O'Grady's PowerPage

Tag: Spike

  • Apple delays in-person work return dates for Bay Area employees following spike in COVID-19 case numbers

    Apple delays in-person work return dates for Bay Area employees following spike in COVID-19 case numbers

    If people were complaining about Apple pushing its employees to return to in-person work too quickly, well, that’s off for a while.

    Where originally the company had stated its requirement that its Bay Area employees return to work in-person three days a week starting May 23, Apple is now delaying that requirement.

    The company has yet to set a new date as to when the requirement will go into effect. Employees are currently expected to work in-person two days a week.

    On April 11, Apple employees began returning to in-person work following a two-year stint of remote work due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The tech giant originally had a plan to bring employees back to work through phases, with a requirement of two days
    in-person work starting May 4.

    The next step of the process involved bringing employees back into the offices starting May 23. The employees would specifically have to show up to work Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. This, however, is where Apple is stalling.

    As reported by Bloomberg, Apple has canceled plans to return to in-person work three days a week indefinitely. Apple has also strengthened its masking policies, requiring employees to wear face masks throughout common areas.

    The comes at a point in which COVID-19 cases have once again begun to increase in the U.S. and around the world. Hospitalizations are also increasing, but at a much slower speed.

    Apple has faced considerable criticism concerning the company’s policy to return-to-work. While many employees have complained, at least one notable employee has outright resigned. At the beginning of the month, Apple lost Ian Goodfellow, the company’s machine learning director, citing return-to-work orders.

    Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.

    Via The Mac Observer, Bloomberg, and The New York Times

  • Apple to re-close four Apple Store locations in Victoria, Australia due to COVID-19 resurgence

    Apple has announced that it will re-close at least four Apple Store retail locations in Victoria, Australia, as a result of a COVID-19 resurgence in the region.

    The company announced on tits Australian retail website that, following limited operating hours on Wednesday, Apple Chadstone, Apple Southland, Apple Doncaster and Apple Fountain Gate will re-shutter their doors in compliance with “stage 3” lockdown protocols enforced by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews. 

    The four mall locations join a fifth Victoria outlet, Apple Highpoint, which was listed as temporarily closed last week.

    Over the last two weeks, the Victoria region has experienced a spike in reported COVID-19 cases, positive tests reaching a new peak of 1919 cases on Tuesday. The upward trend prompted the local government to reinstitute a strict six-week lockdown scheduled to take effect at 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday, July 8. 

    Citizens in the capital of Melbourne, as well as other densely populated areas, face a stay-at-home order

    that restricts public exposure to shopping for food and essential items, caregiving, daily exercise, and work and study. Shopping centers and select retailers can remain open if they follow occupancy guidelines.

    Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.

    Via AppleInsider, The Guardian, and 9to5Mac

  • Public Radio Exchange Labs locates multiple-download bug in iOS 6.0.0, says bug may be responsible for data overages

    There’s a reason bug fixes exist and this might be one of them…

    According to the Public Radio Exchange Labs, a system-wide bug in Apple’s iOS 6.0.0 AV Foundation framework has been found to trigger multiple downloads of streaming media, such as podcasts, over Wi-Fi and cellular networks that could lead to massive data bills.

    The flaw was discovered by Public Radio Exchange Labs, the host of popular podcasts such as This American Life and The Moth, after researching a curiously high spike in download traffic. According to PRX, there is an issue in iOS 6 Audio Playback frameworks that results in files being downloaded multiple times, however the problem has apparently been resolved in iOS 6.0.1 and 6.1 beta.

    First tipped off by This American Life, which complained of unusually high content delivery network (CDN) bills, PRX thought that the “rather extreme” spike in bandwidth was due to Apple’s release of its Podcasts app. Following a series of tests that compared transfer activity in iOS 6 with iOS 5, it was determined that audio files were being downloaded multiple times due to errors in the new operating system’s code.

    “The player appears to get into a state where it makes multiple requests per second and closes them rapidly,” PRX wrote in a blog post on Wednesday. “Because the ranges of these requests seem to overlap and the requests themselves each carry some overhead, this causes a single download of an MP3 to use significantly more bandwidth than in iOS 5. In one case, the playback of a single 30MB episode caused the transfer of over 100MB of data.”

    Not only does the bug affect Apple’s first-party Podcasts app, but third-party titles as well, indicating that the underlying issue is system-wide.

    It is unknown what exactly triggers the re-downloading of content, though it appears the timing is variable as the PRX test saw normal content downloads lasting for up to five minutes. What is consistent, however, is the activity seen when a file has completely downloaded. The tests show that once a file has finished downloading, the AV player restarts the download from the beginning and continues to do so as long as a user is streaming the file.

    As seen in the video below, which shows the HTTP activity of the Podcasts app on iOS 6, the system sends multiple rapid requests even after buffering is complete and the file is downloaded.

    PRX speculates the bug could be the cause of recent complaints regarding trouble with iPhone 5 data overages, with subscribers from various carriers claiming the handset was using cellular data despite being connected to Wi-Fi.

    Because iOS 6.0.1 appears to have fixed the error, it is recommended that users running iOS 6.0 upgrade to the latest version to avoid incurring unintended and costly data charges.

    If you’ve seen this bug on your end, please let us know.

    And, well, take the time to update to iOS 6.0.1 today. It tends to be worth it.

  • Cox TV Connect streaming app goes live in App Store

    You’re fond of your cable service and you’re fond of your iPad, so maybe it’s time for the two of them to finally tie the knot.

    Per Electronista, Cox on Monday rolled out its Live TV streaming app in the form of its free Cox TV Connect for the iPad. As with those from most other cable providers, it lets those with the Apple tablet watch live TV as long as they’re on Wi-Fi paired up with a Cox Internet connection and the right level of TV service. The app has a full programming guide and lets viewers watch through an inset while they check the full guide, or else launches a pop-over to show other currently running shows while minimizing the effect on the full-screen view.

    The access isn’t a full range of channels but includes 35 more frequently watched channels, such as AMC, Bravo, History, and Spike.

    Anyone who uses the app can get away with watching through at least a Cox TV Essential bundle, but they also need a Preferred, Premier, or Ultimate Internet connection. The app itself requires any iPad that can run at least iOS 4.3. No mention has been made of Android or iPhone ports.

    As with most such services, the in-home requirement is likely to appease TV producers that see tablet TV as a second use, even if it’s the same feed. Viacom has tried suing providers like Cablevision, even for service within the home.

    Stay tuned for additional details as they become available and if you’ve tried the app on your end, please let us know how it went in the comments.