14 DAY TRIAL // According to the people who have tested Apple’s latest developer preview of OS X Mountain Lion, the operating system has borrowed a new feature stemming from iOS / iCloud, which eliminates the hassle of having to download an app multiple times over, if you happen to own multiple Macs.
Automatic Downloads is a feature most common to iOS device owners. Those who are running any variant of the iOS 5 iteration should already know that their iDevice syncs over WiFi with their Mac or PC whenever it’s tethered (with the WiFi-sync option enabled, of course).
In the same manner, App Store downloads that occur on the Mac go directly to the iPhone / iPad within range as well, as long as the owner has both platforms enlisted as “authorized” devices.
OS X Mountain Lion will do this for Macintosh applications downloaded from the Mac App Store, according to 9to5mac.
The discovery was made this past weekend, though it appears that the function is not quite ready for public consumption.
In fact, Apple still has quite a few bugs to iron out in Mountain Lion. Depending on the company’s progress, the software could be unveiled in final form at the annual Worldwide Developers Conference or, if things don’t go as expected, later this summer.
The initial estimate was late summer already, but according to some recent reports, Apple is pushing to have the OS released sooner than that.
“We have a great WWDC planned this year and can’t wait to share the latest news about iOS and OS X Mountain Lion with developers,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, at the time Apple announced the WWDC schedule for this year.
“The iOS platform has created an entirely new industry with fantastic opportunities for developers across the country and around the world.”