OS

Apple Computer Inc. (now Apple Inc.)

introduced the Macintosh personal computer,

later retroactively renamed to the Macintosh

128K model.

January 24, 1984,

The operating system of early Macintosh is

named "System Software" or "System", and its

ensuing series was later renamed to Mac OS.

The Macintosh platform is generally credited

with having popularized the early concept of the

graphical user interface, the main recognizable

aspect of Mac OS.

The original Macintosh system software was

partially based on the Lisa OS, previously

released by Apple for the Lisa computer in

1983.

As part of an agreement allowing Xerox to buy

shares in Apple at a favorable price, it also

used concepts from the Xerox PARC Xerox

Alto, which Steve Jobs and several other

Macintosh team members had.

Mac OS has been pre-installed on almost every

Macintosh computer sold, and has been sold

separately in retail stores until being distributed

exclusively online.

Apple Inc. provides updates to the iOS

operating system for the iPhone, iPad, and

iPod Touch through iTunes, and since iOS 5.0,

also through over-the-air software updates.

With the June 6, 2011 announcement of iOS

5.0, a USB connection to iTunes is no longer

needed to activate iOS devices; data

synchronization can happen automatically and

wirelessly through Apple's iCloud service. The

most recent update, iOS 8.1, brought new

features and fixed many bugs.

Apple's iOS did not have an official name until

the release of the iPhone software

development kit (iPhone SDK) on March 6,

2008. Before then, Apple marketing literature

simply stated that their iPhone runs a version of

"OS X", a reference to iOS' parent operating

system.

When introduced, it was named iPhone OS. It

was renamed iOS on June 7, 2010, as the

iPhone was no longer the only device to run

iOS. Apple licensed the "iOS" trademark from

Cisco.

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