What is ”proper” iPadOS? I’m guessing if you asked MR members you’d get a lot of different answers.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Craig Federighi Admits Apple's Beta Programs Don’t Provide the Interaction and Influence Many Users Desire
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
The issue is a team of 100 or even 500 can’t possibly field a dozen or even the top 3 different requests from 10 million beta users. Across 2-3 months and then develop the solution for that. With just a top 3 and a team of 500 over 3 months that would mean each team member is evaluating 1000 idea request per day when 10 would be a lot
Then why does the iPhone come with one? And the Mac? And the Watch (!!) ?
It seems to me you either have it in every platform or none of them.
Which may obviously be true, but how’s one to know when acknowledgment of reports isn’t at a level even Craig isn’t satisfied with?
The 14/16 inch Macbook Pros had a horrible speaker popping issue since launch that specific apps could easily replicate, I provided ktraces and videos of what was happening as well as screenshots of activity showing the problem was being caused by CoreAudioD malfunctioning, reported this FIVE TIMES in Feedback Assistant, and all five of those reports were left open with no resolution. Only after the news started reporting it and users brought their Macbook Pros to Apple Stores so they could get on the phone with senior Apple techs did something get done about it.
I don't think the headline is framed correctly. This is like me saying, "my vote doesn't give me the influence and interaction I desire" because what I really desire is that MY opinions be prioritized. Among millions of beta users their feedback is reduced to nearly being useless simply because of the numbers involved. Or said another way....some beta users are delusional.
Common sense. And that's not remotely what Craig said at all. Craig is responding to a user who is butt hurt that his suggestions aren't being implemented, and Craig is trying to nicely tell the person that Apple hasn't "figured out" a way to take whiny, worthless user suggestions and incorporate them into the product.
Maybe they should have a level one beta that is limited invitation only quasi public beta to say, 10k and scale up to 100k of power users before a wider full scale public beta. This would allow a wider test base that is more manageable. Use AI to surface common themes in reports from the full beta and then dump them down to level one for focused testing and fixes.
This would also give Apple a chance to outright say whether something isn't a bug publicly. I don't think they'd go as far as to say "this will not happen" and close a thread from voting. Users report issue > Apple says works as intended > announces changes to feature behavior or closes thread. It'd be better transparency to those who are concerned about a particular bug or feature request. Open Feedback, there's a feed of current bugs categorized, see what you need there. Although people will still write-in duplicates, much like the forums here on MR. Also, you should be able to remove the Feedback app with betas installed.
As someone who worked in the software industry most beta testers are useless. The bulk are people doing just so they can brag to friends on having a early release and others trying to get free upgrades (back when upgrades were charged for). Then the ones who do submit bug reports most the reports don't have enough info to be of any use. So that usually leave only a couple beta testers who really do provide good testing info. Those few good testers usually get treated to perks like being flown into the company to hangout and special swags and info on future product direction.![]()
Apple's senior vice president of software engineering, Craig Federighi, has admitted that the company's beta testing program, which offers developers and public beta testers access to beta versions of iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, tvOS, and macOS, isn't effective in giving users the amount of influence and interaction they desire.
![craig-ios-16-wwdc.jpeg]()
In an email exchange with MacRumors reader Kieran, Federighi responded to a complaint that Apple’s beta program doesn’t effectively listen to user feedback and suggestions, noting the challenge Apple faces when "literally millions of people participate in our betas, and many, many, many of them want to provide feedback to help influence Apple's products."
When users enroll in Apple's beta program, they're given a device profile that allows them to download early versions of Apple's next operating system, such as iOS 16 and macOS Ventura. Beta testing happens all year round but is most prominent following WWDC in June, where new versions of Apple's operating systems are shown before they're released to the general public in the fall. During the summer, beta testers test the software, finding and reporting bugs, suggestions, and general comments about the new updates.
To provide feedback to Apple, users can use the Feedback app and fill in information about the bug they're experiencing or a suggestion. Often, however, beta users' feedback goes unanswered by Apple. "I agree that the current approach isn't giving many in the community what they'd like in terms of interaction and influence," Federighi admits. "We haven't yet figured out how to achieve that in a practical and constructive way. We'll keep thinking," he continued.
Apple has in the past responded quite drastically to feedback from beta users over changes and new features in iOS, iPadOS, and macOS, but only after widespread criticism and coverage.
For example, last year, Apple turned around a design change for Safari on macOS Monterey following widespread user complaints, allowing users to choose between the design it had promised that was more refined and easier to use and the older tab bar design. More recently, Apple also responded to heavy criticism regarding Stage Manager on iPadoS 16 by delaying iPadOS 16's release entirely and key new features until later this year.
While it's unclear what Apple will do to address the ineffectiveness felt by beta users on the part of interaction and influence over Apple's operating system, as admitted by Federighi, we could see an updated approach for next year's batch of new updates, which will include iOS 17 and macOS 14.
Article Link: Craig Federighi Admits Apple's Beta Programs Don’t Provide the Interaction and Influence Many Users Desire
Product testing is a huge and expensing aspect of development and why companies like Apple keeps releasing software with more and more bugs and incompatibilities. Apple and others use their customers as beta testers especially since they stopped charging for updates and upgrades. Customers would be shocked if they knew how many known bugs software is released with because bugs have priority levels. So only thing companies do is no release with any priority one bugs, lower priority bugs are okay just no priority one bugs. But even that is sleazy because when in crunch time deals start being made between developer groups to bargain away priority one bugs. Things like I'll okay reducing your level 2 bugs down level 4 if you'll reducing my level 1 bug to a level 2.
Then the really ugly side of bug fixes that never get released. Many companies like ones I worked for their policy is no software including bug fixes can be shipped without going thru a full QA cycle. A full QA cycle is expensive and takes a lot of time. This is why when you see bug fixes they usually contain a batch of fixes. Some fixes on old products the fix may never get tested so the fix is never put out to the public. This is all the darkside of software development and it's getting worse not better as products grow and grow in complexity.
How many gigantic bugs have you reported to Apple over the years, and to who?
Imagine the pain of users having easy access to turn their daily driver devices into day 1 beta testers. Devices would be constantly unstable and that would be socialized into Apple products are buggy and low quality. The current method is a safer way to protect the brand and users from themselves.
The real reason? Apple doesn't care what we think. As long as Federighi's been around, it's gotten worse every development cycle. Plain and simple.
I submitted a bug recently for iOS 16.2 and noticed I still had unanswered feedback dating back to 2011 lol. If anything, just select all and mark them closed. Guess I won't bother submitting feedback if they admit that they all go unanswered. What's the point of the feedback app then? 🤔
I'll believe it. I installed the Beta and had a wonderful experience. Since I'm removed the Beta and am using the production version, my computer has been plagued with bugs. Mail keeps running out of space and I have to quit it. Evernote keeps failing forcing a restart. Now Synology is having backup failure galore.
I wish I could go back to the beta. Their release stuff is buggy.
I wish I could go back to the beta. Their release stuff is buggy.
Would be great if Airdrop worked every time and some of the new Macs/displays didn’t have audio and USB problems.
Microsoft has that and some really bad posts get upvoted. It’s too chaotic if anyone can join in and click upvotes and downvotes.
Craig is of course spot on right. But his big issue today, must be the low quality we’re seeing in Apple software. Just look at the article we see today about the software for the new Apple TV. That’s the kind of stuff that Apple cannot continue to do.
The user’s name in the article hyperlinks to some kind of stupid crypto memecoin or nft nonsense called cumrocketcrypto.
Billion dollar company that can't just make a decent music player software for desktop with issues from iTunes that I remember when I was in my early 20s (I'm almost 40 now).
I had put in a bug for Monterey beta over a year ago and they finally got to it. I had already moved on from some of the hardware and Ventura came out a week after they contacted me. They need to be quicker fixes on their bugs.