iOS 10.3 Beta Says 32-Bit Legacy Apps Will Not Work With Future Versions of iOS

[IvanX]

Uh, what? I used to distribute through the app stores. Pretty much every app cost me more money than I ever made from it, thus why I stopped. The financial performance of my apps were pretty typical, from my understanding. Most developers make next to nothing. The best most people get is they get their $100 annual developer fee that Apple charges back. Divide the income over the hours they work and you find they were effectively paid $0/hour.

Developers need to assess the financial consequences of becoming involved in this eco-sphere. It's not for everyone. This is the game that we all play: some developers are eager to jump to the latest and greatest and leaving a chunk of users in the dust while other times Apple puts its foot down and some devs abandon their apps.

People who are unhappy about this are encouraged to lobby developers to update their apps. If developers are not willing to do that, perhaps it is time to consider a different app. Alternatively, people are free not to upgrade to iOS 11, if that is when this restriction will kick in.

There are always options, it's about choosing what option is best for you.

 

[d5aqoëp]

No, you didn't "lose" anything. You got full use out of the system. You should be be blaming Apple. It's the CCTV company that abandoned you. Also you could always keep an older device around just to control that system if you are hell bent on keeping it. But this is how electronics work -- there is no guarantee anything you buy today will work on later hardware. And with anything there is no guarantee the company will be around to support the product a year after you buy it. 5 years is old for a CCTV, you got your $ out of it at $200 per year. I know I have a closet full of worthless devices because the company went belly up and the old drivers don't work (well) with any current OS.

CCTV is something you don't replace every 4-5 years. They work well for 10 years if you do good maintenance.

I know that I learned my lesson but "this 32 bit app will be rendered useless after we update to 64 bit only system" was the last thing I would have had anticipated.

 

[Jsameds]

To think of it from a DRM perspective, all those 32 bit apps you purchased... you will have no access to them because Apple axed 32 bit all together. That's DRM. Your purchases are not yours after all. You are at the mercy of the company who enforces the DRM.

Developers being lazy is not a valid reason. Not everyone has to be like Facebook to routinely update their app with junk lines of code and keep on bloating it till it explodes.

I will have to upgrade my 5 year old CCTV camera system which will cost me $1000 because their remote app is 32bit and very old. It may stop working in iOS 11.

Now I will lose $1000 because of DRM.

Don't update to 10.3 then.

 

[theshoehorn]

Simple solution: don't upgrade. I'll continue using 9.3.5 until my iPad dies. 10 is worse in every way that matters to me. There's no hope for 11 fixing that trajectory.

Hope you don't do anything confidential on that iPad... It's so vulnerable right now I wouldn't even want to be on the same network as you... Please update for the sake of security.

 

[ThaRuler]

Does this mean my fart app will be going the way of the dodo?

 

[pers0n]

I play several games that haven't been updated. They're 'worth' it to me.

Might be best to get an older Ipad then and download them now. The iPad 3 is now considered old and stuck on iOS 9 :/

 

[Tubamajuba]

I have at least two old apps (dating back to iPhone 3G) that contain a ton of archived data (contacts, notes, etc). I use them sporadically now - but I do still use them. So it's going to be a royal pain extracting all that old data and stashing it somewhere safe. And I guess I have to do it now, while the old apps still work.

Guess I need a Data Migration strategy for my phone? Maybe I should hire a consultant?

Apple: It Just Works! (until it doesn't)

The developers have had several years to update the apps you use, and they haven't done so. The developers have abandoned you. This is not Apple's fault at all- they have been clear for quite some time now that all apps must be updated to 64-bit. They're being clear right now that these apps will soon stop working. All this time and all these warnings? No excuses.

 

[steve62388]

To think of it from a DRM perspective, all those 32 bit apps you purchased... you will have no access to them because Apple axed 32 bit all together. That's DRM. Your purchases are not yours after all. You are at the mercy of the company who enforces the DRM.

Developers being lazy is not a valid reason. Not everyone has to be like Facebook to routinely update their app with junk lines of code and keep on bloating it till it explodes.

I will have to upgrade my 5 year old CCTV camera system which will cost me $1000 because their remote app is 32bit and very old. It may stop working in iOS 11.

Now I will lose $1000 because of DRM.

That does suck, but can't you beat up the CCTV manufacturer to get off their backside and update the app?
[doublepost=1485886470][/doublepost]

There are a decent amount of iPhone 5 and iPhone 5Cs out there... those are 32 bit platforms...

Yep, but they probably won't be supported by iOS 11 anyway. They can't update so old apps continue working, no change for the end user.

 

[firewood]

Is there any way, via settings on the iPhone, or in iTunes to get a list of the apps installed that are 32 bit? I'd like to know how much this might affect me, but don't really want to open each of the 260 apps on my phone to find out.

Not on an iPhone with an unmodified OS. But on a Mac, you can change the app's .ipa filename to a .zip, unzip it, and from the Terminal command-line run the command:

lipo -info

on the binary inside the unzipped app's Payload directory to find if it contains an arm64 slice. A script to do that for all iOS apps inside the iTunes/Mobile Applications directory wouldn't be too complicated.

So at the end of the day, the question still rises. Why is 32bit compiled binaries being removed? 64bit CPU's will run 32bit applications fine. it's an arbitrary cutoff

You are assuming that all the custom ARM processor chips that Apple is designing for future products will still do this.

 

[alexgowers]

I feel sad that I still have plenty of 32bit apps on my macbook but on ios they're almost completely gone. Hell I have an alpha piece of 32bit only software right now.

Apple is not phasing these out becuase of performance issues which don't really exist if you compare 32-64bit but because they want to get rid of older apps.

 

[iMacDragon]

I feel sad that I still have plenty of 32bit apps on my macbook but on ios they're almost completely gone. Hell I have an alpha piece of 32bit only software right now.

Apple is not phasing these out becuase of performance issues which don't really exist if you compare 32-64bit but because they want to get rid of older apps.

It does make development in future easier, and frees memory resources. So I'm not in slightest surprised.

 

[WatchFromAfar]

Why all the hostility towards 32-bit apps? Is a “modern”, updated fart app more valuable than a perfectly usable, does what it needs to do so doesn’t need updating 32-bit app?

 

[truthertech]

Looking forward to seeing millions of 32-bit apps disappear from the store because the developers don't see it as worth the cost to update

Well, since there are only about 2 million total, can't be "millions," but I agree with you that it will be nice to see more of the outdated stuff get flushed out to reduce the clutter and improve security and performance for folks.

 

[Quu]

Disappointing, there are a lot of paid games I still play that haven't made the move to 64-bit and I doubt the developers will do it either.

 

[Zimmy68]

Speaking of which, AppShopper is a MacRumors branded app, no?

What is taking so long to update this app?
It still doesn't have an iPad version.

 

[napabar]

I play several games that haven't been updated. They're 'worth' it to me.

So are games on the Atari 2600. Time moves on.
[doublepost=1485887948][/doublepost]Hopefully Apple does this on the macOS too.

A pure 64-Bit OS. No 32-Bit compatibility.

Mile ahead of Winblows and Android.

 

[thespacekid]

So Apple is providing a good reason to not upgrade your iOS or iPhone? Seems counter productive.
[doublepost=1485888133][/doublepost]

So are games on the Atari 2600. Time moves on.
[doublepost=1485887948][/doublepost]Hopefully Apple does this on the macOS too.

A pure 64-Bit OS. No 32-Bit compatibility.

Mile ahead of Winblows and Android.

At least on a Mac you can boot off of another hard drive running the older OS. That choice isn't available for iPhones.

 

[truthertech]

You think not updating is also worth the lack of updated security that comes with it also?

ddd

CCTV is something you don't replace every 4-5 years. They work well for 10 years if you do good maintenance.

I know that I learned my lesson but "this 32 bit app will be rendered useless after we update to 64 bit only system" was the last thing I would have had anticipated.

Just curious. You've said the software is very old and hasn't been updated. That's undoubtedly a security risk, performance hit, feature miss, etc., from the company that sold you the CCTV system. Why isn't your ire directed at them, and what is their response when you've pushed them on this issue?

 

[Arran]

Don't update to 10.3 then.

If only it was as simple as skipping one OS update.

You really think Apple wants iPhone 7 customers to never update again?

 

[AppleB]

It's all good. Time and Technology marches on.
I have a few 32 bit apps that I like and use but I still have a iPad 2 for that.

 

[jschrab]

Dammit. That probably means that all of Llamasoft's/Jeff Minter's games will stop working:
http://minotaurproject.co.uk/blog/?p=376

 

[truthertech]

Great news! Now Apple should warn all of the developers, that 32-bit apps will be removed from Appstore. There are not many things that i hate more (if we talking about tech) than outdated apps. Progress all the way!

There's little reason for Apple to do this. Granted it's a small amount and decreasing every day, but there are people who have older phones who will want to run 32-bit apps. Time will take care of the clutter on the App store.

 

[LordVic]

Not on an iPhone with an unmodified OS. But on a Mac, you can change the app's .ipa filename to a .zip, unzip it, and from the Terminal command-line run the command:

lipo -info

on the binary inside the unzipped app's Payload directory to find if it contains an arm64 slice. A script to do that for all iOS apps inside the iTunes/Mobile Applications directory wouldn't be too complicated.



You are assuming that all the custom ARM processor chips that Apple is designing for future products will still do this.

it's a functionality of the OS, not the CPU. Yes, you cannot run 64bit applications on 32bit CPU, but there's no limitations other wards. Fore xample: Win32 Applications still run perfectly fine on 64bit CPU's and arhitecture. In fact, through emulation technologies, Microsoft even has 32bit applications running in 64bit arm.

I'm struggling to find a technical reason for cutting 32 bit applications out.

 

[ActionableMango]

Why all the hostility towards 32-bit apps? Is a “modern”, updated fart app more valuable than a perfectly usable, does what it needs to do so doesn’t need updating 32-bit app?

I'm going to lose a couple of apps that I value quite a bit, so I certainly don't have any hostility toward the apps. However, the app developer should do the simple update to make it 64-bit compatible, then all would be good.

I accept that iOS has to move on. Continuing to support older hardware, architecture, and APIs forever leads to OS bloat.

 

[Attirex]

This is an outrage! For....someone. With too much time on their hands.