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Mac OS X v10.8 (Mountain Lion) at Stanford

Security Notice

In late February 2014, Apple announced a major security flaw affecting Macintosh computers running OS X 10.7, 10.8, and 10.9. Left unpatched, email, web site traffic, banking transactions, passwords, and other data transmitted to and from these devices are susceptible to being intercepted. Stanford University's Information Security Office strongly urges you to update your system immediately.

To update your system, go to the Apple menu and click Software Update. Install any available Safari updates or security updates. A restart will be required.

Obtaining Mountain Lion

OS X version 10.8, nicknamed Mountain Lion, was released on July 25, 2012. As with 10.7 (Lion) the software will be available for download at the Mac App Store. The cost for Mountain Lion is $19.99 when purchased by an individual through the Mac App Store. There is no .edu discount available.

Volume licenses (20 user minimum) for the Mac App Store are available through SmartMart for $9.99 per seat.

For more information on the new OS, please visit Apple's new OS X Mountain Lion page.

Software compatibility

Users are encouraged to read this section in full to make sure the software they need to use is compatible with Mountain Lion before upgrading. This section will be updated frequently, so please check back often in the first few weeks following Mountain Lion's release.  See this external site for a longer list of applications.

Essential Stanford Software (ESS)

  • Stanford Desktop Tools: SDT 3.1.4 is available and is compatible with Mountain Lion.  Users should upgrade to this version prior to upgrading to Mountain Lion.
  • Sophos Anti-Virus: Version 8.0.6 is available and is compatible with Mountain Lion.
  • Kerberos Configuration Tool:  Version 4.1 is available and is compatible with Mountain Lion.
  • Tivoli Endpoint Manager/Bigfix:  The version released on 9/17/12 is compatible with Mountain Lion.
  • Fetch:  Fetch 5.7.3 is available and is compatible with Mountain Lion.

Administrative Systems applications

See Browser Recommendations for Administrative Applications for the latest information on browser compatibility with administrative applications in use at Stanford.

Other applications

  • OpenAFS: A Mountain Lion-compatible build of OpenAFS 1.6.1 is available.
  • PGP:  Assumed not to be compatible with Mountain Lion.  PGP users should not upgrade to Mountain Lion until an officially supported version of PGP Desktop is available.
  • SNRT:  The Stanford Network Registration Tool which is used during the Stanford Network Self-Registration process is compatible with Mountain Lion.
  • Microsoft Office 2011 and 2008: According to Microsoft, Office for Mac 2011 and 2008 are supported on Mountain Lion.
  • SSL VPN:  Internal testing indicates it works with Mountain Lion.  Not officially supported by the vendor at this point.
  • Box Sync Client: Box has released a Mountain Lion-specific patch to provide better capability between Mac 10.8 and Box Sync.
  • Google Drive Sync Client:  Internal testing indicates it works.  Not officially supported by the vendor at this point.
  • VMware Fusion:  According to the vendor, the most recent version of VMware Fusion 4 (version 4.1.3) works with Mountain Lion.
  • CrashPlan: According to the vendor, CrashPlan is  fully compatible with Mountain Lion.
Last modified August 8, 2014