Mac OS X Lion has been a long time coming. While Snow Leopard was released in the summer of 2009, only a year and a half ago, it came without any substantial new features. There was Exchange support, and a lot of features aimed at developers, as well as a generally more speedy operating system, but overall, it was a minor update for most of its users. Indeed, the last update that had a major impact on users of the Mac OS was Leopard, released way back on October 26, 2007.

With Mac OS X Lion, Apple has shifted their focus not only back to the Mac, but back to the consumer. The operating system is beginning to shape up as a major update to its predecessor, Snow Leopard, both under the hood and atop it. The UI is receiving major changes, from scrollbars to whole paradigms, and many included applications have either an updated UI, or an all new one.