On Tuesday, Apple signaled the end of active development of the first official version of OS X 10.10 Yosemite with the
seeding of the "Golden Master," a one-last-lookover build that will be used as the final first release if no show-stopping bugs are found. An email was sent to registered developers calling for app submissions ahead of the upcoming launch of Yosemite, though no date or deadline was given. The existence of a GM candidate suggests that Yosemite is not far from being released to the public.
The free update offers a number of new features on its own, but also has some of its biggest changes designed to
work in conjunction with iOS devices running iOS 8, which was already released. Marquee features such as iCloud Drive and iPhoto Cloud Library are designed to work best when both a user's Macs and iOS devices are all running the new systems, and recent devices that use Bluetooth 4.0 can take advantage of other major features such as Handoff and Continuity.
Other features of OS X 10.10 Yosemite include a redesigned and expanded Spotlight search and Notification Center, the ability to make and receive calls or send SMS messages or set up a hotspot directly on the Mac (requires a nearby iPhone), a redesigned Mail, Safari and icon set, a new Dark Mode and much more. Developers will need to download the
Xcode 61 GM from the Developer Portal, which includes a finalized Swift programming language for those employing it.
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