iTunes 8.0.2… various problems reported

Apple released a new iTunes version. I downloaded it and installed without problems, but many are reporting various issues.

MacInTouch has several reports today, ranging from possible permissions needing to be repaired, mail deletion (using AOL) problems, broken Internet radio apps (WunderRadio, BBC iPlayer for example).

I noticed that the Apple Store is difficult to contact. I tried to get app updates today, and the effort eventually timed out with an error message. I’ll keep trying, and report any more problems (and solutions) here.

New iPhone Software Release

Apple released new iPhone software today, version 2.2 available through iTunes. It provides new features and enhancements, and is easily installed.

Enhancements

Google Street View

The iPhone now has Street View available, so that if you are searching for a client’s office, or a restaurant, or whatever, if it is on a street that has been Street View-enabled, you can view photos of the building and the area… makes it so much easier to find!

Public Transit and Walking Directions

One thing missing - until now - from Google Maps has been walking directions. Not any more. You can also find public transit schedules and fares, and estimate transit time. I wish this had been available last month, when I was doing an Apple Certification course in San Francisco!

Podcasts

Now you can access the millions of podcasts at no charge at the iTunes store, using Wi-Fi or cellular connections.

Safari Improved

The interface is now more search-friendly, performance is improved, and it is reportedly more stable.

Home Screen Shortcut

You can now take a shortcut from any Home creen back to your first Home screen by pressing the home button. I haven’t tried this yet, so can’t comment on the functionality.

More…

• Enhancements to Maps - dropped pins now display the address, and you can share locations via email
• Decrease in call setup failures and dropped calls
• Preference to turn on/off auto-correction in Keyboard Settings
• Enhancements to Mail
  -
  Resolved isolated issues with scheduled fetching of email, and Improved formatting of wide HTML email
• Improved sound quality of Visual Voicemail messages

The above information provided by Apple Computer today, 11.21.2008.

Problems Reported

From iPhone Atlas, 11.21.2008:
Users Face Serious iPhone OS 2.2 Problems

Posted 21 November 2008 @ 1pm in Troubleshooting

From iPhone Atlas, 21 November
Users who have updated to iPhone OS 2.2 are facing some significant issues, including problems with third-party apps, Internet connection issues, problems deleting email and more.

Third-party Applications broken

Some third-party applications will no longer function properly under iPhone OS 2.2 due to API changes and other modifications. These include a number of applications that make use of CoreAudio. These applications will generally need to be updated by their developers. However, you can try uninstalling then reinstalling applications for problems that do not involve API or other strict compatibility problems.

“Could not Connect to Internet”

Some users are encountering an inability to connect to the Internet over cellular networks after the iPhone OS 2.2 update. In some cases, this issue can be resolved by switching from 3G to EDGE (or, for carriers other than AT&T, the appropriate GPRS network).

“SIM card not inserted” or PIN lock

Some users are receiving an error message indicating that the SIM card is not inserted, or that a PIN lock is in place when none should exist.

The SIM recognition issue can sometimes be resolved by removing the iPhone’s SIM card, then connecting it to your computer and restoring. iTunes may then reload the iPhone software successfully, after which you can re-insert the SIM card and attempt synchronization with iTunes.

If you get the PIN lock message, try the suggestions in this tech note.

Kilometers instead of miles in Google Maps

It appears that Google Maps for the iPhone now displays kilometers instead of miles for various countries. You can temporarily resolve the issue by selecting ‘USA’ in International settings, though this obviously introduces other problems for users outside the U.S.

Problems deleting email

Some users are unable to delete emails from certain accounts, especially AOL accounts after the 2.2 update. This problem can generally be resolved by navigating Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > (Your account name) > Advanced > Deleted Mailbox, then setting for the “On My iPhone” Trash for a POP account, or “On the Server” for an IMAP account.

App Store extremely slow

The App Store is extremely slow after the iPhone OS 2.2 update for some users. This may be a server-side problem that Apple will resolved shortly.

User reports noted in MacInTouch.com include:

Dez Chesterfield
It seems that upgrading my iPod touch to firmware 2.2 has broken access to BBC iPlayer. When I try to access a programme, it says ‘Sorry, programmes can only be accessed over a wifi connection’. Since the iPod *only* has wifi, that’s a bit strange.
Happens with a 1G and a 2G touch. iPhone upgraded to 2.2 works fine from the same wifi access point.

Peter Trinder
The update has also broken the BBC iPlayer as well. See:-
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1797710

Chuck Dingee
The 2.2 update did not erase my custom ringtones. I have had them erased too many times since MobileMe does not store them, so I opted to sync my contacts via USB rather than MobileMe - they have remained ever since. See Knowledge Base:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1948

Harold Lewis
I have noticed a dramatic increase in battery charge life since updating.

Ken K
More on iPhone 2.2:
I’m not really digging the new toolbar interface in (Mobile) Safari 3. Jamming both the address box and the search oval onto the small top line is cluttered and ugly — very un-iPhone. I guess I understand the reasoning behind it — I’ve seen newbies have trouble finding the search oval the first time, making the iPhone’s zero learning curve a tiny tick above zero — but I wish there were an option to use the older, nicer interface.

Or better still, why are there two boxes anyway? Why not a single round-cornered rectangle? If you type a URL, Safari goes there. If you type anything else, it googles it. Or yahoos it for the 2 people out there who have changed the default. I think the one ambiguous case — a one-word entry such as “apple” — is solved by the “.com” key on the keyboard. So how about it, browser interface people? Why 2 boxes when 1 would do?

Safari 3.2 a disaster in progress?

I use a few Internet plugins, like Glims and AcidSearch, and didn’t realize that Safari 3.2 would be so unfriendly to them. Previously, plugins would simply not load (with an error message) if they weren’t compatible. With the new Safari release, the app crashed instead. (the latest Pithhelmet release absolutely breaks Safari 3.2)

I tried the standard solutions…

I deleted the plugins, and thought I got all the files involved, but 3.2 still crashed. I reinstalled Safari. I restarted my Mac.

Safari crashed on launch every time.

Oh, and it appears that some permissions are corrupted, and Disk Utility and Cocktail can’t fix ‘em. Oh joy. My system seemed stable, but I did a restart yesterday and got a blank grey screen. DiskWarrior eventually sorted it, but basically Saturday was lost for work.

Saved by Time Machine

I replaced 3.2 with the previous release (thank you Time Machine) and it worked. I reinstalled Glims and AcidSearch, and it all worked.

Another fine mess

After the MobileMe rollout calamity, I expected Apple would be pretty careful about new releases. Apparently the Safari team didn’t get the memo. The various forums and sites like MacFixit and Macintouch list a variety of problems. The plugin incompatibilities I had are talked about as well as some people’s installation difficulties. Some users got an error indicating “You cannot install Safari on this volume. This volume already has a newer version of Safari installed.” Safari 4 Preview installation cause this, but even after removing the preview some files were left over preventing the 3.2 installer from working.

For those with too much time on their hands?

Except that the solution most often suggested doesn’t always work, and the only thing left to do is to an Archive and Install of the OS!

Or, go back to your backup like I did.

Safari 3.2 Success Stories

Some were able to install without difficulties. If you aren’t using any plugins, you should have no great difficulty, if these experiences are indicative. Some seem to have a great experience, but many are complaining of problems with everything from firewall settings to lost cookies.

Those with no problems say that it is absolutely stable, so far. Most seem to be running Intel machines on 10.5.5.

One user reports that the Google Safe Browsing Service is unavailable.

Some reported issues

Tiger problems

One user had big problems on Tiger on a PPC G5… it broke the OS prebinding, and the system won’t prebind at all. Maybe Apple isn’t testing on PPC machines?

Other problems

from MacInTouch

“With no 3rd party stuff installed, Sarari quits when I try to open a new tab in an existing window. This is whether or not the new anti-phishing feature is checked”

“The new Safari quit spontaneously 3 times this morning. Two times happened when trying to load and play an mp3. Firefox had no trouble.”

“I had just submitted my previous post and clicked on MacInTouch Home. Within a couple of seconds of loading the page, Safari quit.”

from other sources

“I just updated to Safari 3.2 today via auto update, and have had the program crash on me repeatedly, jusst about every time I click a link to another page, or a URL received in e-mail.”

more to come…

Apple released the Safari 3.2 update yesterday, and I downloaded and installed it immediately, ’cause I am your crash-test dummy.

I crashed.

ANY add-ons to Safari, including Concierge (bookmarks helper), PithHelmet (ad-blocking), AcidSearch (search enhancement), Glims and SAFT(several enhancements) seem to be causing crashes. Even without add-ons, some are experiencing crashes.

Before installing the update, do a full backup of your system with Time Machine or clone your drive with SuperDuper of CarbonCopy Cloner. If you do have problems you are then able to restore to the previous state, and keep on working.

This update was to address bugs including XML file handling, image handling and security vulnerabilities. Anti-phishing technology was also included.

Plugins and add-ons should be updated soon, so if you want to upgrade and forego the use of any helpers you are accustomed to you should be able to have them back reasonably soon.

iPhones 8 rolled out, and it’s different. Not terribly different, but under the hood, no doubt changed a lot.

New Stuff

Genius

The Genius Sidebar, where you can “make playlists from songs in your library that go great together” is cool, I guess. The best part, at least from Apple’s point of view, is that it will “recommend songs from the iTunes Store that you don’t already have”.

Fact is, it only is able to access data collected by human surveys. It can’t listen to the music… it looks for matches in metadata. Change the genres, song titles etc, Genius will be confused.

One gripe. To make the sidebar appear/disappear, you click on an arrow which looks a lot like the forward or reverse arrow button for slideshows. Not as intuitive as it could be.

I’ll play with it, when I have time to spare. Not excited about it, but will report back.

HD TV shows

For $2.99 you can buy your fav TV episodes in HD. You can even buy a Season Pass, and get ‘em all. iTunes acts as the HD player, and you get an iPod-ready version optimized for the small screen.

More fun stuff

You can change podcast settings from the default… how many episodes downloaded and kept. Previously only global changes were possible.

Grid view is pretty cool… The new visualizer is very cool.

If you have an iPhone, disable automatic syncing in Preferences (Devices). You can also see previous backups, and delete them if you want to. I’d be a little careful with this option, until you are sure you really, really want to lose the backup.

Prefs (Devices) is also the place you can look for remote speakers connected with AirTunes, disable iTunes volume control for remote speakers, allow iTunes control from remote speakers and look for iPhone and iPod Touch remotes.

Screen Reader friendly

iTunes 8 is now screen reader friendly. Macs and PC users can manage their library using VoiceOver in Leopard, or Window-Eyes in XP and Vista. You can do your purchasing and downloading with your screen reader as well.

Problems?

Typically, people have had issues with the new release. MacFixIt has a number of articles with fixes for various problems, but my guess is that the number of people with these problems is small. If you do have any difficulty with iTunes 8, definitely go to MacFixit and MacInTouch and check them out.

I would love to hear from anyone who wants to share their experience of the new iTunes.

The venerable and much-abused .Mac service, considered overpriced by some and an utter necessity by others, is growing up. Oh, and it works with PCs too, so if you have Macs and PCs to sync, it works.

Next month, it will become MobileMe, with features that may make it more palatable to the people who feel .Mac is too little for too much. Or not.

Current .Mac users will have a seamless conversion, and their old @.mac email and iWeb urls will work, but they will also have new @.me addresses and me.com urls. Complete information about the conversion is available on the Apple .Mac to MobileMe transition FAQ, article HT1932

Storage is doubled, in any event, and if you have purchased additional storage it will be doubled as well.

From the Transition page:

How much will my online storage increase with the upgrade?
With MobileMe, you will get twice as much storage as you did with .Mac:

Individual subscription storage doubles from 10GB to 20GB.
Family Packs now get 40GB of storage: 20GB for the main account and 5GB for each of the four sub-accounts.
If you purchased a storage upgrade, it will also be upgraded at no additional charge:

A 10GB storage upgrade is now 20GB. Your new total storage will be 40GB.
A 20GB storage upgrade is now 40GB. Your new total storage will be 60GB.
Note: The storage increase is effective after MobileMe launches, and may take up to 10 days to appear on all accounts.

Apple’s MobileMe site has a lot of information with demos to fully explain the features. I’ll sum them up:

Available from any Internet-connected device, MobileMe will store your email, contacts and calendars on a secure online server, called a “cloud”. It pushes them down to your Mac, PC, iPhone and iPod Touch, without any intervention from the user. It happens instantly and continuously, automatically. No need for a dock, or to push a button.

This means that I can have the same email (if I choose), contacts and calendar info on my desktop Mac, my MacBook Pro (laptop) and my iPhone, all exactly the same or updated as soon as they connect to the Internet, without thinking about it.

Unanswered question? How long does this process take, and does it slow my machine down? Don’t know yet.

The Gallery and iDisk features are not too different… except that you can upload photos from your iPhone directly to your Gallery, as well as from your computer. The interface seems to be a bit improved, but as I don’t use it much, I don’t want to be quoted on that. You can make a new album or change existing ones from pretty much anywhere that is Internet-connected and changes are “instantly reflected in your gallery”.

You can allow print-quality downloads of photos or entire albums, either as full-size JPEGS or images optimized for 16″ x 20″ prints which have a smaller file size, according to the site.

You can also allow other individuals to upload photos from a browser or email.

MobileMe Gallery works with Apple TV on a widescreen television, so a computer is not required.

iDisk is not changed in terms of its function. The under-the-hood workings may be updated, but I just don’t know.

I just bought Zooom/2, a nifty little utility to move, resize or refocus to another window without a click. According Coderage Software, the new version, 2.2.0, adds window edge snapping, enhanced control of Magnetics feature, an improved information overflow window, a clearer UI, Ignore list improvements and meaningful performance changes…

Also from their site:

What is Zooom/2?
Tired of hunting for the title bar in order to move a window? Do you want a slicker user experience? Try Zooom/2 - and find out what your missing!

Zooom/2 provides you the ability to work with any application window using keyboard shortcuts and the mouse to move, resize and zoom your windows incredibly quickly.

No longer do you have to exactly pick out the grow-area (bottom right) of a window - you can resize any window by holding a shortcut key and then dragging your mouse around anywhere inside it.

Zooom/2 functionality relies on the Apple Accessibility API. A large percentage of applications support this automatically - but some do not, please see the Compatibility page for more information.

Adobe has made Acrobat 9 available for pre-order, with a free trial available soon.This will be a major update coming in 3 flavors: Pro Extended, Pro and Standard. Personally, I already pre-ordered CS4 which will include Acrobat 9 Pro, based on a quick look at Dreamweaver CS4 beta. More on that later…

Adobe’s Acrobat Family page is a good place to start learning about the new version. (more…)

Computerworld’s article describing 68 Leopard issues fixed with the 10.5.3 update is a brief description of the improvements described on Apple’s page.

The current version of iCal still has some security flaws, apparently, but with no evidence of real-world attacks it does not yet seem serious.

TinkerTool Updated

TinkerTool 3.9 was released this morning. I love TinkerTool, but recommend a little caution using it, as you are modifying built-in preferences in the Mac OS X operating system. A brief description of TinkerTool, from the ReadMe file, follows:

TinkerTool is an application which gives you access to additional preference settings Apple has built into Mac OS X. This allows to activate hidden features in the operating system and in some of the applications that come with the system.

TinkerTool does not provide any features itself. Its single task is to give you an extended interface to your personal preference settings. The tool will never change anything in the operating system. For this reason, the integrity of your system is not put at risk. All settings are restricted to the user accounts that launch TinkerTool. If you have multiple user accounts on your computer, settings of different users will not affect each other.

The feature set of Mac OS X varies greatly between different operating system versions. For this reason, TinkerTool must automatically adapt to the system it is running on. The settings available in each system version are listed at the download page.

When you detect a preference setting that causes a compatibility problem with a third-party application, you can simply reset this or all preferences to their previous values.