Golden Gate on Melabit

Siri AI and more on Apple Intelligence

Sat, 27 Jun 2026 18:00:00 +0000

Earlier today, I tried to activate Siri AI (Beta) on the Macbook Air M1 that I updated to Golden Gate a couple of weeks ago.

For now, and who knows for how much longer, here in Europe there’s no hope of using Siri AI on the iPhone or iPad due to the ongoing disputes between Apple and European regulators. But on the Mac, there shouldn’t be any issues, provided you use English as the language for both your Mac and Siri.

So, here I am again, heading to System Settings > Apple Intelligence & Siri — oops, on Golden Gate it has been renamed simply to Siri – to configure Siri so that it uses the same language as the Mac, which is already set to English.

Hey Siri (AI)

Nothing new so far. However, even though I was apparently placed on a waiting list to be notified when the new version of Siri would be available for my Mac,

after just a few seconds, a popup appeared allowing me to set up Siri AI right away.

As soon as I finished the setup, the System Settings > Siri pane changed to what you see below,

and, after the usual long wait for the language model download, my Mac running Golden Gate was finally ready to use Siri AI.

Now, I just need to find the time to give it a proper spin! 😇

Apple Intelligence on Sequoia

While I was doing all this, Apple Intelligence also got activated on the two Macs running Sequoia that I use daily for work. It all started with a notification on my Mac Mini M1,

and straight after that, the System Settings for Siri changed too, becoming as shown below.

The exact same thing happened on my Mac Studio M2 Ultra, which I hadn’t even touched yet.

It is clear that these changes were triggered by configuring Siri to use the same language as the Mac, in my case, English (though it obviously works for Italian and other major languages as well).¹

It’s strange, though, that this didn’t happen a couple of months ago when I did the exact same thing to use apfel and Apple Intelligence on the very same Macbook Air, which was running Tahoe at the time and has now been updated to Golden Gate.

But whatever the reason, Apple Intelligence’s Writing Tools are now working on Sequoia too,

even though, unfortunately, as already noted in my previous post on Apple Intelligence, they lack flexibility since there’s no way to change the default settings. Such flexibility is instead offered by apfel, which I can’t use here on Sequoia because it explicitly requires macOS Tahoe. Too bad!

Having activated Apple Intelligence now also allows me to use Image Playground on the Mac. Whether it’s actually worth using is a different story. In any case, it’s another tool to play around with, which never hurts.

Final thoughts

I didn’t know Apple Intelligence could work on Sequoia too. Reading the documentation, Apple Intelligence has been available in English since Sequoia version 15.1, released in late October 2024, while support for other major languages, including Italian, was added starting with 15.4 (late March 2025, now we are on 15.7.7).

But, partly due to the time that passed between the announcement and when Apple Intelligence actually became available here in Europe, and partly because Apple Intelligence requires both Siri and the Mac to be set to the same language, I had completely forgotten about it.

And I wouldn’t have noticed it today either, if I hadn’t seen the notification on the Mac Mini. A notification that definitely did not appear when, a couple of months ago, I did the exact same thing to try Apple Intelligence and apfel on the Air.

In any case, the requirement to use the same language for both the Mac and Siri just to activate Apple Intelligence is almost ridiculous nowadays. Using two different languages for your Mac and Siri might not be the norm,² but I’m certain it’s not such an isolated scenario as to not deserve the same attention Apple usually dedicates to other user niches.

As I noted in my post on apfel and Apple Intelligence, while you can set a Mac to use English and an iPhone to use Italian, Siri’s configuration is global. Therefore, once English is selected on any Apple device, the choice automatically propagates to all other devices linked to the same account. ↩︎
But I’m sure it’s quite common among those who, like me, work in software development and systems administration without being native English speakers. ↩︎

Golden Gate

Thu, 25 Jun 2026 18:00:00 +0000

The development of macOS has always followed a tick-tock pattern, more or less like Intel processors: the tick versions are more exciting and introduce new and spectacular features, while the tock versions are relaxed and focus on integrating these features into the operating system, fixing bugs and optimizing the overall behavior of the system to make it faster and more responsive.

In short, the tick moments innovate the operating system, but it’s the tock moments that make it great and memorable, as happened with Snow Leopard, Mountain Lion, El Capitan, Mojave, or Monterey.

– The Golden Gate Bridge under construction. Source: SFGate.

Golden Gate, also known as macOS 27, already seems to be on its way to becoming a tock. After the disasters of Tahoe, a version of macOS that addressed the many shortcomings (to put it politely) of Tahoe was just what was needed.

Isn’t it a bit early to make that claim? After all, I’ve only been using Golden Gate for a couple of weeks, and the developers’ beta is just on its first (since a couple of days second) version?

I’d say definitely not, and for a very simple reason: ever since updating to Golden Gate, I no longer pay attention to the user interface. I no longer notice the Finder toolbar, the myriad icons in the menus, or the many other graphic inconsistencies of Liquid Glass. I just focus on using my Mac for work.

After all, that’s how it should be. An operating system is not a showcase item, it is not a high-fashion dress that looks great but is impossible to wear. An operating system is the foundation on which a computer operates, and the more transparent it is, the better. If we don’t even notice the existence of operating system’s existence, as happened with the great macOSes mentioned above, this means it is fast and stable and does everything we ask of it without getting in the way or complicating our lives.

There will be time to examine the differences between Tahoe and Golden Gate in detail, but until then, kudos to the Apple developers for their excellent work. It wasn’t easy to fix Liquid Glass without discarding it entirely, but it seems they are on the right track.

A few words about WWDC26

Tue, 09 Jun 2026 18:00:00 +0000

I won’t make it long, just a few quick hot takes (or should I say lukewarm, since a day has already passed?) on what struck me most in the introductory keynote for WWDC26.

Parental Controls. Maybe it is because my daughters are already grown up, but I’ve always had many reservations about the effectiveness of parental controls. Kids easily bypass them, perhaps with the help of a nerdy friend, while parents gain a false sense of security and, worse still, use them to deceive themselves into thinking they have no responsibility for their children’s online activities.

We’ll soon see if this time Apple has gotten the right balance between control and freedom.

Siri AI. Speaking against Siri is like shooting the Red Cross, and since my daughter is a doctor, I won’t do that. That said, maybe this time we’ll finally be able to use Siri to interact more easily and quickly with our Apple devices, without the nonsense of the past.

I wrote we’ll be able, but the sad truth is that here in Europe we will have to wait who knows how long to be able to use Siri on iOS and iPadOS, while it should be available immediately on macOS. We’ll see.

macOS 27 Golden Gate. After the Tahoe disaster, and in particular the awkward implementation of Liquid Glass in macOS Tahoe, Apple seems to have listened to the criticisms of many dissatisfied users (I’m one of them, but I doubt Apple noticed), trying to correct the most glaring flaws of Liquid Glass.¹

The impression I got from the keynote is that Golden Gate is a version of macOS focused more on improving what’s already there than on introducing new features.

To me, this is very welcome news, given that these are the versions of macOS I loved the most and that I still consider the best, from Panther and Snow Leopard, to Mountain Lion and El Captain. As soon as I finish writing this, I’ll try downloading Golden Gate, so stay tuned!

Such as, for instance, macOS Tahoe: see you in September, macOS Tahoe: where is my Terminal?, macOS Tahoe, again, macOS Tahoe: let’s free the icons!. ↩︎