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If you had money on “Lion” as the next big cat namesake of an Apple OS, collect your winnings now. Mac OS X 10.7 Lion made its grand public debut today with a preview at the Back to My Mac event. The new OS isn't due to launch until Summer 2011, but Apple's preview offers plenty to look forward to.

Apple's line on Mac OS X 10.7 is that it's taking what it learned from the iPad and applying it to the desktop OS. The new features they showed off today certainly have a strong iPad flavor. Launchpad is an iPad-like homescreen for your apps, right down to the iPad's folder view. There's also a full-screen app mode that seems to mimic the iPad user experience. Even the Mac App Store borrows heavily from the iOS App Store. The main Mac-exclusive new feature seems to be Mission Control, which is like a souped-up Exposé, showing you everything running on your Mac in one view.

Lion seems like it will be a pretty easy switch for users, but it's a good thing developers have a year to prepare their iPad-like user experiences for the Mac.

For a quick look at Lion's new features, check out our gallery below.


Gallery: Apple OS X Lion Preview ScreenshotsApple previews OS X 10.7 Lion, due to launch Summer 2011

Fuente: Download Squad