Lately I've been asked about a million questions about Apple's Mac OS X. Let me try to answer some of the more pertinent ones here (in 600 words or less):

Q: What _is_ Mac OS X?

A: Mac OS X (pronounced "Mac OS Ten") is Apple's long-awaited "next-generation" operating system. It's a modern industrial-strength operating system that's fully buzzword compliant, with advanced features such as protected memory, preemptive multitasking, symmetric multiprocessing, modern networking, advanced virtual memory, and UNIX application support.

Q: What does all that mean?

A: In theory, it means that OS X will be better, faster, and more reliable than any version of Mac OS before. We'll find out soon enough.

Q: How soon?

A: Mac OS X is expected to ship in the first half of 2001.

Q: What is Mac OS X Public Beta?

A: Mac OS X Public Beta is a preview release of Mac OS X, available today for $29.95 from the Apple store. It's a chance for you to see Mac OS X in action and provide Apple with feedback on its features.

Q: What are the system requirements for Mac OS X Public Beta?

A: You need an iMac, iBook, Power Macintosh G3 or G4, Power Mac G4 Cube, or PowerBook G3 with at least 128MB of physical RAM.

Q: Should I try it?

A: Only if you have a spare hard disk or, better still, a spare Mac. Although I've found the Public Beta remarkably stable for most tasks, it's still lacks some important features. So I don't recommend running it on your main (or only) Mac. Also, once you've installed it, the only way I know of to remove it reliably is to reformat (erase) your hard disk. So if the Mac you're installing Mac OS X on contains data that's important to you, I strongly recommend a complete backup before you install it.

Q: Will I need new software? Will the programs I use today with Mac OS 9 work with Mac OS X?

A: The vast majority will. Most extensions and control panels won't, but almost every other program I've tried, including the current versions of Photoshop, Microsoft Office (98 and 2001), AppleWorks, BBEdit, and lots more, run flawlessly under OS X Public Beta. Apple refers to these programs as "Classic" and while Classic applications work fine, you'll probably want to replace your most-used programs with "Mac OS X native" versions, which are written (or re-written) to take advantage of Mac OS X's advanced features such as protected memory, multithreading, and preemptive multitasking.

Q: Can I run Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X on the same Mac?

A: Absolutely. Once you install Mac OS X, you can choose to boot under OS X or OS 9 at any time.

Q: Do I need to know anything about UNIX to use Mac OS X?

A: No. While it's based on UNIX, all the UNIX underpinnings are well-hidden from users. If you're comfortable with UNIX, however, you can access a UNIX shell environment using the included "Terminal" program.

Q: So? How do you like it?

A: I like it a lot so far. The user interface (called "Aqua") takes some getting used to but it shows a lot of promise. My favorite thing is that the OS almost never dies when an application crashes -- you just quit that application and continue working. That's just so cool.

Mac OS X Public Beta. $29.95. Apple Computer. Cupertino, Calif. http://www.apple.com/macosx/.

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