Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2017/03/thursday-morning-news300317/
Apple has pulled the OTA update to iOS 10.3 for the iPhone 5 and 5c for reasons unknown, according to AppleInsider. While you can still download and install the update manually from iTunes, there doesn’t appear to be any significant complaints about a failed installation on the older phone models that have a 32-bit processor.
The latest numbers put Apple Music mobile usage at 40 million users for February, ahead of Spotify’s 30 million. It’s not a huge win for Apple as Spotify still has far more paying users overall, but the minor victory is attributed to the three month trial period of Apple Music, and the real test will be how many of those users convert to paying subscribers after their trial period.
Former Apple engineering manager Terry Blanchard has left Apple to work at Readdle. Blanchard’s work at Apple included work on the Apple Mail client, and he will now be building a rockstar team to work on Readdle’s Spark email client at their San Francsisco head quarters.
Apple is now blocking App Store submissions when the name of the app includes the price. Both the Mac and iOS App Stores will be automatically rejecting apps which including pricing information in the title. It’s a significant change, given that many apps have had free versions for years that will now be blocked by iTunes Connect.
The tvOS 10.2 update requires AirPlay hardware verification, preventing third-party streams from sending audio to the fourth-generation Apple TV. Rogue Amoeba’s blog post on the issue has more information, but for the time being, they’re recommendation is for fourth-generation Apple TV users to stick with tvOS 10.1.1, and turning off automatic updates in order to prevent being accidentally upgraded and losing AirPlay functionality.
9to5Mac tells us how to use the Find My AirPods feature in iOS 10.3. A word of warning from Twitter: don’t try out the feature to play a loud sound when the AirPods are in your ears. There’s a button, and it warns you that AirPods might be in your ears, but you can still press the button anyway.
The Mac Observer lists the Terminal commands you’ll need to create your own APFS drive on your Mac and start your own experiments with Apple’s new filing system. It’s still unknown when Apple will be making the switch to APFS on the Mac, but by all accounts the iOS conversion has gone pretty smoothly.
Google Calendar has made the jump to iPad, if you’re a fan of the Google Suite of apps. It’s basically the same as the iPhone version, just a little bigger, and there’s even Split View support. Google has also promised improved notifications, coming soon.
One developer says the ability to reply to customer reviews on the App Store is as much future PR as it is responding to existing customers. With that in mind, he went through all of his 700 reviews with the aim to educate users about features they may have missed, acknowledge flaws or shortcomings, all the while never picking a fight.
