Mac OS X Leopard internal roadmap revealed (UPDATE)

UPDATE: Sources provide us follow-up with some changes to the roadmap here.

Sources close to the development of Mac OS X Leopard in Cupertino have provided to MacScoop the project's roadmap from now until the release, which is scheduled on late October.

New Leopard build to be seeded by early July

Anytime from now to early July, Apple will release a new build of Leopard fixing some very annoying issues developers have encountered with Airport as well as several other user Interface, API and Developer Tools issues.

The update will be available to Select and Premium registered ADC (Apple Developer Connection) members but it's not sure whether it will be seeded as a separate build or as a downloadable update. The first possibility is more likely, sources said.

Major build on early August

In a little more than a month, Apple's development team targets a feature-full build. The build that was provided to developers during the World Wide Developers Conference earlier this month is actually not totally feature frozen.

Some minor features are currently being finished for the system. These features will arrive in the August build along with user-interface improvements, sources told MacScoop.

If you expect major "wow" features or interface changes, you will be disappointed. What we may expect is additional settings and some user interface polishing. Among the most criticized parts of the new user interface are the new menu bar and Dock.

We don't exclude the possibility that intermediate builds with minor changes are seeded before this build arrives.

Final Candidate on early September (see follow-up)

The milestone that will follow the total feature-freeze is slated for September, as the target of Apple's internal development team is a totally feature-full and stable Final Candidate version of Mac OS X Leopard.

During this phase, Apple developers will stop implementing and focus on testing the system.

Four to six weeks to go Golden Master

After the Final Candidate, Apple's staff will continue testing Leopard for a period of four to six weeks at most. In early to mid October, Leopard should reach the Golden Master status and Apple will be launching the DVD and packaging production.

Release on late October

Finally, the release is scheduled for late October but could be delayed to early November in case one of the milestones of the roadmap takes more time than expected. Though sources are confident that this won't happen.