AirPlay Mirroring and iMessage Coming to Mac OS X Lion

Sunday October 30, 2011 11:03 pm PDT by Arnold Kim

AirPlay Mirroring and iMessage are reportedly coming to OS X Lion, according to 9to5Mac's sources.

Airplay Mirroring demoed on an iPad 2

AirPlay Mirroring is a feature that first made its appearance on the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S. It allows you to wirelessly stream whatever's on your iPad or iPhone display to your HDTV via Apple TV. The Mac implementation is reportedly going to be similar, allowing broadcast of your desktop to your TV.

AirPlay Mirroring for the Mac will allow a user to wirelessly mirror exactly what is shown on their Mac’s display to an Apple TV connected to a projector, television, or external monitor. AirPlay video streaming is also being integrated into QuickTime X.

Meanwhile, iMessage is again being said to be coming to the OS X Lion. We had previously reported on iChat strings that have suggested work was already underway. Though it seems the decision to make iMessage a separate app or a part of iChat has reportedly not been finalized.

iMessage is Apple's new messaging solution for the iPad, iPod Touch and iPhone found in iOS 5. It allows customers to send SMS-like messages over standard data connections rather than expensive text messaging plans. OS X Lion integration with iMessage would allow you to send iMessages to friends and family with iOS 5 devices from your Mac.

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Top Rated Comments

Screwtape

196 months ago

Come on Apple, you MUST make this all one application. It's stupid to have Facetime, iMessage and iChat all be separate.

Score: 16 Votes (Like | Disagree)

spectre51

196 months ago

Wish I could airplay my iPhone to a Mac's display. Would work great since my macmini is my htpc connected to my TV.

Looking forward to imessage on the desktop.

Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Cougarcat

196 months ago

I think the reason they made FaceTime a separate app was so you could receive calls in the background, without the app open. Presumably, iMessage would need this capability as well.

They should integrate iMessage with the FaceTime App instead. Sometimes I've wanted to send the person I'm FaceTiming a link.

Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)

jonohayes

196 months ago

iMessage + FaceTime + iChat = Messenger.app

I really hope Apple make 1 application for iMessage, FaceTime, and iChat.

I'm sick of having 2 and soon to be 3 applications that do that same thing on the mac.

they could even open it up so yahoo, MSN maybe even Skype could tap into it! (dreaming i know)....

Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)