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OS X 10.11.4 framework resource found with ‘macOS’ naming, fueling more speculation about an OS X rebranding

FlightUtilities.framework macOS

Is OS X destined to be rebranded as macOS? Such a change wouldn’t at all be surprising, with iOS, watchOS, and tvOS already donning similar naming conventions. At this point, OS X is the odd man out, but a recent finding indicates that a change might be in the works.

Brazilian Apple blog MacMagazine points to the name used for an Interface Builder document buried deep within OS X’s System folder as evidence of a possible naming change.

Eagle-eyed developer Guilherme Rambo found that an Interface Builder document under the FlightUtilities.framework in /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ contained the macOS designation in its filename. We were able to verify Rambo’s findings, and spotted the macOS nomenclature located at the end of the document’s filename.

Specifically, the document is named FUFlightViewController_macOS.nib. Notice the “macOS” right before the filename extension. According to Rambo, this changed in OS X 10.11.4, which just launched publicly nine days ago.

macOS

Unfortunately, this isn’t as conclusive as it first seems. Developers often use macOS identifiers in filenames and code for convenience, as it offers a simple naming scheme for apps that span multiple Apple platforms (due to the symmetry of ‘macOS’ and ‘iOS’ suffixes).

Hence, developers often reference ‘macOS’ in one way or another, not necessarily linked to an upcoming rebranding. Remember that this file is only ever meant to be referenced internally, the macOS name is never exposed to the UI.

Moreover, although a change in naming could be in the works, to bring OS X in line with the branding of Apple’s other operating systems, marketing decisions are unlikely to be shared with engineering this early in the cycle.

Apple’s annual developer conference, which is just a few months away, would be the most ideal setting for it to announce a rebranding of its venerable desktop OS. Although such an arbitrary finding in no way guarantees that Apple is planning a naming switch, such a change makes sense given the naming conventions applied to the other operating systems.

By the way, we are seeing visits to 9to5Mac from ‘OS X 10.12’ slowly ramp over the last couple of months. Unfortunately, Google Analytics does not give any insight into the Mac OS X / macOS branding.

Screen Shot 2016-03-30 at 12.55.55

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Comments

  1. iSRS - 8 years ago

    It makes sense and will likely happen at some point. OS X is 16 years old at this point. And it really is Mac OS X, though they moved away from that a few years ago.

    Would allow for macOS 11, though…

  2. chriscolegate - 8 years ago

    MacOS has been used for years in the “Contents” of basically all apps…
    So this is nothing new but I agree that a change of the naming convention to conform with the other OSs’ would make sense.

  3. They could be doing it to avoid confusion between iOS 10 and OS X.

  4. Howie Isaacks - 8 years ago

    If they change the name to macOS, that would fit in with the other OS names really well. I thought Yosemite should have been OS XI, not OS X 10.10. That seemed really dumb to me. When Apple changed the name of their pro notebooks to MacBook Pro, Steve Jobs said it was because they wanted to have “Mac” in the name of the product. Calling the OS that runs on the Mac “macOS” works better than calling it “OS X”.

  5. Makoni (@makoni) - 8 years ago

    iOS ten, OS ten. I thought they could unite them in one system, like Microsoft did it with Windows 10. Also, Steve Jobs said on iPhone presentation that iOS in actually modificated Mac OS.

  6. bradmacpro - 8 years ago

    Back to the future. Before there was OS X there was Mac OS X and before that, Mac OS, since Mac OS 7.6 (through Mac OS 9.2.2)

  7. bradmacpro - 8 years ago

    Also avoids the pronunciation problem some people have brought up. I might say “Oh Ess Ex” and some other people insist it should be read as “Oh Ess Ten”, so getting rid of the X avoids that little problem.

    • Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

      That is a consequence of learning a word by reading it, versus hearing it aloud. (Reference: How I Met Your Mother – Chameleon)

      Apple has consistently said “ten”. For anyone who has heard it aloud, there isn’t any confusion.

  8. Tristan Gauci - 8 years ago

    This same NIB actually exists in 10.10.2.. No idea why nobody else has checked or noticed this yet.
    Here’s a screenshot of it. Not sure about earlier versions though. – http://imgur.com/LCKXpg6

  9. marvingraefe - 8 years ago

    I really hope that this will not simply be a name change but instead a totally new operating system. My suggestion is that ‘macOS’ will be based on iOS which would make sense if we look at tvOS and watchOS. They are all based on iOS which is clearly the more modern and newer operating system. I am not saying that we will have a stretched out iPad operating system on our future MacBooks, instead it will have an optimized GUI for desktop and notebook computers. I think it will even keep keyboard and mouse as input methods. Basically the same way that tvOS received a GUI and input method (Siri remote) to fit the needs for a TV operating system. But under the hood, it runs iOS which has one big advantage for Apple: It has a huge developer community that is already familiar to code for iOS. Correct me if I’m wrong, I’m not a developer. But I guess that it’s not too hard to take an existing iOS app and to port it to watchOS and tvOS. We saw with tvOS that Apple has implemented a Universal Purchase for apps, with macOS being based on iOS this would also be possible in the future. A developer may only need to add some lines of code to its existing iOS apps to port it to the Mac running macOS.

    I also believe that macOS will be exclusive to Macs running ARM chips which will ultimately be the start of a transition to Apple Ax-powered Macs. That’s why we didn’t see an update to the MacBook 12” at the spring event. It will be unveiled at WWDC and be available in the fall as the first ARM-MacBook powered by the A10X-Chip together with macOS. A Mac Mini will probably also be released in the fall using the ARM chips. All other Macs will be transitioned in the following years.

    • Markus (@jokey2k) - 8 years ago

      “I really hope that this will not simply be a name change but instead a totally new operating system” Totally bullshit as iOS and OS X share the same Code except for the WindowManagement. All other parts are already the same. There’s tons of talks how to write code so that your application logic works on both OS X and iOS. Only differs in the GUI part for obvious reasons.

      “I also believe that macOS will be exclusive to Macs running ARM chips which will ultimately be the start of a transition to Apple Ax-powered Macs.” I hope this won’t happen for a long time because:

      – Ax chips are nowhere close to the power of current, say, i7 processors.
      Internally they are fast, just looking at GeekBench.
      But their external interfaces are too slow by magnitudes compared to PCs.
      Think of getting something as simple as USB3 speed. Didn’t just happen yet.

      – Then there’s no PCI-equivalent meaning you cannot attach a powerful graphics processor but just use what fits in the chip.

      – Third issue being memory. Due to the design of the ARM architecture you need to place memory on chip so you are limited in physical size and cannot fit 16GB in easily.

      If you want to get a feeling for using something ARMish as desktop, just get yourself a cheap RaspberryPi or whatever clone you like and see for yourself how these devices perform, once you stick a desktop OS on it.

  10. Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

    I think they need to unify their OS naming.

    When they launched the iPad, they renamed iPhone OS to iOS, because it ran on the iPhone and iPad. Further, the iPad started with iOS 3, because that’s what version iOS was on at the time. Now, the version of iOS on iPhone is not identical to the version on iPad, but it is, fundamentally, the same OS.

    And all was right with the world.

    Then they launch the Apple Watch. It runs a watch version of iOS 8. Well, when they launched the iPad, they just said it ran iOS 3, just the tablet version of it. So, it makes sense that the Apple Watch would run iOS 8, just the watch version of it.

    But no.

    It runs watchOS 1.0, because it is the first version of iOS running on a watch. This makes some sense, although by this logic, iOS should be split into iphoneOS and ipadOS, two largely identical, but somewhat different OSes.

    Things are a little strange, but they follow some sort of logic.

    Then they launch the Apple TV (4th gen). It runs a TV version of iOS 9. Based on past history, they can brand it as iOS 9 (the iPad convention, just start with the current version number of iOS), or tvOS 1.0 (the Apple Watch convention, brand it as its own OS with a 1.0 version number).

    But no.

    They mix the two conventions and release tvOS 9, even though there are no previous versions of tvOS.

    Far from splitting things into macOS, iphoneOS, ipadOS, tvOS, and watchOS, I think they should consolidate the branding into OSX and iOS. That’s all. That’s it. OSX is for your desktop/laptop computer. iOS is for your smaller, more limited functionality devices.

      • itsjuke - 8 years ago

        What about the ipodOS? It seems that Apple doesn’t care about the iPod anymore because they never come out with lots of new features for it and it’s not on the main header of their website. It’s weird.

    • I think you forgot to consider the Apple TV 2nd and 3rd gens, which also ran a modified version of iOS. This software was probably tvOS 4-8. When the 4th gen came out, they took the opportunity to rebrand the Apple TV OS as tvOS. According to the build number on ipsw.me, the 4th gen follows the same build number scheme as its predecessors.

      Initial watchOS could be labeled as 1.0 since it was the first generation of that device.

      Also, not that at matters much to branding operating systems, UIKit is used on both iOS and tvOS, while watchOS uses WatchKit for building UIs. tvOS and iOS have a lot more overlap than watchOS and iOS.

      • AeronPeryton - 8 years ago

        And didn’t the very first AppleTV run a stripped down version of OS X Tiger?

      • Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

        They went with Apple TV Software version 7 to tvOS 9. One interpretation is that they skipped 8 to sync up version numbers with iOS.

  11. brianpennington - 8 years ago

    I’m confused. The full name of the OS has always been Mac OS X, even though people eventually started dropping the Mac bit. Before it was Mac OS X it was Mac OS 9 and Mac OS 8. http://www.guidebookgallery.org/screenshots/macos80

    So is this all about a change from Mac OS to macOS?

    • Randy March - 8 years ago

      The full name is “OS X”—the “Mac” part is officially gone since Mountain Lion. Before Mountain Lion, “OS X” was merely a short name. ;-)

      It’d be fun to see Apple take a step back, put back the “Mac” (but lowercased and merged with “OS”), and drop the “X”. macOS 10, macOS 11 … it does have a ring to it. :-p

  12. tomtubbs - 8 years ago

    Do the analytics give any indication of the CPU, GPU, screen resolution etc of say the devices saying they’re running OS X 10.12? If new unreleased Macs did visit the site, could you glean any specs?

  13. I have the same frameworks document on my Macbook Air. I would love to see it change to macOS.

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