Apple announced the latest version of its Mac OS X operating system at WWDC. Mac OS X Yosemite features a new design and several new features; lets take a look at some of the best new features.
At last year's WWDC 2013 Apple launched iOS 7, which featured a redesigned user interface filled with new features. The company also unveiled Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks, its desktop operating system that runs on its Mac computers.
Apple used WWDC 2014 to show off Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite. The OS further adopted new features from iOS, including its very bright design, and now Yosemite and iOS 8 work even more seamlessly together. Let's take a look at some of OS X Yosemite's top features.
Messages - In OS X Mavericks, Messages allows you to text message other iOS users, but if your friends or family don't have an iPhone or iPad those messages only appear on your iPhone. With OS X Yosemite all of the SMS and MMS messages you receive on your iPhone will now appear in Messages regardless of what type of phone they are using. This makes texting a breeze when your iPhone is in another room or charging.
Phone - Your Mac will turn into a phone thanks to Yosemite when used with an iPhone. You can make and receive phone calls using your Mac and when your iPhone rings, the caller's name, number, and picture show up as a notification on your Mac. You can answer calls by simply clicking the notification and your Mac will instantly transform into a speakerphone. You can initiate calls via Contacts, Calendar, Messages, and Safari.
Handoff - Yosemite's new Handoff feature allows your Mac and iOS devices that are in close proximity to automatically pass whatever you're doing from one device to another. For instance, if you start writing an email on your iPhone and want to finish typing it on your iMac using a full keyboard, Handoff lets you automatically switch over and begin where you left off.
AirDrop - Apple has finally made it super-simple to share files between your Mac and iOS device in OS X Yosemite. The feature previously only worked with other computers on your network and wasn't able to AirDrop with iPhones and iPads (even though iOS devices could share between them). You'll now be able to drop things like documents, images, files, web pages and more from your Mac to your iOS device and vice versa.
Those are only a few of Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite's new features. For a full list, check out Apple's Yosemite preview site. Apple will release OS X Yosemite sometime this fall.
