While Apple had earlier shared the most recent version of the kernel of macOS on GitHub, which also runs on iOS devices, for the first time the company has made it possible to find ARM versions of the kernel.
Apple macOS (originally named Mac OS X) was launched in 2001, built on top of NeXTSTEP, an operating system developed by NeXT, a startup founded by Steve Jobs in 1985 and later sold to Apple.
NeXTSTEP as the foundation for Mac OS X, relies heavily on open-source technologies, because its derived from open-source project BSD.
Albeit, it can’t be compiled or run own version of macOS, but developers certainly do care about the source code. And as iOS and macOS use the same Unix-based core, Apple wants to get feedback from the open-source community.
The Apple Watch and the Apple TV also run variants of iOS, as well as many frameworks. And perhaps Apple is simply working on a version of macOS that runs on ARM chips.
But there's still a question mark why Apple could have open-sourced the kernel of iOS and macOS for ARM processors.
