Mac OS X Unleashed

By John Ray and William C. Ray

• Table of Contents
  • Copyright
  • About the Author
  • Acknowledgments
  • Tell Us What You Think!
  • Introduction
  • Part I: Introduction to Mac OS X
  • Chapter 1. Mac OS X Component Architecture
    • Mac OS X Overview
    • Darwin
    • QuickTime
    • OpenGL: Open Graphics Language
    • Quartz
    • Classic
    • Carbon
    • Cocoa
    • Java 2
    • Aqua
    • Migration Issues
    • Summary
  • Chapter 2. Installing Mac OS X
  • Chapter 3. Mac OS X Basics
  • Chapter 4. The Finder: Working with Files and Applications
  • Chapter 5. Running Classic Mac OS Applications
  • Part II: Inside Mac OS X
  • Chapter 6. Native Utilities and Applications
  • Chapter 7. Internet Communications
  • Chapter 8. Installing Third-Party Applications
  • Part III: User-Level OS X Configuration
  • Chapter 9. Network Setup
  • Chapter 10. Printer and Font Management
  • Chapter 11. Additional System Components
  • Part IV: Introduction to BSD Applications
  • Chapter 12. Introducing the BSD Subsystem
  • Chapter 13. Common Unix Shell Commands: File Operations
  • Part V: Advanced Command-Line Concepts
  • Chapter 14. Advanced Shell Concepts and Commands
  • Chapter 15. Command-Line Applications and Application Suites
  • Chapter 16. Command-Line Software Installation
  • Chapter 17. Troubleshooting Software Installs, and Compiling and Debugging Manually
  • Chapter 18. Advanced Unix Shell Use: Configuration and Programming (Shell Scripting)
  • Part VI: Server/Network Administration
  • Chapter 19. X Window System Applications
  • Chapter 20. Command-Line Configuration and Administration
  • Chapter 21. AppleScript
  • Chapter 22. Perl Scripting and SQL Connectivity
  • Chapter 23. File and Resource Sharing with NetInfo
  • Chapter 24. User Management and Machine Clustering
  • Chapter 25. FTP Serving
  • Chapter 26. Remote Access and Administration
  • Chapter 27. Web Serving
  • Part VII: Server Health
  • Chapter 28. Web Programming
  • Chapter 29. Creating a Mail Server
  • Chapter 30. Accessing and Serving a Windows Network
  • Chapter 31. Server Security and Advanced Network Configuration
  • Chapter 32. System Maintenance
  • Appendix A. Command-Line Reference
  • Appendix B. Administration Reference

QuickTime

The second layer of the OS X foundation is the imaging layer—these are the tools that higher-level operating system applications (like those you use daily in Mac OS 8 or 9) can call on to create multimedia presentations or render three-dimensional images.

The first of these tools is the QuickTime API. For many people, QuickTime is nothing more than a brushed aluminum window that occasionally plays a movie or song.

QuickTime, however, is far more than a movie or MP3 player. It forms the heart of all multimedia operations in Mac OS X. Any application using QuickTime can transparently support reading or writing dozens of image file formats, including:

• PICT—(the native Mac OS 7/8/9 picture format)
• TIFF—Tagged Image File Format (Mac OS X native)
• JPEG—Joint Photographic Experts Group
• GIF—Graphics Interchange Format
• BMP—Bitmap graphics format (Windows native)
• PNG—Portable Network Graphics
• Targa—Targa file format

In addition, QuickTime also supports audio and video standards such as

• MPEG 1—Moving Picture Experts Group
• AVI—Audio Video Interleave (Windows standard)
• DV—Digital Video (the standard supported by most digital video cameras)
• MP3—MPEG Layer 3 (a popular music compression and distribution format)
• WAV—WAVE sound File (Windows native)
• AIFF—Audio Interchange File Format (Mac OS X Native)

By employing QuickTime in applications such as the Finder, suddenly an entirely new capability is added to the system. Figure 1.5 shows the new OS X Finder's Info window. Unlike previous versions of the Mac OS, file information now includes a full preview of any media that QuickTime supports—from still images to music and video.

Figure 1.5 Showing the information of a file now includes a preview of QuickTime- supported content.

Although best known for its capability to handle movie and audio formats seamlessly in the operating system, QuickTime also includes features such as QuickTime VR. QuickTime VR allows the creation of three-dimensional panoramic models that can be linked together to create entire 3D worlds. If you're already using Mac OS X, you can view several sample QuickTime 5.0 VR movies at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/preview/gallery/.

From the perspective of the Internet service provider, QuickTime supplies a robust and scalable streaming media platform. Capable of adjusting to the user's available bandwidth, QuickTime streaming server can offer thousands of instant-access video streams from a single workstation. Because the QuickTime Streaming Server is distributed under Apple's open source license, it can be installed directly onto OS X, even though the software, by default, comes loaded only on Mac OS X Server.

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