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posted by janrinok on Monday November 25 2019, @10:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the not-really---just-ship-with-the-buggy-bits-disabled dept.

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow4408

To cut down on bugs, Apple is changing how it develops its software

The initial release windows of both iOS 12 and iOS 13 saw users complaining about a plethora of bugs both major and minor. Apple has plans to mitigate this problem when iOS 14 launches next year, according to sources who spoke with Bloomberg.

People familiar with the shift told the publication that a major factor contributing to iOS 13's rough launch window was the fact that many Apple developers were making daily or weekly commits of new changes at varying levels of readiness and quality, and those features were enabled by default regardless of their readiness. This meant that test builds were often unusable for stretches of time due to one problematic feature or another, which limited the amount of time testers spent with the software.

Under the new methodology, new test builds of Apple's future operating systems will turn certain features deemed to be buggy or to cause usability issues off by default. Testers will be able to opt-in on a feature-by-feature basis in many cases, reducing the likelihood that they will be working with "unlivable" builds.

Bloomberg's sources provided some insight about how Apple assesses the reliability and state of its own software features, as well.


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  • (Score: 1) by anubi on Monday November 25 2019, @11:45PM (6 children)

    by anubi (2828) on Monday November 25 2019, @11:45PM (#924698) Journal

    If I could only get a good stable API that did not change. If the API change screws up my stuff, I get blamed.

    --
    "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
  • (Score: 3, Touché) by Bot on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:05AM (1 child)

    by Bot (3902) on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:05AM (#924705) Journal

    ANUBIS looking for HAPI? same old story I guess?

    --
    Account abandoned.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:11AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:11AM (#924709)

      Thanks! I love the pun!

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:09AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:09AM (#924708)

    If I could only get a good stable API that did not change.

    You want Microsoft instead. Apple has always been crap at backward compatibility.

    • (Score: 3, Funny) by Mykl on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:21AM (1 child)

      by Mykl (1112) on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:21AM (#924713)

      I have to disagree. Apple's backward compatibility is excellent when they choose to pursue that. For example, they've been supporting 32bit apps running on a 64bit OS for 10 years now. Similarly, they had apps that worked across both PowerPC and Intel architectures simultaneously. There's a lot of pain being felt with the discontinuation of 32bit support in the latest OS, but that's been a conscious decision by them to end it (for good or bad), not the result of any technical shortcomings.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:55AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:55AM (#924726)

        You forgot to mention the transitions from 6502 (8-bit) to 65C816 (16-bit) to 68000 (24-bit) to 68020 (32-bit). How did Apple choose to pursue backward compatibility?

    • (Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:23AM

      by Bot (3902) on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:23AM (#924716) Journal

      He said stable...
      You might parse it as stable interface, not stable in execution, but then he added 'that did not change' so he is either italian (italians love redundancy, to repeat the same stuff, being redundant that is) or he meant stable execution, which rules windows out.

      As for backwards compatibility, Apple pulled it twice or thrice, with the //gs emulating the II, ppc emulating the 68k, and running windows (which is considered very backwards among applists).

      --
      Account abandoned.