Mac OS 8: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Mac OS 8 is a version of the Mac OS that was released in July 22, 1997.

Mac OS 8.0

Improvements in Mac OS 8 include a multi-threaded Finder, the three-dimensional platinum appearance and a number of performance related improvements to virtual memory, Applescript execution times and system start-up times.

Released late 1997, OS 8.1 was the last version to run on Macs with either a m68k or PowerPC processor. It introduced support for the HFS+ file system format, which supported large file sizes, longer file names and made more efficient use of the space on larger drives due to using a smaller block size. It is the earliest version that can run Carbon API apps.

Released October 15 1998, OS 8.5 was the first version of the Mac OS to run solely on Macs equipped with a PowerPC processor, as such it removed some but not all of the m68k code, improving system performance. It was the first version to include the Sherlock search tool.

Released May 8 1999 OS 8.6 introduced the concept of a nanokernel to the Mac OS which allowed for multi-tasking and multi-processors.