OSX Leopard: Top 10 reasons to upgrade or switch

The top ten cool new features in OSX Leopard – in ascending order. This is very much biased to my needs, so your mileage may vary.

1: Video Recording
Use Photo Booth to make movie clips. Capture those precious moments and send them to your friends in an email message. You can even choose a frame from your movie to use as your account picture or iChat buddy icon. [turns the built in camera into a cool toy]

2: Mail Data Detectors
Act on information in Mail immediately. Mail automatically detects text fragments like appointments and addresses, and lets you choose smart actions with a click: create a new contact, map an address, or create an iCal event. [I need to do this all the time]

3: DVD Player: Smoothly play back even DVDs that may be damaged. New technology in Leopard can locate and avoid scratched areas of the disc. [nice, but the DVD player is still region protected]

4: Grammar Check
Let your grammar set a shining example. A built-in English language grammar checker helps ensure that you don’t make errors in grammar. [this should work for writing blog entries]

5: Reopen Windows
Go back to a set of windows you were viewing after closing them or even after quitting Safari.  [great if you close a tab or window by mistake]

6: Dictionary: Harness the power of Wikipedia when you’re connected to the Internet — built right into it’s Dictionary. You get a great Mac OS X user interface with super-fast searching and beautifully laid out-results. [next step – Wikipedia on the mac offline ]

7: Preview: Easily remove the background from an image, leaving just the subject. Simply select Instant Alpha from the Tool Select button on the toolbar and click and drag in the area of the background you wish to remove. You can also use the Extract Shape tool to select a specific area of the image to keep, automatically excluding the rest. [super cool]

8: Address Book: View a detailed map of any address in Address Book. Just hold down the Control key while clicking any address and select “Map of” and Safari will show you its location in Google Maps [more great integration, and again something I will use a lot]

9: RSS
Subscribe to an RSS feed in Mail and you’ll know the moment an article or blog post hits the wire. Even better, you can choose to have new articles appear in your inbox. [this could transform things]

10: Back Up Everything
Automatic backup, built right into your Mac. Never worry about losing a file again. Time Machine stores an up-to-date copy of all your Mac’s files on an external hard drive, personal file sharing volume, or Mac OS X Server. That includes system files, applications, accounts, preferences, music, photos, movies, and documents. [finally – it is here]