iPhone Bugs Found
This entry was created after viewing pre-release videos and demos on apple.com. Be sure to check out iPhone v1.0 Bugs for a list of issues with the v1.0 release.
It is very likely that these issues have already been resolved, but here are my findings anyway! Oh, and most of these things are very picky and appeared in the Quicktime animations on the Apple web page. Probably not the preferred method of QA used by Apple staff! :-)
Whenever I pick through software in this way I always think to myself -- I hope no one ever makes a list like this for the applications I have created!
- 1 hour, 23 minutes, and 30 seconds in to the Macworld 2007 Keynote Address (iTunes Podcast version): Steve Jobs summed up the iPhone features in a section titled "All together now". While listening to the Red Hot Chili Peppers Steve receives a phone call from Phil Schiller. As expected the music fades out, the screen changes, and the phone rings. Steve continues showing off a real world situation of sending an email and looking at a web page. Perfect! The unexpected portion of the presentation occurs after Steve hangs up on Phil. The music fades in and the phone switches to the Voicemail view. Huh? Steve quickly (and smoothly) presses the "Home" button followed by the "iPod" icon. My guess is that after hanging up the device should have switched back to the iPod on its own.
- Apple website demo -> Revolutionary Phone -> Calls: When Sidney calls the control window flips over and allows Bob to select the "Hold Call + Answer" button. After selecting this option the window flips back to the control window. For some reason the "keypad" button is disabled and then re-enabled about one second before the user presses "merge calls" button. I can't think of a reason why they would change the state of the keypad button at that particular time.
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> Calls: The "keypad" button becomes inactive after Bob hangs up on Gary and Sidney, while the other buttons remain active. My guess is that either this button should remain active or the other buttons should also be disabled.
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> Calls: The scrolling conference text that appears at the top of the display after Sidney is merged reads "Gary Knox & Sidney...". The text starts to scroll and the dots are replaced with Sidney's last name. After the scrolling continues until "Gary Knox & Sidney..." appears again. Then names are replaced with the word "Conference". Is this scrolling text what everyone expects to see here? Should it say "Conference" or "Merged Call"?
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> Voicemail: When clicking on the "Phone" icon on the main screen the user is presented with the Voicemail page. For some reason the spinning activity graphic appears between the signal strength indicator and clock. It isn't spinning, just visible. When the user clicks on "Gary Knox" it begins to spin to show that work is being performed. My guess is that because it is a new message the phone has to download it from AT&T. After listening to about 6 seconds of the message the spinning stops and the graphic disappears. The user clicks on the message from "Sidney Bailey" and no spinning occurs.
- Will the battery indicator color change depending on the remaining charge (all of the demos the public have seen are with devices that are plugged in or simulated in a Quicktime demo -- so the graphic is always green)? Whenever in a non-list type screen the top line of the device is gray. Whenever presented with a list screen such as contacts or even SMS the battery graphic is green. If the color of this graphic is going to change to provide additional feedback perhaps it should be color on all screens?
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> SMS: When viewing the list of messages before entering text the "Send" button is blue. In other areas of the phone such as Photos -> Use As Wallpaper, the buttons are white/gray, then after being pressed they become blue. Along the same lines, the "Set Wallpaper" text becomes dark gray to indicate being disabled. This is probably by design because a similar blue button appears on the compose mail screen (the "Send" button in the upper right). So this likely boils down to the two themes contained on the iPhone... the colorful email/SMS/Contact visual style screen and the dark gray/black screens found when listening to music in the iPod/home screen/photos. So this is probably by design.
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> Photos: When starting to view photos the signal strength/clock/battery bar that appears on all screens oddly disappears after the user flips to the second image in the Italy album. It is replaced with a dark gray bar. This bar then disappears after the user begins to resize the image. The "normal" display returns when the user taps the screen to request the menu to set the wallpaper. Now, this also may be by design to give you a full screen view of your photos... the only thing that might be wrong here is the dark bar that appears after swiping to the second image.
- Apple iPhone web page -> Revolutionary Phone -> Photos: Unlike the lists that appear on other screens, the Photo Album list appears with the gray theme (as opposed to the more colorful contact list, SMS list, etc). From looking at the other screens on the phone I believe this screen should use the color theme. Now the actual photo viewer would appear "correct" with the gray theme.
- Apple iPhone web page -> Breakthrough Internet Device -> Safari: After viewing the Fandango site the user clicks on the "Search" button to bring up a Search screen. The title that initially appears on the screen is "Movie Tickets and Theater Showtimes" (though the word "Showtimes" is slightly obscured by the Cancel button). Below the title text is the URL of the current web site "http://www.fandango.com/". After clicking in the Google search textbox the current page title changes to "Movie Tickets and Theater..." and the current page URL textbox is cleared and the color changes to a light blue. My guess is that a white control means it has focus, and light blue signifies an inactive control. It is possible that clicking back on the address textbox will re-populate it with the active page. My thought as an user is that the current URL should remain in the textbox (heck a modified version of the page title sticks around -- why not the URL).
- Apple iPhone web page -> Breakthrough Internet Device -> Maps: After selecting the Starbucks on Market St, the user is returned to the map where the user finds that location has conveniently been selected. Clicking on bubble brings you to the details for that Starbucks. After calling the store and returning to the map the initial Starbucks is selected (not the Market St location). As a user I would expect the selection bubble to remain on the last selected item.
- 1 hour, 13 minutes, and 40 seconds in to the Macworld 2007 Keynote Address (iTunes Podcast version) -> Maps: Steve Jobs showed a demo of Google maps. While showing off the zooming feature it seemed that every time he "got higher and higher resolutions of the map" the alignment of the map was thrown off. So, he would double tap on the Washington Monument and the map zooms in about an inch to the right of where he is tapping (unless that is Steve is not tapping on the pin, and I don't know why he would do something like that). The result of not zooming on double tap point is that users will need to scroll around a lot to center their selection on the screen. As a user I would expect that the item I double tap on would automatically become centered on the screen.
- 1 hour, 11 minutes in to the Macworld 2007 Keynote Address (iTunes Podcast version) -> Wigits - Stock: Steve Jobs showed a demo of the stock wigit. The wigit took a long time to load any data, and there was no feedback provided to the user. I am sure it was an uncomfortable few seconds for Steve while he wondered if it was going to load. Finally when he was starting to think about grabbing a backup unit it popped up the loading screen. Thank goodness. I would think that something should be presented to the user immediately. Perhaps just the symbol list followed by the loading feedback.
- 1 hour, 11 minutes, 26 seconds in to the Macworld 2007 Keynote Address (iTunes Podcast version) -> Wigits - Weather: Steve Jobs showed a demo of the weather wigit. The same issue as the stock wigit (no data presented to the user for several seconds). Flipping to the next location was faster, but still lacked polish. I would suggest that after downloading and displaying the first weather forecast that the wigit then start collecting for all subsequent locations. This would provide the user with the feeling of a faster responding device.
I would like to take a moment to answer some questions I have received recently concerning this post.
Q. Have you lost your mind.
A. Umm. I don't think so. I am pretty excited for the iPhone release and have watched the Keynote more times than anyone should. On second thought, maybe I have lost my mind.
Q. Why did you create this posting nitpicking a prototype/beta/unreleased product.
A. My thought was this -- on the slim chance that I stumble upon something that Apple has overlooked and they fix it, then we all get a better iPhone.
Q. Variations of you don't have a life, get a life, and get real.
A. I have added that to the top of my to-do-list.
Thank you for the questions, comments, and suggestions. Please keep them coming!
Reguarding the questions you got from readers; it seems like you already don't give a hoot what criticisms are thrown your way, but I just wanted to reassure you that not everyone thinks you're a nut! (well, maybe a little...haha) But I think all the time and effort you've put in to finding these iPhone flaws was excelent and I'm appreciative. As you said, maybe if these problems are addressed, Apple will be more inticed to bring us a better iPhone! Thanks again.
This is a little bit weird that everyone is rushing to tell all the bugs on Iphone I have never seen that on Motorola who have so many bugs for so many years....and what about others companies even if they been there for a while they do have bugs and too many for all those years in business.
It almost feel like people want to put them out of business at they just started!!!
Oiseau
This might already be a known issue. When a security PIN is applied to the iPhone, it is still possible to click "Emergency Dial" and then call the iPhone user's phone number and enter their voicemail, without any authentication. This would imply that if someone got ahold of your phone and knew your phone number, they could listen to all of your voicemails without difficulty, even if the phone were locked by a security PIN.