Once upon a time you could organize/rearrange the apps on your iphone via your computer screen while the phone was plugged in. My phone is currently on 11.0.3, and my itunes is 12.7.0.166, so both up to date, and I no longer see this option available.
Does it no longer exist? If it does can you show me where to find it? Searches in Google and Apple Support only point me to outdated articles.
Management of apps, books, and tones has been removed from iTunes 12.7. See Changes in the new iTunes - Apple Support for details. The intention is clearly that management of these generally takes place on the device.
See the Manually add items from your computer section of Manually manage content on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch using iTunes - Apple Support for the control that remains. This can be used to copy apps (including apps that have been withdrawn from the store), ePubs, iBooks, PDFs, and tones from your computer to your device. The File Sharing feature for copying data between apps and the computer is still there. You can also use iCloud Drive, or Dropbox to move content to and from the device.
A long time criticism of iTunes, at least from some quarters, is that has been that it has become bloated. Perhaps this is an attempt to address that. I let both my iOS devices update automatically when there is an updated app, and I'm not interested in hanging on to old apps that a developer has withdrawn, nor do I need to rearrange my apps often, so while the change is drastic, I don't think it really affects me much. I'm more irritated by the changes to iTunes U, and iBooks in iTunes for Windows.
See Deploy apps in a business environment with iTunes - Apple Support for access to iTunes 12.6.3 if you want to revert to a build with app management features. Windows users need to uninstall the current copy of the iTunes application first. See Empty/corrupt iTunes library after upgrade/crash for steps to revert to a pre-iTunes 12.7 version of your iTunes database.
tt2
And they do care.
Many, many people complained about how slow and bogged down iTunes was. Many many people offered feedback and clearly the App management was the feature least used by most that complained. Or the one people suggested was less necessary.
If you want Apple to hear you, and what you want, like they heard the people that complained about it, and caused them to remove it, you can use the Feedback form here: Feedback - iTunes - Apple
Feedback is the only way Apple knows what people want. If enough people complain about something, Apple may be compelled to change it as they have.
Hahaha, well that *****. I only used iTunes to organize my app icons. I would only plug in a device a couple of times a year for this reason when it got too chaotic. Even with the (slightly) enhanced ability to do this on device with iOS 11, it was still 10 times faster & more efficiency to do it with a mouse and the ability to see more than one screen at a time.
I guess the good news is I never need to launch iTunes again.
Apologies, this is correct. Although the Apple Configurator 2 is too sophisticated for me. Let's see how 12.6.4 does.
MakkahCheo wrote:
any solution so far?
Yes, many, from over half a year ago. 😉 Click on the other posts like this link at the bottom of your main window to read the 300+ replies with solutions.
Indeed. I much prefer organizing my Apps directly on my devices, than the slowness that was iTunes before, to do anything related to Apps.
Also with the new App Store app layout, its quite simple to see what apps are installed, and which are not, and quikcly install or remove Apps from the device.
In all honestly using iTunes was always much more of a pain, than doing it on the device directly has ever been.
lowriskLA wrote:
...Manually moving apps on the phone screens has always been a suboptimal way to organize apps. Is this another downgrade by Apple?
Gee, you don't think that is easier/better? Apple believes it is,
therefore you must learn to believe it is.
In certain situation it was easier to do it in iTunes on the Mac.
For exemple, I got too much app on my iPhone and they disappear because there is a maximum of page of app on the phone. In iTunes, there was no page limit, so I can take an app on the page 17 and bring it back to the page 1.
(Because we only have the possibility of 16 pages of app , not more)
For the app that are hidden on the phone, I was able to reach them only with the research option.
What about putting some in folders? I don't know if that will work -- I only have a page and a half of apps on my iPhone and frankly I rarely even need access to the ones on the second page. Oh, and I only have a page and a half because it's an older iPhone with a smaller screen.
Tried to do this, but it doesn't work. Says that I have a "later version of iTunes already installed." When I hit "OK," I then get a screen that says,
"iTunes Installer Completed
Errors occurred during installation before iTunes could be configured.
Your system has not been modified. To complete the installation, run the installer again.
Click Finish to exit the installer."
When I do this and rerun it, I keep getting the exact same errors. It's a never-ending loop of not being able to successfully install this as you recommended.
iTunes Installer Completed
Errors occurred during installation before iTunes could be configured.
That error suggests a problem removing the old version of Apple Software Update. Try repairing Apple Software Update from the programs and features control panel first. See the second box of Troubleshooting issues with iTunes for Windows updates for further advice. You will also need to revert to an older version of your database as shown in Empty/corrupt iTunes library after upgrade/crash.
tt2
This is not a good UX. iOS 11 provides an improved way to setup a new device, in my case as iPad Pro 10.5 and restore from an iPhone backup. However the folders from the phone do not port over which leaves me with a large mess of apps to try and sort out, with an at best clumsy interface. You click and drag an app to try and move it 5 screens over and inevitable end up accidentally dropping it on the wrong page. But wait theres more fun, you still have 50+ more apps to move around. Understand simplification of iTunes on the Mac but then provide replacement functionality in settings or something. I have this awesome new Apple Pencil would be great if I could arrange and group apps with it. Please, please groom some user stories and get them in the backlog ASAP!
So Apple, in it's infinite wisdom, has decided to make their phones once again harder to use. Grab an icon and try to move (toss) it to another page. Wups! It goes right back where it was. Useless. The method on the PC was a pain as well, but at least it worked. Now I gotta figure out how painful it will be to switch to Android. The worst part is starting my games all over 😟
Apple you suck.
Absolutely a bad maven Apples part. It is a step backwards, something I'd expect from Microsoft. To reduce functionality in an environment is not why I went with Apple. I agree with everyone thats complaining the new way, on the device, is clumsy, time consuming and out and out frustrating. I feel your pain !
Thanks for the info. Even bad news is ok when accurate 😟
I preferred being able to organize apps both ways for different reasons.
When I searched Apple.com I found this still on their website (iTunes 11 for Mac: Sync and organize iOS apps). This was misleading even though it says "iTunes 11" in the title, I never thought Apple would remove such a prominent, user-friendly feature from future versions of the software.
Thanks again for the info.
how to organize apps with itunes?
