Snow Leopard to borrow features from iPhone

Location-based services and multi-touch apps rumoured

6 February 2009 10:34 GMT / By Amy-Mae Elliott

Apple's forthcoming Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard operating system will get iPhone-esque features such as location-based functionality and multi-touch apps, AppleInsider reports.

Citing "people familiar" with the pre-release versions of the OS, the blog says the software includes the iPhone SDK's CoreLocation framework which means applications will be able to see the latitude and longitude of the Macs.

Macs don't have GPS, but AppleInsider says CoreLocation "will utilise a Mac's existing networking hardware to triangulate the system's location in a manner similar to the way the original iPhone was able to use the technology to emulate a true global positioning signal".

Uses for such functionality could be seen with Apple's iPhoto software that now includes a "Places" geo-tagging feature, as well as Safari getting wise to the searcher's location for locally relevant results.

Full tags

Software, Mac software, Apple, Rumours, Operating Systems