Date: 2008-11-02 11:52:02 Created: null
OS X is the operating system that drives all modern Macs. If you've got a little bit more than just a passing interest in computers you may have heard of, seen or otherwise noted it since it's generally agreed to be a whole lot prettier than any version of Windows (or other OS:es for that matter). If you haven't seen it at all and want to find out, just go to Apple's website (see externals) and look around. The whole site is designed in the style of the OS, and of course there are plenty of screenshots to look at as well.
OS X replaced the aging and less candy-looking OS 9 and is thus meant to be pronounced as "OS ten" rather than "OS x)". But Apple and others have taken a liking to using the project names of different versions of the OS. Yep, different names for different versions. The thing is Apple likes to make new releases of its OS featuring quite a few updates in one package. And, which annoys many people including me, they charge for those updates unless you got the last version very, very recently. That's my guess at why the project names got popular anyway, Apple wants the differences to be clear so people feel they're paying for more than just a 0.1 version increase. 10.2 was the first version to use its project name officialy, which was Jaguar. 10.3 is coming up soon at the time of writing (see the sub-page) and is called Panther.
For a geek like me there's more to OS X than just a pretty face and ease of use. In difference to OS 9 and earlier, OS X is built on FreeBSD, one of the many UNIX-like operating systems out there. If you're into things like this you know what I'm talking about already, if you're not into things like this it's nothing to worry about. Building on something UNIX-like means stability, an easier time porting software from other UNIX-like operating systems and also lots of possibilities of diffing around under the hood and working with a terminal window that all geeks love (or say they love to look geekier anyway). Like I said, if you're not interested you don't need to know, and won't have to find out either no matter how much you use OS X. Apple knows how to make things smooth, pretty and user friendly.