With the official release of Mac OS X Developer Preview 4 and all the juicy new tidbits that came to light during the Stevenote, it's only natural that Apple's revamped the Mac OS X section of its web site. In fact, Apple now feels that Mac OS X is spongeworthy enough to qualify for its own tab on the glorious Apple.com web page header. Yes, no matter where you are on Apple's site, you're now just a click away from more info on Apple's upcoming operating system-- that's high praise indeed. More importantly, it means we all have some more stuff to look at when we're avoiding getting any actual work done. Score!

Whereas developers will rejoice that DP4 includes the "final API specifications" to allow them to start writing Mac OS X applications, regular Mac geeks like us know where the real joy is; it's in the movies. Apple has posted updated QuickTime movies to demonstrate the changes it's made to Aqua since January's onstage demo-- you remember, the Demo That Lit A Thousand Flames? Of particular interest is the new Dock movie, which reveals some solid improvements to that much-maligned interface element; icons are rendered without tiles, applications are grouped separately from minimized windows and aliases, and when items are dragged out of the Dock, they disappear with a Newtonesque puff of smoke. Now we know why Apple never sold off the Newton technologies when the project was Steved-- that smoke puff is pure interface gold, baby! In short, the Dock now sucks less.

In fact, we're rejoicing at the news that in DP4, Mac OS X has reportedly become quite a bit more Mac-like overall. Whereas the earlier version of Aqua was heavily suffused with NeXT-style interface conventions, CNET notes that Steve spent some time onstage showing how Mac OS X can be made to behave quite a bit like the Macs of today. For one thing, the new Finder (which is really just the NeXT file browser on steroids and cough syrup) is now even more customizable, to the point of being "exactly like the Mac Finder today, if that's the way you want it." Here's hoping. In addition, apparently disk icons can be dragged to the Desktop instead of sitting in the Windows-like "Computer" directory. That's good. And if the Dock can duplicate the functionality of the current Mac OS folder tab popup windows, why, even old curmudgeons like us may soon run out of things to complain about. Hey, stranger things have happened.