Apple scrambles to fix buggy Mavericks apps

Apple is readying a spate of updates to a number of apps that shipped with its latest version of OS X, Mavericks, which launched on October 22 at the low, low price of gratis. According to sources speaking with 9to5Mac, the updates will be to iBooks, Safari, and the Remote Desktop client, and were seeded to Apple employees on …

[SuccessCase]

"And thus we are provided with yet another reminder of the risks taken when installing "version .0" of any major software release."

No we aren't because you haven't said what the bugs are or how severe they are. Indeed I've been using Safari and iBooks on Mavericks and have no idea what the bugs could be. So, yer, they must be severe.

[Kristian Walsh]

Oh for goodness sake. Stop being such a fanboy.

There are lots of bugs in point-zero MacOS releases. Always have been. Some get fixed, some don't. Lion was riddled with minor bugs, because the dev effort was expended on dressing up the apps to look like their iOS equivalents, rather than improving performance. It only stabilised before the release of 10.8.

It's good to see bugs being fixed, but 10.10 will need to be another "no new features" release to undo the damage done by Lion.

I have Lion on my Air laptop, and am waiting for Mavericks to stabilise before I look at upgrading. But on the machine I rely on to get my work done, I've stayed on 10.6, and I don't see a lot of reason to move yet.

[Anonymous Coward]

Other evidence of it not being perfect.

Apparently Apple changed the code in their underlying VPN software between their last developer release and their proper release. We use Cisco mobility client and it struggles to maintain a connection when on wireless. I hear that Jupiter and other VPN people have had similar problems.

https://supportforums.cisco.com/thread/2247235

I'm a bit surprised by this, changing code at the very last second strikes me as very, very poor indeed. I would have accepted that the testing manager would have thrown a wobbly at this (if he/she knew), if he/she didn't know then the PM should have thrown a wobbly about last minute changes. Thats poor management here.

However I haven't had many (any?) other problems, many people seem to have some issues but apart from the VPN (which is actually a big problem for me), its been pretty pain free. I don't use iBooks, which apparently is a crock of shit, so I'm OK so far.

[a53]

I have a glitch with ibooks, unless I use full screen, the pages won't appear.

[SuccessCase]

Re: From my experience

@HolyFreakinGhost. I understand it's frustrating when there are bugs. However it's important to distinguish who is responsible for the software about which you are complaining. I can assure you it is even more annoying for engineers to read tech comments by people blaming them for a bug which is unlikely to be in their code. If you are finding MPlayerX buggy, raise it with the engineers of MplayerX, not Apple. It may be Apple's fault, but probably isn't.

Also be aware other apps can wreck a system. For example i upgraded my daughters OSX installation. It was running really slow. Before I did the upgrade, I removed Intego Virus barrier (which isn't needed - Apple proved under the hood AV built in and most users don't even know it's there. It was a mistake to install Intego in the first place). The moment it was removed, her machine was like new again. The performance problems evaporated.

[Philip Hodges]

Re: From my experience

It might be annoying, but the blame is correct. Exposing a bug in someone else's software is great during the test phase, but is not very clever in a production release. They should be humble and they should be very concerned, no matter how relieved they are that for once the defect was not in their own software, and that it has been found.

[There have been at least two cases where Apple software was indeed responsible for disk corruption: having to boot in safe mode to repair a disk before journalling was enabled by default for OSX was no fun, and going back another decade there was the black dot System 7 fix.]

[Anonymous Coward]

Overstretched

iOS 7 - buggiest release ever.

Mavericks - same.

Maybe use some of that $100bn to buy some test tools?

[a53]

Re: Overstretched

I've no issues with ios7 on my iPhone 5 at all. Works like a dream. Only seen 1 minor problem with Mavericks which is fairly insignificant.

[rcorrect]

meh

On my iMac 2008 with 4GB RAM, Mavericks doesn't do nearly as well as Snow Leopard did. RAM is eaten in a hurry and applications feel more sluggish. Frequently when I bring an application forward there is a noticeable delay. If you got the RAM and CPU then Mavericks might work better on your Mac. I'm putting up with it so I can use the latest Xcode. Also I gave Apple's Maps a try and I am unimpressed.

[Mike Bell]

Re: meh

RAM is eaten in a hurry

Yes. Mavericks makes much better use of RAM than its predecessor, and will aggressively cache memory to make better use of hardware, as well as compressing least-used memory. Unused RAM is a waste of resources, and you should view it as such if you have Mavericks installed.

[cd]

Apple Upgrades

Why do people even consider this before the .6 revision is out?

[Mike Bell]

Re: Apple Upgrades

Ooh let me guess... Maybe because a new version of the OS supports new features of interest? Maybe because it's the first Apple upgrade in years that is designed to work with pretty old hardware? Maybe because it's free? Maybe because it was in beta for a long time and had generally very positive reports? Maybe because you're not using your computer for mission-critical work? Now I come to think of it, I'm struggling to find any reason at all.

[nanchatte]

My mavericks has been rock solid apart from a regression in the USB Displayport compatibility limiting me to one USB monitor.... There are a few minor buglets, but it's a lot better than either lions were. And faster, too.

[stizzleswick]

Fixes are out already, it seems

At least, I got the iBooks and Mail fixes installed today. No idea what they were fixing, because like a few others above have noted, I haven't experienced any bugs. From my point of view, Mavericks and its associated stack of applications is one of the smoothest OS releases in my lifetime, and I started out on MS-DOS 2.1.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Fixes are out already, it seems

Where are you getting you getting the fixes from? Nothing from Software Update for me.

[William Donelson]

Even with some bugs, 10.9.0 is a vast improvement in speed and stability over 10.8.5

[alan buxey]

.0 release

>And thus we are provided with yet another reminder of the risks taken when installing "version .0" of any major software release

well, not really. the OS itself seems sound. not had a problem. regarding those Apps - iMail, Safari etc - I dont use them, I use superoir (IMHO) applications instead - namely Chrome and Thunderbird. iBooks - I havent had a problem with..and I' happy that , at last, I can read iTunes book purchases on the desktop and not NEEDING an iPad or iPhone.

as for memory usage - read the very very informative reviews and tech notes - the OS is swap-averse and uses memory more aggressively to reduce power consumption..inclusing using memory compression methods to use memory as much as possible. Some applications will need some updates to take advantage of the new features (if those Apps are still being developed) or they'll enter the battery-eating hall of shame (energy impact pane in the acvitivy monitor)

[ChrisMcD]

iBooks was a forced "upgrade"

After relatively hassle free OSX updates a free Mavericks was a temptation I should have resisted.

But then, what could they screw up with simply making iBooks available on the mac?

Well, I can only assume it was so simple the task was given to an intern who never read books and apparently never sorted their music in iTunes! Either that or Apple have taken an unpleasant decision to deny you access to your own possessions.

I have been relative lucky considering the tales of woe on the discussion boards, but:-

1) iBooks fails to sync with iTunes. Whether books are loaded into your iPad is apparently a matter of random chance. If you are really unlucky they never made it to iBooks in the first place.

2) Your books collection, lovingly arranged in iTunes is hidden away in a secret folder.

3) All the titles and arranging built up over years are wiped and your cherished collection is given a series of random number file headings.

Considering that iTunes popularity was based on the opportunities that it offered to personalise collections, this indicates a worrying lack of awareness on the part of Apple that people like to personalise their libraries as well. Do I not have some vague recollection that Steve Jobs was happy to undermine the forcing of mediocre song purchases bundled into "albums"?

Worryingly, it now looks like Apple have decided that since you do not own the books you have purchased you are not entitled to personalise them.