macOSX Mountain Lion 10.8

OS X Mountain Lion 10.8: The Ultimate Refinement

Released on July 25, 2012, OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion followed the "tick-tock" release cycle established by Snow Leopard. If Lion was the bold explorer of new iOS-inspired ideas, Mountain Lion was the polished professional that perfected them, bringing over 200 new features to the Mac.

The Arrival of Notification Center

Mountain Lion finally solved the problem of scattered alerts by introducing the Notification Center.

• A New Sidebar: A simple swipe from the right edge of the trackpad revealed a sleek sidebar containing all your missed messages, calendar alerts, and system warnings.

• "Do Not Disturb": This release introduced the ability to silence all notifications with a single click—a godsend for presenters and focused workers.

Deep iCloud Integration

Mountain Lion was the first version of OS X built from the ground up to live in the cloud.

• Documents in the Cloud: Apps like Pages, Numbers, and Keynote now featured a unified "Open" dialog that displayed files stored on iCloud alongside local files.

• Messages: Replacing the aging iChat, the new Messages app brought iMessage to the Mac, allowing for seamless conversations that synced across iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

Notes, Reminders, and Game Center

Continuing the "Back to the Mac" trend, Apple brought several popular iOS apps to the desktop as standalone programs:

• Notes & Reminders: No longer buried inside Mail or Calendar, these became dedicated, easy-to-use apps.

• Game Center: Brought social gaming, leaderboards, and multiplayer matchmaking to the Mac for the first time.

• AirPlay Mirroring: This allowed users to wirelessly stream their entire Mac screen to an Apple TV with zero configuration.

Security: Gatekeeper

To combat the rise of malware, Mountain Lion introduced Gatekeeper. This security feature allowed users to choose between allowing apps from "Anywhere," just the "App Store," or the "App Store and Identified Developers," giving users a powerful shield against unverified software.