Chapter 1. The Mac OS X Environment

Welcome to the wonderful world of Mac OS X, the next-generation operating system from Apple Computer!

The Mac OS X operating system powers modern Macintosh computers. After many long years and a few scrapped attempts to modernize the older Mac OS operating system, Apple released Mac OS X in April of 2001. Since then, Apple has released a steady stream of upgrades and system updates. This book was written around Mac OS X version 10.4, "Tiger," the latest version.

In order to write software for Mac OS X, you need to know your way around the system. By now you may already be familiar with Mac OS X's applications and user interface style. Those things all rest on top of a number of subsystems and services that make up the Mac OS X operating system.

In this chapter you learn

  • How the Mac OS X operating system is structured, including what the major areas of the system are and how they work together

  • How to use Mac OS X's command-line interface

  • How applications take advantage of the operating system services on Mac OS X

  • How Apple encourages a common look and feel for Mac OS X applications

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