iOS 8.4, OS X 10.10.4, GarageBand 10.1 & And iTunes 12.2 Hit The Streets
Apple released a lot of software updates yesterday. Now some of these updates were to support the launch of Apple Music, but there were other things that Apple did not advertise. Let me give you a rundown.
iOS 8.4
The main purpose of iOS 8.4 was to support the launch of Apple Music, but Apple had some other fixes under the hood including the following for iBooks:
Browse, listen and download audiobooks from inside iBooks.
Enjoy the all-new Now Playing feature, designed specifically for audiobooks.
Books that are Made for iBooks now work on the iPhone in addition to the iPad.
Find and pre-order books in a series right from your library.
Improves accessibility of widgets, glossary and navigation in books made with iBooks Author.
New default Chinese font.
New setting to turn off Auto-Night theme in your library.
Resolves an issue that may have prevented Hide Purchases from working.
Resolves an issue that may have prevented downloading books from iCloud.
There’s also these important fixes:
Fixes an issue where receiving a specific series of Unicode characters causes device to reboot. This was a issue that surfaced a few weeks ago.
Fixes an issue that prevented GPS accessories from providing location data. This was a Bluetooth related issue and I suspect that there are other Bluetooth issues that were fixed as I note that the issues that I reported when I wrote a how to guide on fixing iOS related Bluetooth issues with cars are much less prevalent in my case. I will continue to test things on this front.
Fixes an issue where deleted Apple Watch apps could re-install.
One other fix that I have noted is that WiFi seems way more stable on my iPhone than it has been in the past.
OS X 10.10.4
The latest iteration of OS X Yosemite brings significant fixes under the hood. Some of which Apple did not publicize. Let me start with the ones that they did publicize:
• Improves networking reliability
• Improves Migration Assistant reliability
• Addresses an issue that prevented some external displays from functioning properly
• Improves the reliability of upgrading iPhoto and Aperture libraries to Photos
• Improves reliability when syncing photos and videos to iCloud Photo Library
• Addresses an issue that could cause Photos to unexpectedly quit after importing some Lecia DNG files
• Resolves an issue that could delay outgoing email messages in Mail
• Fixes an issue where a website could prevent the user from navigating away by presenting repeated JavaScript alerts in Safari
For enterprise customers, this update does the following:
• Addresses an issue where OS X systems bound to directory services could stop responding under certain conditions
• Adds the ability to create mobile accounts with the createmobileaccount tool
• Fixes an issue in Profile Manager that could allow a user to install pre-release software even when the setting is disabled
Let me focus in on the “Improves networking reliability” part. When Yosemite was released, Apple replaced a very stable process that handled networking functions called “mDNSResponder” with a new service called “discoveryd” which proved to be the source of instability when it came to Bluetooth and WiFi. With 10.10.4, they’ve returned to “mDNSResponder” in hopes of bringing stability back to wireless connections. It’s early days yet, but the results seem to be mixed thus far. I have noted that things in my case are a bit better. I will continue to test things on my end.
The other unpublicized fix is the introduction of third party TRIM support for SSD drives. Now I wrote a story on Apple not supporting TRIM on SSD drives that they don’t make. I’ll copy something out of that story to explain what TRIM is:
TRIM allows the OS to tell the SSD which parts of the SSD no longer contain valid data due to erases either by the user or operating system. This means that the SSD could write data faster because it didn’t have to figure out what parts of the drive are free and what wasn’t.
Now you can enable TRIM on a non Apple SSD drive if you dare. Here’s how you do it:
BACK UP YOUR DATA
Open the Terminal
Type “sudo trimforce enable”
You’ll then be presented with a very scary message that warns you that you may lose data if you enable this command if the drive is unsupported. Simply answer yes.
Done. Declare victory and have a beer.
Now the reason that the scary message appears is due to the fact that different SSD brands implement TRIM in different ways. Therefore you may have something weird happen and you may lose data as a result. But at least Apple has clued in that they restrict the use of SSDs in their computers.
iTunes 12.2
The sole purpose of iTunes 12.2 is to support the launch of Apple Music. I did not note anything else in my testing.
GarageBand 10.1
Apple updated GarageBand adding new features and a huge amount of new content for musicians and sound makers to work with. Here’s a full list of what’s new:
10 new Drummers that produce beats in a variety of electronic music and Hip Hop styles including House, Trap, Techno, Dubstep and more.
Over 100 EDM and Hip Hop-inspired synthesizer Patches featuring the new Transform Pad Smart Control for sound morphing
Record the movements of software instrument Smart Controls to capture performances of effect and tone adjustments
1,000 new Apple Loops from a variety of popular instruments and genres including EDM, Hip Hop, Indie, Disco, Funk, and Blues
Share directly from GarageBand to Apple Music Connect
Adds support for Force Touch trackpad
Resolves an issue which prevented the export of long recordings
Contains multiple enhancements to Accessibility
There’s also a update to GarageBand for iOS.
Since a lot of these updates focus around Apple Music, I’ll direct you to a YouTube video posted by MacRumors that has a walkthrough of Apple Music:
Be sure to look at the full list of countries on Apple’s website. iTunes users can access Apple Music for free for a three month trial period. After that, an individual subscription is $9.99 and a family subscription with support for up to 6 users is $14.99.
This entry was posted on July 1, 2015 at 10:38 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Apple. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
iOS 8.4, OS X 10.10.4, GarageBand 10.1 & And iTunes 12.2 Hit The Streets
Apple released a lot of software updates yesterday. Now some of these updates were to support the launch of Apple Music, but there were other things that Apple did not advertise. Let me give you a rundown.
iOS 8.4
The main purpose of iOS 8.4 was to support the launch of Apple Music, but Apple had some other fixes under the hood including the following for iBooks:
There’s also these important fixes:
One other fix that I have noted is that WiFi seems way more stable on my iPhone than it has been in the past.
OS X 10.10.4
The latest iteration of OS X Yosemite brings significant fixes under the hood. Some of which Apple did not publicize. Let me start with the ones that they did publicize:
• Improves networking reliability
• Improves Migration Assistant reliability
• Addresses an issue that prevented some external displays from functioning properly
• Improves the reliability of upgrading iPhoto and Aperture libraries to Photos
• Improves reliability when syncing photos and videos to iCloud Photo Library
• Addresses an issue that could cause Photos to unexpectedly quit after importing some Lecia DNG files
• Resolves an issue that could delay outgoing email messages in Mail
• Fixes an issue where a website could prevent the user from navigating away by presenting repeated JavaScript alerts in Safari
For enterprise customers, this update does the following:
• Addresses an issue where OS X systems bound to directory services could stop responding under certain conditions
• Adds the ability to create mobile accounts with the createmobileaccount tool
• Fixes an issue in Profile Manager that could allow a user to install pre-release software even when the setting is disabled
Let me focus in on the “Improves networking reliability” part. When Yosemite was released, Apple replaced a very stable process that handled networking functions called “mDNSResponder” with a new service called “discoveryd” which proved to be the source of instability when it came to Bluetooth and WiFi. With 10.10.4, they’ve returned to “mDNSResponder” in hopes of bringing stability back to wireless connections. It’s early days yet, but the results seem to be mixed thus far. I have noted that things in my case are a bit better. I will continue to test things on my end.
The other unpublicized fix is the introduction of third party TRIM support for SSD drives. Now I wrote a story on Apple not supporting TRIM on SSD drives that they don’t make. I’ll copy something out of that story to explain what TRIM is:
TRIM allows the OS to tell the SSD which parts of the SSD no longer contain valid data due to erases either by the user or operating system. This means that the SSD could write data faster because it didn’t have to figure out what parts of the drive are free and what wasn’t.
Now you can enable TRIM on a non Apple SSD drive if you dare. Here’s how you do it:
Now the reason that the scary message appears is due to the fact that different SSD brands implement TRIM in different ways. Therefore you may have something weird happen and you may lose data as a result. But at least Apple has clued in that they restrict the use of SSDs in their computers.
iTunes 12.2
The sole purpose of iTunes 12.2 is to support the launch of Apple Music. I did not note anything else in my testing.
GarageBand 10.1
Apple updated GarageBand adding new features and a huge amount of new content for musicians and sound makers to work with. Here’s a full list of what’s new:
There’s also a update to GarageBand for iOS.
Since a lot of these updates focus around Apple Music, I’ll direct you to a YouTube video posted by MacRumors that has a walkthrough of Apple Music:
Be sure to look at the full list of countries on Apple’s website. iTunes users can access Apple Music for free for a three month trial period. After that, an individual subscription is $9.99 and a family subscription with support for up to 6 users is $14.99.
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This entry was posted on July 1, 2015 at 10:38 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Apple. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.