Coming in at two months after their previous update, Apple have today released their latest major update for Snow Leopard, which also arrives with a security patch that includes their previous OS X release, Leopard.
The Snow Leopard update to 10.6.2 arrives with a host of fixes that are aimed at improving the reliability of the operating system itself, while others are aimed at technical bugs related to Apple software that comes pre-loaded (Mail, Safari), as well as improvements to iWork, iLife, Aperture, Final Cut Studio and fixes for some graphical and font issues.
Fixes included in the Snow Leopard update:
- an issue that caused data to be deleted when using a guest account
- an issue that might cause your system to logout unexpectedly
- Spotlight search results not showing Exchange contacts
- the reliability of menu extras
- an issue in Dictionary when using Hebrew as the primary language
- shutter-click sound effect when taking a screenshot
- an issue with the four-finger swipe gesture
- an issue adding images to contacts in Address Book
- an issue in Front Row that could cause sluggish or slow frame rates hile watching videos
- creation of mobile accounts for Active Directory users
- reliability and duration of VPN connections
- general reliability improvements for iWork, iLife, Aperture, Final Cut Studio, MobileMe, and iDisk
- overall improvements to VoiceOver performance
- this update addresses video playback and performance issues for iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2009) and iMac (27-inch, Late 2009) computers that may occur in some situations while AirPort is turned on
You can find the full list of Snow Leopards fixes at Apple’s website, the 10.6.2 update can be downloaded manually from Apple here or via Software Update in Snow Leopard.
The released security update fixes a list of flaws in numerous software used on both Leopard and Snow Leopard for applications such as Quicktime, plus included features such as Spotlight, to add to a number of other parts of the OS X system.
The security update is included in the Snow Leopard 10.6.2 update, but for Leopard users, you can download the update via the Software Update utility or by downloading it manually from Apple here.
Apple has released a second beta version of the next Snow Leopard update (10.6.2) to its developers, according to AppleInsider.
According to users of this beta build, the new update has improved almost 150 “general focus areas” since the last update, 10.6.1, was released only weeks ago. These include updates to core services like Time Machine, Spaces and Front Row as well as several applications including the new QuickTime Player, Photo Booth and Address Book.
AppleInsider also reports that the update particularly focuses on Wireless Wide Area Network (WWAN) support for mobile data services and adds enhancements to MobileMe, iDisk, Exchange support and NTFS and WebDAV filesystem support.
Finally, the new update fixes performance and stability issues that are largely tied to drivers and OSX’s OpenCL compiler, includes a number of security patches and bugs including updates to the software update service, printing and parental controls, and fixes a bug caused when switching between applications using the Dock.
Users across the internet have reported several issues with Snow Leopard since its release in August 2009, with the first update, 10.6.1 being issued to users just days after launch. This initial update fixed numerous issues including an outdated version of Adobe Flash that shipped with the operating system.
No expected release date has been issued for the 10.6.2 update at this time.
Apple’s latest operating system, Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard), has been found to ship with an outdated version of Adobe’s Flash Player (10.0.23.1). This version of Flash Player contains a vulnerability on Mac machines that could leave your system vulnerable to hackers.
What could be the most distressing thing of all, is when users upgraded from Leopard (10.5) to Snow Leopard (10.6), users found themselves with a downgraded version of Adobe’s Flash Player (10.0.23.1). Users who upgraded that had the latest security patches installed of Flash Player (10.0.32.18) found themselves with a vulnerable version installed on their machine.
Snow Leopard appears to have shipped with an outdated version of Flash Player from the 1Q of this year, around the time when Apple had to freeze the code for Snow Leopard. Users with Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) are urged to upgrade their copy of Flash Player to 10.0.32.18 or higher immediately.
Adobe has since released a security alert for Snow Leopard on their blog.
Download: the latest version of Flash Player here.
The dev channel has been updated with a new release for Mac OS X. This release includes bug fixes and some improved compatibility with Snow Leopard. This release is only slightly different than the 4.0.203.2 release so please refer to that release for more information.
Version: 4.0.203.4
Changes specific to Mac OS X:
- [r23636, r23693] Add modifier key support (e.g. cmd-clicking, shift-clicking) throughout the Mac UI. (Issues: 17301, 17912)
- [r23667] Sometimes cmd-w wouldn’t close the last tab in a window. (Issue: 19447)
- [r23702] Korean IME didn’t work in the Omnibox. (Issue: 19421)
- [r23715, r23733, r23740, r23821, r24213] Improve appearance of various UI components. (Issue: 14898, 18902, 19115, 19943)
- [r23741, r24006] Favicon lost in various circumstances. (Issue: 18352, 18359)
- [r23886] Add bubble when user clicks the star button. (Issue: 14929)
- [r23964] Implement tab-to-search. (Issues: 10943, 10944, 12285)
- [r23975, r24209, r24234] Crash fixes. (Issue: 19837, 19958, 19728)
- [r24030] Text could appear garbled on 10.6. (Issue: 11269)
More details about additional changes are available in the svn log of all revisions.
You can find out about getting on the Dev channel here: http://dev.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel.
If you find new issues, please let us know by filing a bug at http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/entry.
Jonathan Conradt
Engineering Program Manager
Download: Google Chrome 4.0.203.4