Super annoying syncing bug still unfixed since the first beta of iOS 5 & iTunes 10.5

[Pooshka]

Anyone with an iOS device will be able to reproduce the bug. It's been there since the first beta of iOS 5 and iTunes 10.5. Unbelievable!

Basically, either iTunes refuses to sync metadata changes to an iOS device or the iOS device refuses to accept metadata changes from iTunes during the sync. Metadata changes just won't sync. What kinda metadata? Anything from song lyrics, song genres to book authors, etc.

Here's how to reproduce the problem:

1. In iTunes, select any song for the experiment. Get Info. Paste lyrics.
2. Sync the song to your iOS device.
3. On your iOS device, go into the Music app. Find the song. Check the lyrics. They are there, correct? Good because the first sync always works.
4. Now here's the problem: go back to iTunes. Find the same song. Get Info. Edit the lyrics in any way (remove half of it for example).
5. Re-sync.
6. On your iOS device, go back into the Music app. Find the song. Check the lyrics. You expect to see the changes from the 4th step, right? Nope, you see the same lyrics from the 1st step, totally unchanged. Wait, but didn't you edit out half of the lyrics and re-sync?
7. Here's more: go back to iTunes. Find the same song. Get Info. Remove the lyrics completely.
8. Re-sync.
9. On your iOS device, go back into the Music app. Find the song. Check the lyrics. You expect to see NO lyrics because you removed them, correct? Nope, the lyrics are still there, unchanged, intact.
10. But do not stop here because it gets even more frustrating: this time you wanna remove the song, even the album, even the artist, even all of the music from your iOS device and re-sync the music with no lyrics whatsoever back to your iOS device. Alas, even after all this hassle, the very same song still has the very same lyrics from the very 1st step.

There is absolutely no way of removing or editing metadata after the initial sync. It's there permanently. It's like plague; you can never get rid of it no matter what you do: edit, delete, sync, unsync, resync, reset, restore, destroy the iOS device or even burn the computer.

 

[mavis]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4 (32GB, JB): Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

I've never had a problem with this (and yes, I use lyrics all the time). Running iTunes on a Mac.

 

[Pooshka]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4 (32GB, JB): Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

I've never had a problem with this (and yes, I use lyrics all the time). Running iTunes on a Mac.

Yeah, but have you ever had to edit or remove lyrics for any reason?

Try removing any lyrics in iTunes, syncing and then see if it's removed in the Music app as well.

 

[goMac]

Because you're using the betas, I'm assuming you're a developer, and if so, you have the proper channels already with which to report these bugs.

 

[Pooshka]

Because you're using the betas, I'm assuming you're a developer, and if so, you have the proper channels already with which to report these bugs.

Already done. I still have the right to post on here, correct?

 

[mavis]

Because you're using the betas, I'm assuming you're a developer, and if so, you have the proper channels already with which to report these bugs.

What about me? I'm not using a beta, and I've just confirmed the bug exists in iTunes 10.5 build 141 (the publicly released version) ...

 

[Night Spring]

Actually, I think the problem is not just with lyrics, but any changes in metadata. For instance, change the genre of a song, and see if the change is reflected on iPhone.

The same bug also exists with iBooks. Edit book info in iTunes, sync, the old info doesn't change on iPad/iPhone.

I have sometimes managed to get the changes to take by deleting all songs/books, then resyncing them all again. But again, sometimes even that doesn't work.

Very annoying. *sigh*

 

[Pooshka]

Ok, so I've posted the issue on ASC. I'll keep you updated if anything.

 

[mavis]

Ok, so I've posted the issue on ASC. I'll keep you updated if anything.

Any news on this? I've tried wiping all of my music and re-syncing, and still can't get updated album art and lyrics to show. Highly frustrating!

 

[mavis]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4S (64GB): Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

Wondering if anyone has tested this with the iOS5.1 beta ... ?

 

[mmhardky]

Fast forward to May 2012 and iOS5.1.1 ...

The freaking bug is still there!

Interesting is, that the only change that is actually synced is "song title".

 

[mavis]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 4S (64GB))

Fast forward to May 2012 and iOS5.1.1 ...

The freaking bug is still there!

Interesting is, that the only change that is actually synced is "song title".

I'll have to test it when I get home. It's been working fine for me on iOS5.1, though.

 

[Ishmumrhmn]

No use, Apple will not care anyways

 

[griz]

I'm getting it with iBooks and it's annoying.
If I sync a PDF to iBooks and then make a change to the Genre, or artist name or the sort order, iTunes does not update that information to my iPad.
The only way to get the changes to go is to uncheck syncing of books, remove them all and then check it and resync. At which time another bug rears its head. Rechecking Sync All, will appear to sync everything but when you look at the iPad, nothing is there. Then if you go back to iTunes and sync again, it will quickly sync but switch from all books to selected books. I then have to recheck all books and it will sync them all over again. Big PITA.