much to add to the shockingly thorough posts above. I just want to mention that until 10.2 "Jaguar", the cat names were code names, not used as official public names.

 

[RacerX]

...made it to the general public (i.e., you could buy a boxed set in a store)...

Well, then we shouldn't over look the early Mac OS X Server releases (that weren't associated with Mac OS X releases). Mac OS X Server 1.0, 1.2 and 1.2v3 were all sold in boxes in stores (starting in the spring of 1999 and ending in the summer of 2001 with the release of Mac OS X Server 10.0.3).

I still have two out of my three boxes for those versions (and still have all the media and documentation for all three).

While some people only thought of those versions as being for servers, many people (like me) used them as workstations. In fact until Mac OS X was released* the only way to do WebObjects development on a Mac was with Mac OS X Server. Otherwise you were forced to work on a PC in Windows NT 4.0 Workstation or 2000 Professional.




* As I recall Apple didn't release WebObjects developer tools for Mac OS X until WWDC in May of 2001. On the CD Apple provided for developers that year you were given the WebObjects developer tools installer and for those who didn't already have a WebObjects license there was an expiring license string that ended on September 30, 2001.

 

[fryke]

Cheetah was 10.0, Puma was 10.1. Sorry, had to correct you here, ElDiablo... So:

10.0.x "Cheetah"
10.1.x "Puma"
10.2.x "Jaguar"
10.3.x "Panther"
10.4.x "Tiger"

 

[ex2bot]

It would have been a LOT of fun to play around with the early versions of OS X Server. I saw an early review. But I started at 10.0.3 (for a week before 10.0.4 came out) and switched almost exclusively to OS X at 10.1.

Remember the 30 second beachballs? Zen and the art of 10.1.

10.2, for me, still had some 30 second beachballs. Not as many. That must have been Finder. Finder would get stuck waiting for something and sit down and cry.

Anywhoo. . .

Doug

 

[nixgeek]

I played around briefly with Mac OS X Server 1.0 at my old workplace. Quite an interesting beast. Of course, my Linux/Unix skills weren't like they are now, so I couldn't find much use for it other than to open windows here and there.

Hopefully I can come across it again. It was a nice moment in the Mac OS's history.

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

Cheetah was 10.0, Puma was 10.1. Sorry, had to correct you here, ElDiablo...

Oops! Thanks!

 

[RacerX]

I played around briefly with Mac OS X Server 1.0 at my old workplace. Quite an interesting beast. Of course, my Linux/Unix skills weren't like they are now, so I couldn't find much use for it other than to open windows here and there.

Really? I can't remember the last time I opened up a terminal in any of my Rhapsody-based systems ( well, not exactly true, I'm pretty sure I used the terminal a few times a couple weeks ago when setting up my 8600 for the first time and changing the 7500 over to it's server tasks).

I spend most of my time in Rhapsody doing either web design or page layout in Create 10.0. All of my Rhapsody Resource Page (which will soon be moved to www.rhapsodyos.org) was made using Rhapsody based tools on my Rhapsody systems. And oddly enough (because I didn't set out to do it) most of my NEXTSTEP and OPENSTEP Resource Page was made in Rhapsody too.

There isn't that much I can't do in Rhapsody that I can do in Mac OS X. This morning I was doing some simple sound editing in Rhapsody (using Resound 3.0). I did some quick image corrections yesterday using ToyViewer and PixelNhance, and browsed some image CDs using ToyAlbum.

Granted, most people had no idea what apps were out there for Rhapsody... and no idea where to find them, but they did/do exist. For me, Create having illustration, webdesign and page layout abilities covers a great many bases. ToyViewer, PixelNhance and TIFFany 3 can do most of the image correction, editing and processing that I need. And if TextEdit (I use an Objective C version, not Apple's Java version) didn't cover what I needed as a word processor, there is always WriteUp or even PasteUp (another page layout application). For what browsing I do in Rhapsody OmniWeb 3 is fine (and it is great as a HTML source editor) and RBrowser has all my FTP needs covered.

And then there are games. I have four versions of DOOM (Ultimate DOOM, DOOM II, Final Doom: The Plutonia Experiment, Final Doom: TNT - Evilution), Heretic and Quake II installed on my 8600 (I have a page on that stuff here). Plus I have Balling, Hextris, FarmersMahJongg and some other games on there, so I have plenty of entertainment.

And I can even play music. I currently use MacOSXAmp as my mp3 player, but I could also run iTunes in Blue Box (I recently modified a version of iTunes 1.0 to run in Mac OS 8.6).

The Unix side of these systems is nice... but I rarely use it myself.

10.2, for me, still had some 30 second beachballs. Not as many. That must have been Finder. Finder would get stuck waiting for something and sit down and cry.

Wow.

I've been using 10.2 exclusively on my PowerBook (my primary system) and iMac (my backup) since it was released in August of 2002. In fact it replaced the original Mac OS X Server 1.2 installation I had on this PowerBook. Even though I got 10.3 shortly after it came out, I didn't have it installed on any systems here until I got my wife her PowerBook. I now have a copy of 10.4 sitting around here (unused) too.

Yeah, 10.2 has been... well, perfect for me. I've had incredible uptimes (once getting past 260 days before the power took my system down) and I rarely see any crashing (I think Mail has crash twice, Photoshop three times, GoLive six times, ImageReady and LiveMotion have never crashed, Create four times, Acrobat twice and the Finder four times since September 2002).

I know that this type of performance is rare (I get calls from clients using 10.2, 10.3 and 10.4 all the time with issues), but for me I couldn't be happier with 10.2. It does what I need and is (nearly) completely trouble free. Which is good as I don't have the same type of patience for problems on my own systems that I do with my clients systems (I think it is the same reason why doctors don't have family members as patients).

 

[nixgeek]

Really? I can't remember the last time I opened up a terminal in any of my Rhapsody-based systems ( well, not exactly true, I'm pretty sure I used the terminal a few times a couple weeks ago when setting up my 8600 for the first time and changing the 7500 over to it's server tasks).

I spend most of my time in Rhapsody doing either web design or page layout in Create 10.0. All of my Rhapsody Resource Page (which will soon be moved to www.rhapsodyos.org) was made using Rhapsody based tools on my Rhapsody systems. And oddly enough (because I didn't set out to do it) most of my NEXTSTEP and OPENSTEP Resource Page was made in Rhapsody too.

There isn't that much I can't do in Rhapsody that I can do in Mac OS X. This morning I was doing some simple sound editing in Rhapsody (using Resound 3.0). I did some quick image corrections yesterday using ToyViewer and PixelNhance, and browsed some image CDs using ToyAlbum.

Granted, most people had no idea what apps were out there for Rhapsody... and no idea where to find them, but they did/do exist. For me, Create having illustration, webdesign and page layout abilities covers a great many bases. ToyViewer, PixelNhance and TIFFany 3 can do most of the image correction, editing and processing that I need. And if TextEdit (I use an Objective C version, not Apple's Java version) didn't cover what I needed as a word processor, there is always WriteUp or even PasteUp (another page layout application). For what browsing I do in Rhapsody OmniWeb 3 is fine (and it is great as a HTML source editor) and RBrowser has all my FTP needs covered.

And then there are games. I have four versions of DOOM (Ultimate DOOM, DOOM II, Final Doom: The Plutonia Experiment, Final Doom: TNT - Evilution), Heretic and Quake II installed on my 8600 (I have a page on that stuff here). Plus I have Balling, Hextris, FarmersMahJongg and some other games on there, so I have plenty of entertainment.

And I can even play music. I currently use MacOSXAmp as my mp3 player, but I could also run iTunes in Blue Box (I recently modified a version of iTunes 1.0 to run in Mac OS 8.6).

The Unix side of these systems is nice... but I rarely use it myself.

Again, I was still a little new to the Rhapsody experience. I would love to play with it again today as I would probably be able to do a lot more with it now, espeically considering the great Rhapsody resource we have here in you.

Now if only I could find it so I can install it on my StarMax. Linux is just too slow on it (although it's bearable) and OS 9 just doesn't do it for me.