Say Goodbye to iTunes as You Know It: macOS Catalina is Here

Say goodbye to iTunes, as you know it, anyway.  In the new version of macOS, called Catalina, Apple will break up the app into three separate apps for Music, Podcasts, and TV. The Podcast app lets you search for the show and episode based on content.

The announcement, made at the Apple WWDC 2019, is similar to what Google announced at its own I/O conference last month. The TV and Music apps also look just like what was leaked earlier in the year, with more colorful icons on the side that allow you to browse through content by genre and recommendations.

The Mac also supports the iPad as a second display — offering a workaround for those who wanted a touchscreen on their MacBooks. (Of course, that requires owning two Apple products.) Apple calls this feature Sidecar. The iPad can be connected via both wired and wireless connections.

Both iOS and macOS will soon offer voice control that lets you control everything from opening apps and adjusting the volume to other actions like editing text. Voice dictations are processed locally on the device without sending any voice information to the cloud.

On the apps front, a new Find My app will now let you search for your device even if it’s offline by using Bluetooth beacon that bounces off other Apple devices near the misplaced device. Screen Time is coming to the Mac as well to enforce more limitations across devices.

Lastly, Apple announced Project Catalyst, a framework that lets developers port iPad apps to the Mac (previously codenamed as “Marzipan”). Developers can access Catalyst today and just check off Mac in Xcode to simply extend support over to the desktop OS.

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