Evolution of Threading and Multitasking in Mac Computers: From Single-Core to Modern Multi-Processing
By
emschwartz
Master baker tier. Every paragraph earns its place on the tray.
Summary
This article traces the evolution of threading and multitasking capabilities in Mac computers from the original 128K Mac with a single Motorola 68000 processor to modern multi-core systems. It covers the historical progression through technologies like Switcher, MultiFinder, Process Manager, Thread Manager in Classic Mac OS, and modern implementations including Pthreads, NSThreads, and Grand Central Dispatch, explaining how Apple's approach to concurrent processing has evolved over decades.
Key quotes
· 4 pulledThe original 128K Mac from 1984 came with a single Motorola 68000 processor running at 8 MHz that could only run one app at a time.
Today's Macs come with multiple CPU cores that can comfortably run several substantial apps simultaneously, while running a Time Machine backup and other tasks in the background.
A processor with a single core and no support for multi-tasking runs one sequence of instructions at a time.
This brief history outlines the journey between them.
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