Mac OS has come a long ways since System 1.0, and there’s no better way to see just how far we’ve come than to look at screenshots. Francesco Mugnai has compiled quite a comprehensive collection of screenshots that chronicles the evolution of the Mac operating system, it’s a fun walk through time, so check it out if you like to reminisce about the good old days of SE/30’s and LCII’s!

Mac OS Evolution: System 1.0 to 10.6

Impressive to go from this:

To this!

Remember BeOS? If you don’t that’s ok, it came out around 1995 and even though its performance was leaps and bounds above Mac OS System 8 and Windows 95, it never quite caught on, so it died off and seemingly disappeared. Now BeOS is reborn as Haiku, an open source lightweight operating system. It’s certainly more of a novelty at this point, but it’s kind of fun to play around with in a retro sort of way, and who knows maybe it will give Linux a run for it’s money? Well probably not since they’re both free. Anyway, check out Haiku, you can download it as an installable ISO, a VMWare image, or a live boot CD.

Download Haiku
Haiku homepage

The Polaroid film effect is a fun and retro look for digital images, and now you can make Polaroid style pictures without Photoshop! The nifty app called Poladroid is cross-platform compatible and works exactly as advertised: simply drag any image onto the Poladroid app and out comes a Polaroid style image.

The app itself is a little quirky and sort of slow, but that’s partially because the developer built in a virtual ‘development’ process much like the real Polaroids, you can even shake them around (by moving the image around the screen) to develop quicker. If you’re impatient, simply right-click on the image within the app and select to have the image saved now. By default the Polaroid images are dumped into ~/Pictures but you can adjust the setting in the preferences.

Apparently there was an iPhone version of the app but Apple has rejected it numerous times from the app store… bummer… but at least we can run it on our Macs! (Windows PC’s too, if you swing that way)

Developer home
Download now

The above image was borrowed from the Poladroid Flickr Pool where you can see tons of other sample Polaroid pictures that were all made with this app. Definitely check it out!

“This was a very typical time. I was single. All you needed was a cup of tea, a light, and your stereo, you know, and that’s what I had.” – Steve Jobs

Amazing picture and quote from Diana Walker

Source: Diana Walker: The Bigger Picture via Lifehacker

I’ve been on a bit of a retro and minimalism kick lately, preferring simplified apps that take me back to the good old days of BBS’s and 2400bps modems (ok maybe not the modems), and when I saw that GLTerminal has a new release I was pleased. It’s basically just a Terminal replacement that uses GL to create the appearance of an oldschool terminal, complete with monitor curvature and all. Everything else works as it should, so if you’re looking for a fullscreen old school alternative for Termianl, or just want something fun to work in for a while, try out GLTerminal.

Developer home
Download GLTerminal now

Still not convinced? Check out this screenshot below, it will make your Mac look like it’s in 1986!

Note: a reader pointed out that if you disable the display curvature, you can use this app to have a high resolution full screen Terminal to work in, something that the default OS X Terminal app does not provide.

Paintbrush is a Microsoft Paint clone of sorts for Mac OS X, it’s an absolute joy to use in it’s simplicity and we are pleased that a new version is available with even more MS Paint type functions for your Mac. We’ve covered this MS Paint clone for Mac here before on OSXDaily but a new release is out with more features and bug fixes, and it’s even better than before. If you’re missing Microsoft Paint for your Mac then Paintbrush will scratch your itch just fine! Check out the screenshot to see just how MSPaint like this app really is, and be sure to download it now!

Developer home
Download now

I’ve been bored with the standard Mac OS X boot up screen and it’s grey Apple logo, and a few times I have scoured around trying to change it manually to no avail. Today though, I stumbled into a post on The Unofficial Apple Weblog that makes changing the Mac OS X boot image a snap with a nice little program fittingly called BootXChanger. With this app you can change the image to basically anything you want as long as the background color is the same shade of grey. If you want the retro look, it’s easy to get that, or if you want to design your own little boot logo that’s fine too. (note: the above image belongs to TUAW)

Download BootXChanger
BootXChanger homepage

Many of us who converted from a Windows PC to a Mac may long for the amazing artistic capabilities allowed within Microsoft Paint. Ok so maybe that’s a bit dramatic, and we all know that Microsoft Paint is pretty crappy, but that’s also why it was fun. Thankfully, developers in the open source community saw this available niche and went to action, creating Paintbrush, a uniquely Mac OS X clone of a Microsoft Paint-type application. The features are exactly as basic as you’d expect, this is truly the closest thing to MS Paint for Mac that you’ll find. Check out the screenshot or download instantly below:

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WriteRoom is founded on a great idea that is hard to find nowadays in the computing world, a distraction free workspace that emphasizes nothing but the task at hand. In this case, the task is writing, which WriteRoom allows you to do easily. There are few frills other than what you absolutely must need to write, so don’t expect Microsoft Word. The WriteRoom workspace is attractively presented in a simple retro green on black terminal-like appearance, although you can change the color scheme to whatever you want. Check out the screenshot below.
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How would you like to run Mac OS System 7 in Mac OS X? Never thought about it? Us neither, until we came across a post at Mac Informant showing us how to do it. OK so this just might be at the top of the useless list, but the fact that it’s possible makes it cool. Their tutorial is a little inaccurate but it’s nothing you can’t sort out on your own with some minor trial and error, so if you’re interested in running a 16 year old operating system inside one of the most advanced OS’s available, you’re in the right place. If you’re not up the task, check out our screenshots below to see what you’re missing.

Mini vMac

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