OS X Yosemite
OS X Yosemite (/joʊˈsɛmɪti/ yoh-SEM-it-ee; version 10.10) is the eleventh major release of macOS, Apple Inc.'s desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers.
"Mac OS X 10.10" redirects here. Not to be confused with Mac OS X 10.1.Developer
Closed, with open source components
October 16, 2014
10.10.5 (Build 14F2511)[2] / July 19, 2017
Apple - OS X Yosemite - Overview at the Wayback Machine (archived August 28, 2015)
Every bit as powerful as it looks.
OS X Yosemite was announced and released to developers on June 2, 2014, at WWDC 2014 and released to public beta testers on July 24, 2014. Yosemite was released to consumers on October 16, 2014.[4] Following the Northern California landmark-based naming scheme introduced with OS X Mavericks, Yosemite is named after the national park.
All Macintosh computers capable of running OS X Mountain Lion (v10.8.x) are able to run Yosemite as the two operating systems have the same requirements.[5] However, to take full advantage of the Handoff feature, additional minimum system requirements include a Mac with Bluetooth LE (Bluetooth 4.0). As with Mavericks and Mountain Lion, 2 GB of RAM, 8 GB of available storage, and Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.8 or later are required.
These are the models that are compatible with OS X Yosemite:
These are the models that support new features such as Handoff, Instant Hotspot as well as AirDrop between Mac computers and iOS devices:[6]
Features[edit]
Default wallpaper[edit]
The default desktop wallpaper is an image of Half Dome.
Design[edit]
Yosemite introduced a major overhaul of OS X's user interface, emphasizing flat graphic design over skeuomorphism, following the aesthetic introduced with iOS 7. It is the first major redesign of the OS X user interface since 10.5 Leopard. Other changes include thinner fonts and blurred translucency effects. Some icons have been changed to correspond with those of iOS 7 and iOS 8. Yosemite maintains the OS X desktop metaphor.[7]
Other design changes include new icons, light and dark color schemes, and the replacement of Lucida Grande with Helvetica Neue as the default system typeface.[8][9][10] Yosemite is the only macOS version to use Helvetica Neue as the default typeface, as in El Capitan it was again changed, this time to Apple's own, newly-designed San Francisco typeface. In Yosemite, the Dock is a 2D translucent rectangular strip instead of a skeuomorphic glass shelf, reminiscent of the Dock design used in early versions of OS X through Tiger and in iOS since iOS 7.
Beta testing[edit]
Apple initiated a new public beta program for OS X, a practice not seen with its operating systems since 2000's US$29.95 Mac OS X Public Beta, which had preceded the release of Mac OS X v10.0. Yosemite is part of the OS X Beta Seed Program, a public program that allows the first 1 million[22] users to download and test the Yosemite beta at no charge. Beta testers are required to acknowledge the potential risks involved with prerelease software, and sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA).[23] The program began releasing Public Betas on July 24, 2014.[24] Six public betas of Yosemite were released.
Reception[edit]
On release, Yosemite received positive reviews, with users praising the simplified user interface. Programmer John Siracusa, who had reviewed every OS release, wrote for Ars Technica that "Yosemite is an aesthetic one-way valve... switching back to Mavericks after a week or two in Yosemite is like returning to iOS 6. Everything looks embarrassingly chunky, glossy, and gaudy."[25] Macworld's review generally praised Yosemite for its design, but noted that it had found WiFi network issues and that Continuity had proved unreliable.[26]
Yosemite faced problems with network stability and the discoveryd DNS program. Because of this, Apple replaced discoveryd with the mDNSResponder system (used in Mavericks) in 10.10.4.[27] Another notable bug experienced on Yosemite was the 'Unicode of death' problem, following a similar bug in 2013, in which a meaningless Arabic text string could crash applications using the system text-display APIs.[28] Some users who upgraded to Yosemite complained that the Finder fails to show the contents of folders.[29]
Spotlight on Yosemite by default reports the user's current location (at the city level) and all their search queries to Apple and third parties.[30][31][32][33] Reporting by Spotlight can be disabled by the user, although, even if this is done, the Safari web browser will continue to send search terms to Apple unless the function is separately disabled.