Resolution Independence In Leopard?

Everyone is pretty exited about Leopard because many expect the new version of OS X to be out before Windows Vista… again. As WWDC creeps ever closer, more and more details about what we can expect in the next generation OS appear.


One such new, fundamental feature we can expect is 'resolution independence' at which John Gruber hinted at last November has been mentioned again by a developer named Dustin MacDonald.

Because most of the elements that are displayed on computer screen are worked with in terms of pixels, when you change the resolution of the display, the size of these elements changes as well. Some elements become so small in high resolutions that they are nearly illegible, and thus the need for technology that will keep elements the same size, regardless of display resolution.

The need for this has been clear for a while, but with today's displays becoming more and more powerful and able to display higher and higher resolutions, it has become a necessity.

Apple has already implemented a "resolution scaling" feature in 10.4, which developers can access. A lot of what is needed for resolution independence is already present in OS X, and although Apple has not said anything about this, the existing technology point to it being a strong possibility, at the very least.