Apple says iOS software update to fix pesky alarm clock bug
A software update for Apple's iPhone and other iOS devices is reportedly in the pipeline to rectify a glitch that has caused quite a few rude awakenings for some users overseas.
A report out of Australia notes that the Alarm Clock application Apple ships on the iPhone and iPod touch began waking users up an hour early in the southern region of the continent -- New South Wales, the ACT, Victoria, and Tasmania -- because a bug caused the software not to fall back an hour when changes to daylight savings time kicked in one Sunday ago.
More specifically, it appears that the bug affects devices running variants of iOS 4 than have reoccurring alarms set to wake users up during the week for work, for instance. Meanwhile, a lengthy discussion thread over at the whirlpool forums has dozens of users complaining that their non-recurring alarms have ceased working completely.
"Mine did not work this morning," said one user. "I have since tried creating new alarms, turning the[m] off etc.. Doesn't work. I just tried setting the alarm 1 hour forward and it worked. So definite issue with DST."
A representative for Apple Australia told ZDNet that the company is "aware of this issue and already developed a fix which will be available to customers in an upcoming software update."
That update is likely to appear in the next few weeks before changes to daylight savings time begin to take affect in other portions of the world, including the United States.
In the meantime, users plagued by the recurring alarm problem can either set the alarm one hour after the time they actually want to wake up or deactivate the recurring alarm and remember to set a non-recurring alarm each night.
A report out of Australia notes that the Alarm Clock application Apple ships on the iPhone and iPod touch began waking users up an hour early in the southern region of the continent -- New South Wales, the ACT, Victoria, and Tasmania -- because a bug caused the software not to fall back an hour when changes to daylight savings time kicked in one Sunday ago.
More specifically, it appears that the bug affects devices running variants of iOS 4 than have reoccurring alarms set to wake users up during the week for work, for instance. Meanwhile, a lengthy discussion thread over at the whirlpool forums has dozens of users complaining that their non-recurring alarms have ceased working completely.
"Mine did not work this morning," said one user. "I have since tried creating new alarms, turning the[m] off etc.. Doesn't work. I just tried setting the alarm 1 hour forward and it worked. So definite issue with DST."
A representative for Apple Australia told ZDNet that the company is "aware of this issue and already developed a fix which will be available to customers in an upcoming software update."
That update is likely to appear in the next few weeks before changes to daylight savings time begin to take affect in other portions of the world, including the United States.
In the meantime, users plagued by the recurring alarm problem can either set the alarm one hour after the time they actually want to wake up or deactivate the recurring alarm and remember to set a non-recurring alarm each night.
Comments
That update is likely to appear in the next few weeks before changes to daylight savings time begin to take affect in other portions of the world, including the United States.
That's a bit of a strange way to say it. DST will "have an effect" very soon in the US. "Take effect" is usually reserved to point to the beginning, or reinstatement of something, not the fact that it is ending.
At any rate, what a frustrating bug. I rely on my phone every morning for an alarm, so I'd be pretty annoyed. I would imagine this is probably not a bug for the end of US DST, but if it is, here's hoping they get it fixed in the next couple weeks.
What about the alarm that goes off every Friday morning at 10:30AM reminding me to pick up some furnace filters? I set that up early this summer and deleted it a month later but it won't go away.
As an added feature, the iPhone watches to make sure you actually do the task before removing the reminder. Maybe you weren't carrying your phone when you picked up the filters?
On the technical side, I set my alarm for 7:00 am, it went off at 8. WTF?
yes,i hate the bug www free123 net/sig/24/smile.gif
Mods, this is just stupid smiley link spam!
Mods, this is just stupid smiley link spam!
Use the Report Button »
Edit: Ah, I see you edited the link to keep it from being linkable. Good show, but I still say use the Report Button.
Put a 2-gen touch running iOS 4 to sleep overnight without going into airplane mode, and the battery will plummet 15% and more overnight, presumably because it's still waking up to hit that WiFi connection. (Push notifications are off.) Put it in airline mode and that doesn't happen. It's not like it takes rocket science to document this problem. Two nights is sufficient. And it's not like I and others haven't told them about it.
And why is this so? The 2-gen touch (and the iPhone 3G) gets so few new features in iOS 4, that they'd have done better to create a more modest update, one without all the glitches, and called it iOS 3.3. As best I can tell, the only reason I and millions of other iPhone 3G and iPod touch users have to suffer the hassles of iOS 4 is because iBooks only runs on iOS 4. Apple is sticking us with a sluggish, bug-ridden OS to sell a few more ebooks.
That's why I'm delighted that the Droid is moving up behind the iPhone. Apple has begun to behave like most at-the-top-of-the-market firms: catering to the whims of a well-placed few while ignoring the needs millions of customers.
This is disgusting. Months after release, they have yet to fix problems with iOS 4 on the iPhone 3G and iPod touch that should have been caught at the alpha testing level and yet they're getting all hot, bothered and frantic about a little alarm clock bug.
In Sweden, a not to smart tech guy decided to do a poor job when updating the time servers.
Half my company came late to work.. All the clocks were set back.
My wake-up alarm came on at noon.
It was on the news and everything. Android was affected to.
Not the same issue but still funny.
Use the Report Button
I did!
Am sure the update will be of size 250-350mb
Sad, but true. Does iOS has OTA upgrades? Does it patch only what needs fixing?
The Cocoa date and time classes are so complicated not even Apple's engineers can use them.
LOL legitimate excuse to be late... Since it is in the news...With no confirmation date, still plenty of time to be late (again).
One thing I've always wondered: why did Apple remove the clock app from iOS 3.2? iPad users have no native clock that can keep running in the background to sound an alarm. That will almost certainly change when 4.2 comes out next month with background processes so third-party alarm clock apps can finally have that functionality, but it just seems like an odd omission.
For some reason, the iPad lacks a few features we all grown accustomed to.
Why this is, I don't know.
But it is strange. No stocks, weather, voice memos, clock, calculator, or compass..
When I think back, was there not a Steve quote about the calculator not looking good on such a large screen or something.
For some reason, the iPad lacks a few features we all grown accustomed to.
Why this is, I don't know.
But it is strange. No stocks, weather, voice memos, clock, calculator, or compass..
When I think back, was there not a Steve quote about the calculator not looking good on such a large screen or something.
Most of those I don't think are strange and even predicted prior to the actual anmouncement of an Apple tablet. For starters, the later I/O of the 10" display allows for some really complex apps and the App Store trounced Apple's basic efforts almost immediately so I think Apple is best to leave this to the 3rd parties. Apple still hasn't updated their Weather app to use the GPS to find your location on the iPhone version which seems odd unless you consider that Apple is moving this functionality to the 3rd parties.
My biggest issue with these simplistic and/or forgotten apps is that you can't remove them with using a JB app or use a Profile that you can create from their Enterprose Configurationn Utility. What I'd like Apple to do is have a section in Settings that allows you Show/Hide these apps for all users, excluding Settings, of course.