Today, Apple held their annual World Wide Developers Conference (live coverage and updates from the event can be found here). Aside from announcing iOS 6, revealing minor upgrades to the MacBook Air and a completely redesigned MacBook Pro, Apple also announced new features for OS X Mountain Lion.
One of the more exciting announcements for Apple’s upcoming OS X installment is Dictation. While Dictation will provide users with an alternate method of text input, OS X will still lack complete Siri functionally found on the iPhone 4S and the new third-generation iPad (when iOS 6 is released).
Additionally, “Power Nap” will also make an appearance in Mountain Lion. Essentially, the new feature will force your Mac to periodically check and update Mail, Calendar, Reminders, Contacts, Photo Stream, Notes, Find My Mac and documents data stored in iCloud. Moreover, when a Mac with Power Nap enabled is connected to a power source, it can and will download software updates and initiate Time Machine backups.
Further information regarding Notification Center, Sharing, Facebook integration AirPlay mirroring, Game Center and Safari updates were also announced. For those of you who are curious, here’s a list of all of Mountain Lion’s main features (from Apple):
As far as pricing goes, Mountain Lion (10.8) will be available for an upgrade price of just $19.99 – that’s $10 cheaper than the Lion upgrade! Customers will be able to upgrade to 10.8 via the App Store from as low as OS X Snow Leopard.
The new Macs, also revealed at WWDC, will ship with Lion and if purchased, will receive a free upgrade to Mountain Lion when it’s officially released next month. Stay tuned for more coverage on Apple and today’s announcements.
