It’s that time of year again when Apple launches all of its new operating systems into public beta and invites a brave public to sift through bugs and crashes to find the nuggets of gold that Apple has been working on. With macOS Sonoma now in public beta, the big question is this: should you upgrade your Mac?
Desktop delights or disasters? Let’s take a leaf out of Apple’s book and start with screen savers. This year, Apple has introduced a bunch of video screen savers that double up as desktop wallpapers. When the screen saver starts, the video begins from the image depicted in your wallpaper, before soaring through the air across landscapes, cityscapes, or through space.
The best part of desktop widgets, though, is their interactivity. You can now check off reminders or launch shortcuts directly from the widgets themselves, without having to open the associated app first. It’s such a simple change, but it makes an impressively large difference. The time you save not having to open apps when you click on widgets adds up.
Video magic Many of the new additions in macOS Sonoma focus on FaceTime calls. For instance, I was excited about the new controls over Continuity Camera that Apple has teased, where it looks like you’ll be able to adjust your camera’s zoom and pan, among other additions. I’d personally love to see more control over Portrait mode, but anything that brings calls closer to the power you get in the Camo app will be very welcome.
Get the message Messages has a few new features, but they’re mostly confined to additions that should have been present years ago. For example, swiping left to right on a received message lets you reply to it, something rival apps like WhatsApp have allowed for roughly 300 years. Better late than never, I guess.
Each profile can load its own extensions and save its own bookmarks. So, you could have a profile for work and a profile for studying and keep them almost entirely separate. Each profile can be found by clicking the related button in Safari’s top-left corner. It could be that Apple simply hasn’t ironed out the kinks in Game mode just yet. Given how desperately Mac gamers need a boost from Apple, we’ll be watching closely.