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Early Os X GUI concept mockups

E

ed.

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 31, 2008
220
181
Hello everyone,

I know this might not be the right place for this request, but I figured that this sub-forum might contain the highest concentration of Apple history experts.

I remember seeing many years ago (I can't remember if it was on a magazine - maybe Wired?), and possibly later again online, what was described as an early mockup for Os X, before it went towards Aqua.

What I remember were very colourful icons and backgrounds, with heavy use of circular elements - for example I seem to remember a lot of icons were round.

It didn't look anything like what came before, and I would say nothing like Aqua - somewhat darker and 'graphical' instead of light and 'photorealistic' in style.
I also remember that the text along with it said something along the lines that some of the details during the development of the GUI for Os X were introduced exclusively to please Steve Jobs, sometimes sacrificing usability for the sake of dazzling him.

I've looked everywhere online, but no one seems to have stuff that was not officially shipped.

Does anyone here have a clue?

Thanks for any help!
 
Hey, thanks for the answer! I actually did - forgot to add it in the post - and it was nothing like that. I'm pretty sure it was just a mockup and was never actually programmed. As I've said, it looked like nothing that was before or after, and most of all, it looked colourful and insane... more like the navigation of an interactive cd-rom than an operating system.
 
ed. said:
Hey, thanks for the answer! I actually did - forgot to add it in the post - and it was nothing like that. I'm pretty sure it was just a mockup and was never actually programmed. As I've said, it looked like nothing that was before or after, and most of all, it looked colourful and insane... more like the navigation of an interactive cd-rom than an operating system.
Click to expand...

Rhapsody was coded and released as developer previews. And can be downloaded.

There were previews of Cheetah as well. Under the name Kodiak.

10.0 was discussed and previewed before release. I did beta on that. But it was a long time ago. I remember it basically being useless other than for tinkering.

It was pretty. Still probably my favorite visually.

Edit....

Here’s a “reflection” article on Kodiak
https://www.macworld.com/article/3021418/os-x/revisiting-the-first-os-x-beta-kodiak.html
 
Last edited:
yeah, I wen through dozens of GUI screens that were actually released, but really none comes close to what I remember, that's why I suspect it was just an internal mockup that was never released.

I've read that the team tasked with the new Os X interface, before working on Aqua, did a lot of mockups just to show that they had new ideas beyond what was already existing (apparently they were originally told to make the new os look like the old, and Steve Jobs did not like that when he found out, so they put together demo concepts just to start thinking outside the box).
 
ed. said:
yeah, I wen through dozens of GUI screens that were actually released, but really none comes close to what I remember, that's why I suspect it was just an internal mockup that was never released.

I've read that the team tasked with the new Os X interface, before working on Aqua, did a lot of mockups just to show that they had new ideas beyond what was already existing (apparently they were originally told to make the new os look like the old, and Steve Jobs did not like that when he found out, so they put together demo concepts just to start thinking outside the box).
Click to expand...

Could be. Don’t know which ones you saw. Rhapsody was like NextStep and squarer perhaps than classic. If that’s possible.

Kodiak was the first glimpse of the modern X.

But there were lots of articles. And it could even be that something like MacAddict did their own interpretive drawings based on rumor.
 
I have a computer that has all four of the developer previews installed.

DP1 and DP2 look a lot like Rhapsody/OS X Server. They use a "platinum" UI similar to OS 9.

DP3 introduced "aqua." It was tweaked in DP4 and public beta, and then of course between 10.0 and 10.4 it got cranked back substantially.

I'll try to start up my computer with all installed and post screen shots.
 
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Hey thanks for the effort, bunnspecial, but I’m pretty sure what I remember was a non functional interface mockups, so I’m pretty sure it wasn’t in any developer preview.
 
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