Sequoia was on Beta 8 on August 29, 2024. The next one was the RC released September 9 (iPhone event), it was the same build as the final, released one week later.
Sonoma 14.8 and Sequoia 15.7 are now already on RC4. Is this normal, so many RCs?
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macOS Tahoe 26.0 Beta 8 - Bug fixes, changes, and more
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Sequoia was on Beta 8 on August 29, 2024. The next one was the RC released September 9 (iPhone event), it was the same build as the final, released one week later.
Sonoma 14.8 and Sequoia 15.7 are now already on RC4. Is this normal, so many RCs?
No.
I'm not sure whether it's incompetence or staff shortages at Apple, but so many minor UI glitches and issues aren't being fixed.
There are also minor-ish bugs in some of their stock apps, especially MacOS. Either Apple can't fix them or doesn't want to fix them.
I had planned to upgrade my iPhone 11 finally, to get the new iPhone 17, but as a few of the new features are bugged I might as well stick with a phone that doesn't support them all, as I wouldn't be using them anyway.
(I suspect I'll upgrade later in the year when iOS 26.x is out and Apple realise that ignoring all the Feedback requests during the betas and waiting for the general population and press to notice all the bugs wasn't so smart.)
Still, there are a couple of weeks left before the 17 release ...
Yep, and in that period, Apple turn the beta to a RC. Many don't realise what happens here, but when the beta period ends, the software is reintroduced to the engineers to look, and fix bugs, and internally test the product. With the best intentions, they will polish the product, for final release.
I hope your post ages well! There's a chance - most of the issues are minor and shouldn't take much effort to fix*, but then if that's the case they could have fixed them already.
* Before someone accuses me of not being a developer, I have been one, but not recently as I got fed up fixing other people's minor bugs 😁
The way that Apple works, (and I think this is consistent amongst major developers0 is they don't focus on bugs during the beta phase, but focus on features, and getting them to work, and then tidying up at the end.
That does make sense, but history suggests "at the end" is in a MacOS/iOS x.y release where y is not zero.
Having said all that, both MacOS and iOS 26 are running OK on my devices (M4 MBP, iPhone 11) and the minor bugs are just that: irritating but not show-stoppers.
You're probably right, but then software is fickle. Companies can, and often do, spend ridiculous amounts of resources in ensuring the 'perfect' release, and time and time again, someone's particular use case, invokes a bug. Many examples of this, like CrowdStrike, and Sonos' come to mind.
I too had weird display issues with the beta on my M2 Max Studio, ended up going back to macOS 15. No issues on my M1 MacBook Pro though.
Usually at this point in time this is it for 26.0, code freeze and rigorous QA to find critical bugs, data loss stuff, bricked hardware, this kind of nasty surprises, I wouldn't expect any UI level fixes until 26.1. Maybe, just maybe they will postpone macOS release by a month (they did it before). Pretty sure that Apple is currently in a crunch mode to ship iOS26 so it could be installed on new iPhones that would launch in September, everything else is low priority.
The fact that we are at weekly beta's, and that it's rumoured that rc's will soon follow, would suggest that macOS won't be delayed.
Safari keeps crashing on me, started in the previous beta, but hasn't been fixed in this one. it's a bug in the tab bar it seems. Anybody else?
Damn Apple is cooked... I thought that Apple would add many features during betas because OS 26 didn't had a lot, just the new UI... But actually no... It's very sad.
Since we're close to the end of macOS 26's beta cycle, I feel comfortable in concluding that Liquid Glass on macOS is just a fancy skin. No new animations or visual effects like on iOS which, to me, is half of Liquid Glass' appeal.
Looks like macOS just gets a more 'static' version of Liquid Glass with the same old animations, some of which date back to the early Mac OS X days.
I like the look at face-value but macOS's Liquid Glass implementation is lacking when compared to iOS / iPad OS.
If this is reflective of how the new UI will look in the public release, I don't think it'll make a solid first impression. The Safari sidebar in full screen is still not right, and even the Preview app has visual bugs when in full screen.
Safari's sidebar when in full screen
Preview's window frame when in full screen. Note the visual glitch on the left hand side of the window controls.
In some apps, the 'floating' sidebar illusion is completely broken, such as in the System Information app.
Looks like macOS just gets a more 'static' version of Liquid Glass with the same old animations, some of which date back to the early Mac OS X days.
I like the look at face-value but macOS's Liquid Glass implementation is lacking when compared to iOS / iPad OS.
If this is reflective of how the new UI will look in the public release, I don't think it'll make a solid first impression. The Safari sidebar in full screen is still not right, and even the Preview app has visual bugs when in full screen.
Safari's sidebar when in full screen
Preview's window frame when in full screen. Note the visual glitch on the left hand side of the window controls.
In some apps, the 'floating' sidebar illusion is completely broken, such as in the System Information app.
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Actually yes, its normal!
Security update mode updates just get Release Candidates for some reason, never ever betas.
In the background? That's just a Finder window background picture.
I was hoping the sidebars and toolbar would have made some Liquid Glass use of it, as there could actually be something behind them. But no. One could imagine the picture extending to the full window.
That looks absolutely hideous. Sequoia by comparison actually looks more modern.
People will get used to the new UI very quickly, they did it with Tiger to Leopard, Mavericks to Yosemite, Catalina to Big Sur and now this.
I however can't ever get used to tghe new settings app, since Ventura I can't find sh*t. I actually like the new playful UI even though the consistency needs to be improved, all these new colour gimmicks I'm not gonna use anyway. What's less cool is the fact that my M1 Macs feel dated now because the UI feels as sluggish as Sequoia felt on older Intel Macs
I however can't ever get used to tghe new settings app, since Ventura I can't find sh*t. I actually like the new playful UI even though the consistency needs to be improved, all these new colour gimmicks I'm not gonna use anyway. What's less cool is the fact that my M1 Macs feel dated now because the UI feels as sluggish as Sequoia felt on older Intel Macs
i doubt most macusers will notice much difference, or care much, when they update to tahoe; it's only obsessive people (like those on this forum, including myself) who really pay attention to the details.
i did freelance mac support in NYC for about 15 years; in my observations, few people use the options and extras (like launchpad, or mission control, ad infinitum). they surf, email, write... and save their work (somewhere, often to be tracked down later 🤣).
still, fun to discuss these things (and hope apple pays any attention at all) 👍
i did freelance mac support in NYC for about 15 years; in my observations, few people use the options and extras (like launchpad, or mission control, ad infinitum). they surf, email, write... and save their work (somewhere, often to be tracked down later 🤣).
still, fun to discuss these things (and hope apple pays any attention at all) 👍
Oh yeah. I completely forgot that option since I use list view. It would be cool if LG used it.
I forgot to mention, that the automatic **** to dark mode doesn't work in tahoe beta 8 anymore. I have to set it manually to dark mode. Using an M1 Mac mini and M1 Pro MBP