iTunes 12.7

Mark Hunnibell wrote:

No kidding. Did they actually THINK about this before they made the change?

I have perhaps a dozen apps that have file storage capability. I used to be able to drop a PDF from my Mac in Finder to, let's say, Adobe Acrobat reader. So how do the fascists at Apple allow me to do that? Where is the documentation? Why was there ZERO warning about this loss of capability!?

Throwing the word "fascist" around so lightly is insulting to the people who have died under fascist regimes.

There was no intent on my part to denigrate or insult anyone who died under fascist regimes. I think perhaps your view of fascism is narrower than the actual meaning of the word (according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism):

Fascism is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism, characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and control of industry and commerce...

In this context, I stand by my use of the term; Apple is inflexibly dictating how people use its products by forcing them to use them in one way with the intent of "controlling industry and commerce."

Mark Hunnibell wrote:

There was no intent on my part to denigrate or insult anyone who died under fascist regimes. I think perhaps your view of fascism is narrower than the actual meaning of the word (according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism):

Fascism is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism, characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and control of industry and commerce...

In this context, I stand by my use of the term; Apple is inflexibly dictating how people use its products by forcing them to use them in one way with the intent of "controlling industry and commerce."

You're still trivializing the term. You appear to be ignoring the first part of the definition "radical authoritarian nationalism". Apple is not a country. They are a manufacturer of consumer luxury goods who has every right, in a capitalist system to change their product as they see fit.

Mark Hunnibell wrote:

But... by all means... ignore the message and attack the messenger. As I said, I stand by my use of the term.

The person who drove a truck into a crowd in Charlottesville was a Fascist. It is simply unacceptable in a polite society to compare anyone or any organization to a murderer.

Lawrence Finch wrote:

Drew Reece wrote:

I suspect that iTunes also backs up new apps to that location, so in theory you could revert apps if you have an old copy (e.g. from Time Machine). I don't have iTunes 12.7 to test that theory - update an app on iOS & then sync to iTunes to see if it updates the copy on the Mac.

I have 12.7 (not my choice), so I checked. Syncing does not copy apps from iOS to iTunes. Which makes sense, in a way, because with app slicing introduced in iOS 10 an app for one device will be different code than the same app for a different device.

Thanks for confirming Lawrence.

Can iTunes actually get apps from a device? Is there any way to grab an installed app for safe keeping? It seems pointless if the only apps you can install are the 'cruft' that Apple left behind from this update (the apps synced pre 12.7).

I know schools that use iTunes to install & manage apps on hundreds of iOS devices (often they are the same model, so app thinning is irrelevant). If they can no longer manage the apps they will be stuck downloading GB's of data on their network, ugh.

This change is very bad even in principle (it wasn't broke, so why fix it?), and doesn't even work as advertised. My phone tells me there are 2 updates pending, CamScanner and TomTom Europe, but the App Store says there are no updates. This might imply that only Apple apps will be picked up by the App Store, already bad enough, or maybe that the "update via App Store" part of this simply doesn't work. Bad, bad, bad!!!

I hate this update!! I have hundreds of apps on both my iPhones and iPads. How do I rearrange pages of folders in one step? CAN'T! How do I restore from my Mac instead of hours or days via wifi? CAN'T! I was going to purchase a new iPad Pro and an iPhone X. Now I will just wait until my iPhone and iPad die because apple thinks my time isn't worth anything. They just lost over $2k from just me!!! I bought in to the Apple ecosystem for ease of use. This update stinks!!!

Drew Reece wrote:

Can iTunes actually get apps from a device? Is there any way to grab an installed app for safe keeping? It seems pointless if the only apps you can install are the 'cruft' that Apple left behind from this update (the apps synced pre 12.7).

Apps haven't transferred from device into iTunes since the release of iOS 9 and the introduction of app thinning/slicing. Each device gets only the relevant code and resources.

I know schools that use iTunes to install & manage apps on hundreds of iOS devices (often they are the same model, so app thinning is irrelevant). If they can no longer manage the apps they will be stuck downloading GB's of data on their network, ugh.

Presumably schools and businesses have tools for pushing out required apps and updates over Wi-Fi with no user interaction necessary. Can you imagine the job of manually hooking up several hundred devices to USB, one at a time in turn to deliver an update with iTunes, and then making sure that each device gets back to the right user? 😮

tt2

Hi Joseph, Im pretty irritated too! 😮 Thanks for the link to provide feedback I will be providing them some! I was ticked to find that all my 32 bit apps I had stored in iTunes were gone. As well as the ability to shop for apps within iTunes, dumb move. I did find that you can still do file transfer to apps via iTunes, when iOS device is plugged in. Thats something at least. Considering reverting back to older iTunes version from backup myself.

Not that this is a great solution, but i uninstalled this version of iTunes and managed to restore the older version. Less than ideal, but for what i need it for (to see the storefronts on PCs), this will suffice...for now.

Hi Mark, fairly frustrated to. I found that you I can still do a file transfer under "file sharing" option when iOS device is plugged to apps such as adobe acrobat. Still mad about losing all my 32bit apps though

How about a simple fix? Why doesn't Apple just take the former Applications section from the pre 12.7 iTunes and rename it iOS applications and allow us to download the program to the new macOS High Sierra? That would solve everything. Those who don't want to use their computers can do nothing, and those who want the convenience of the previous Applications section of iTunes will have an alternative.

turingtest2 wrote:

Presumably schools and businesses have tools for pushing out required apps and updates over Wi-Fi with no user interaction necessary. Can you imagine the job of manually hooking up several hundred devices to USB, one at a time in turn to deliver an update with iTunes, and then making sure that each device gets back to the right user? 😮

tt2

I don't need to imagine, I have seen it done 🙂

Some places have (what seems like) odd methods to manage devices and Apple didn't help much in the earlier days of iOS.

Schools brought specific carry cases with multiple USB hubs built in to charge/ sync to a dedicated Mac (via iTunes and Apple Configurator). The devices can go to any user as they do not care about the data, they just want specific apps updated at the start of each term. It may seem antiquated but devices need to be able to fit the needs of the user not what Apple thinks users need.

The current iTunes assumes Wi-Fi works well everywhere & the network can handle all the traffic, which just isn't the case. 30 iPads/ Touch's trying to fetch updates at the start of a lesson can ruin the entire lesson. This is a reason to keep the devices on older OS's & avoid accepting iTunes updates too - it isn't clear to me what OS they will be running now.

Apple's caching server should make it better but devices still can choke the local network.

Please tell me how I can get back to a version of Itunes that has APPS support. Apple assumes too much in this new version that I only want music - you guys got it totally wrong!!!! I now have no reasonable means of managing multiple Apple devices, maybe it is time to switch to that other platform.

Apple has a long and dismaying history with software. In the beginning there was AppleWorks, one of the first integrated app suites, and very good. Discontinued. Pages, Numbers, and Keynote replaced it, but no real integration. (Keynote has also been dumbed-down over time.) Filemaker: an Apple product at heart, fine database app, gets better and better, but no integration at all, not even searchable with Spotlight. And now this with iTunes. Apple decides what people want, or anticipates what they will want, but the trade-offs often seem to me to not be worth it; while they cater to the newer trends and younger kids, and try, often successfully, to create stuff even beyond them, they often seem to leave long-time users hanging, for no apparent reason. Mac OS integration with iOS is a fine idea in principle, but the resultant dumbing-down of some Mac stuff is a disappointment.