Apple Delays New iOS Features to Focus On Stability

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rgMekanic

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In a report today, Apple is changing it's 2018 strategy for iOS in order to focus on performance and quality issues. Software head Craig Federighi announced the revised plan to employees at a meeting earlier this month, planning to make iPhones more responsive and less prone to issues. The features reportedly getting delayed until 2019 are a home screen refresh, changes to the in-car user interface, improvements to core apps such as Mail, and updates to the camera, photo-editing and sharing features.

While I completely agree focusing on performance and security is paramount, the planned features that are getting delayed are fairly important as well. One would assume that Apple has enough staff to do both and not put off feature updates for a year.
 
About time software companies put stability over new features. Good on them, but let's see if they actually follow through.
 
rgMekanic said:
In a report today, Apple is changing it's 2018 strategy for iOS in order to focus on performance and quality issues. Software head Craig Federighi announced the revised plan to employees at a meeting earlier this month, planning to make iPhones more responsive and less prone to issues. The features reportedly getting delayed until 2019 are a home screen refresh, changes to the in-car user interface, improvements to core apps such as Mail, and updates to the camera, photo-editing and sharing features.

While I completely agree focusing on performance and security is paramount, the planned features that are getting delayed are fairly important as well. One would assume that Apple has enough staff to do both and not put off feature updates for a year.
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Features need to not break other features or functionality. They also have to go through security paces. The more you add to any system the more surface area you give for an attacker to find an exploit of some sort. I'd rather things bake a little bit longer so I don't beta test more than I need too.

...We all know what happens when games don't get proper polish. They get EA'd.
 
While they are at it, they should probably look at standardizing their interface between apps, and coming up with a coherent design language. IOS is a bloody mess right now, and has been for years.
 
jnemesh said:
While they are at it, they should probably look at standardizing their interface between apps, and coming up with a coherent design language. IOS is a bloody mess right now, and has been for years.
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I can imagine now that the X is out, that's another interface that app makers need to take into account.
 
Their QC on iOS releases has been slipping over the years despite implementing a public beta resulting in a bigger pool of data. Some rather embarrassing bugs from the "it just works" company can't happen when you are asking a premium price. While I am pleased with my Apple devices, their software has been less reliable than in years past.
 
SparkedFire said:
Windows Phone just worked. It was sad to see it go, but I understand why it died.
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If it "just worked" it would still be on the market. It DIDNT just work, the "First Smartphone out of Beta" was DISCONTINUED mere months after launch, and to get the latest OS often required brand new hardware. It only took a few stabs in the back like this for consumers to avoid it like the plague.
 
jnemesh said:
While they are at it, they should probably look at standardizing their interface between apps, and coming up with a coherent design language. IOS is a bloody mess right now, and has been for years.
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Objective C and Metal are both pretty coherent, they are the only two Apple officially supports as of iOS 8 I am not sure it can get much more coherent than that....
 
jnemesh said:
If it "just worked" it would still be on the market. It DIDNT just work, the "First Smartphone out of Beta" was DISCONTINUED mere months after launch, and to get the latest OS often required brand new hardware. It only took a few stabs in the back like this for consumers to avoid it like the plague.
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I guess you are forgetting any issues that occured during apple/androids initially launches.... Both had issues with the software/hardware in the first few generations..... Once WP hit 8, those issues were gone. I used my lumia 830 for like 3 years. Never had it lock up or start getting wonky, requiring a reboot like my Pixel 2 does sometimes. Oh and the battery lasted almost a week between charges, and the camera was amazing, and the UI was fast/fluid (and simple). Would have kept using it, but the screen somehow cracked in my pocket.

The main issue with WP was MS didn't focus/push adoption of app on their platform. If they brought in the best developers for the platform and offered to have them create apps for companies on WP to get more people on it, I think it would have taken off.

And losing 1 of only 3 competitors in a field is a bad thing. The more competitors, the more they push each other to keep innovating and keeping the price point low.
 
Ever since MS's build updates have started rolling out I've been saying the same thing. Fix what you got before jumping into something new. Aside from the catch up races I've witnessed with various drivers on different systems I'm also wondering how long till the articles start coming out about the new exploits their various new features have created.

I hope Apple follows thru, and others learn from it.
 
iOS is in dire need of a homescreen refresh. The grid of icons is getting pretty stale and to be honest it should have been updated years back. Google is miles ahead of interfaces when it comes to the android vs ios argument.
 
KnightViper said:
iOS is in dire need of a homescreen refresh. The grid of icons is getting pretty stale and to be honest it should have been updated years back. Google is miles ahead of interfaces when it comes to the android vs ios argument.
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Does it work? Yes. Then dont "redo" it for courage.
 
KnightViper said:
iOS is in dire need of a homescreen refresh. The grid of icons is getting pretty stale and to be honest it should have been updated years back. Google is miles ahead of interfaces when it comes to the android vs ios argument.
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Buggy widgets and a couple of rows of icons. I really don't see how stock Android has changed over the last 4 years?

Could you educate me in what is different in stock Android, compared to 2 or 3 years ago, or are we talking round app icons instead of square here?
 
Stimpy88 said:
Buggy widgets and a couple of rows of icons. I really don't see how stock Android has changed over the last 4 years?

Could you educate me in what is different in stock Android, compared to 2 or 3 years ago, or are we talking round app icons instead of square here?
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Has android radically changed since lollipop, no. But that was the introduction to material design and there have been refinements along the way. Ios is too restrictive even when just moving icons, you have to play musical chairs with them. At least with android you have far more flexibility to change up the ui to your likening.
 
Biznatch said:
I guess you are forgetting any issues that occured during apple/androids initially launches.... Both had issues with the software/hardware in the first few generations..... Once WP hit 8, those issues were gone. I used my lumia 830 for like 3 years. Never had it lock up or start getting wonky, requiring a reboot like my Pixel 2 does sometimes. Oh and the battery lasted almost a week between charges, and the camera was amazing, and the UI was fast/fluid (and simple). Would have kept using it, but the screen somehow cracked in my pocket.

The main issue with WP was MS didn't focus/push adoption of app on their platform. If they brought in the best developers for the platform and offered to have them create apps for companies on WP to get more people on it, I think it would have taken off.

And losing 1 of only 3 competitors in a field is a bad thing. The more competitors, the more they push each other to keep innovating and keeping the price point low.
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I disagree. The phone market is better without MS cluttering it up with their horrible Fisher Price OS.
 
Stimpy88 said:
Buggy widgets and a couple of rows of icons. I really don't see how stock Android has changed over the last 4 years?

Could you educate me in what is different in stock Android, compared to 2 or 3 years ago, or are we talking round app icons instead of square here?
Click to expand...

No, I can't. Because if you can't use google or make even a halfway intelligent response, I can't (and won't) be bothered trying to educate you.
 
jnemesh said:
I disagree. The phone market is better without MS cluttering it up with their horrible Fisher Price OS.
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Sounds like someone who's never used WP before.... The GUI is pretty similar to IOS, so if what you say is true, it applies to apple as well.....
 
Biznatch said:
Sounds like someone who's never used WP before.... The GUI is pretty similar to IOS, so if what you say is true, it applies to apple as well.....
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No, I have used it, it sucked, the live tiles didn't update as they should, sometimes taking over an HOUR to display notifications. Also, the interface was pretty poor, as you had to scroll on the home page...and you had very limited ability to customize. But hey, if you liked it, you can skin Android to act and look just like WP. There was nothing innovative or useful that came out of Windows Phone. Otherwise we would see similar concepts in other operating systems by now.
 
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