Apple releases iOS and iPadOS Public beta.

By danno5, 12 July, 2023

Forum
Apple Beta Releases

Hi,
Just a quick update, the public betas for iPadOS and iOS 17 are now available.
Please, if you update to beta make sure you always install the latest builds, so you know what you are testing and can find bugs proactively
Remember, it is very important to submit your feedback to Apple

Options

Your Feedback is Important to Improving Accessibility on Apple platforms

Don't assume that Apple is aware of a bug or that your report won't make a difference - submitting bug reports directly to the company helps them reproduce and resolve the issue faster. Your report may provide crucial information. The more reports they receive, the higher the priority they give to fixing the bug.

If you're using a beta version, use the Feedback Assistant on your device to submit feedback and bug reports. If you're using a public release, follow the instructions on this page.

Comments

By Dominic on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

If you don’t like the public beat of iOS 17, com there is going to be a way that you’ll be able to roll back without a computer

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

At present, the only way that you can downgrade is by restoring with a computer.
As far as I’m aware, there are no changes to this process

By Dennis Long on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

As far as I know there no changes to this process. Before people claim otherwise get proof and provide it. Maybe you shouldn't use dictation either it makes your messages almost unreadable.

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Firstly, always fact check your information. Do not share it until you can verify that it is correct.
Also, using dictation is fine, but if you’re going to use it at least edit the text after so that we can actually read it, and understand what the point you are trying to make is without having to put in a ton of extra work to decode it

By Andy Lane on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Thanks to everyone else that is doing beta testing but I just can’t deal with my stuff working even worse. I’m so done with VO bugs and Apple not fixing them for years if ever. Genuinely thanks to everyone who is prepared to go through it, I just can’t deal with even more problems than I am still dealing with on the almost last version of iOS 16. The only way I can see that changing is if 17 public beta solves the problems I’m having with 16.I really hope Apple takes everyone’s unpaid work testing seriously and finally starts fixing longstanding bugs and not introducing new ones. Well bugs happen but I hope they squash the ones that are identified.

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

That’s completely fine, not everybody has to test any iOS version and there is no obligation to. I’m sure between us all, we can all continue testing and try to find the bugs so that when other people update they aren’t affected by them.

A quick note, though, iOS 16 was a genuinely buggy release, and I don’t think ever achieved stability

By Andy Lane on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

I just think I’m done with it for the operating system of the device that does everything. Especially considering how little resources Apple has on accessibility relative to what appears to be required. I’m all in with testing applications but OS’s shouldn’t be this much work for so little reward. I’ve completely lost trust that my phone is going to do what I ask it to reliably and thats not a good thing. I’ve said elsewhere, Apple has this year to sort it out otherwise I’m gone. I know things aren’t perfect on the other side but from what I understand, at least my phone will do what I asked it to and have reliable and predictable behaviour. When you have no sight, having an unreliable screen reader that does random things at random times simply because of bad software isn’t something I’m willing to accept anymore.

P.S. VO jumped to the preview button about 8 times and the save button once while writing that. Each time I had to go back to the phone and navigate back to this box. Oh goodie, 9. Lol. Good luck everyone.

By Enes Deniz on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Don't really know the answer to that. Anyway, have you noticed any differences? Only yesterday could I install iOS 17 Developer Beta 3 Rerelease, and now I've just learned that the first public beta has been released already. I had to uninstall a bunch of apps and do some cleaning that will free up some needed disk space anyway, but I also had to go through the download and installation procedures. I regret not waiting for it, but now all I can do is update once again.

By Enes Deniz on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Well, I installed the beta mostly because I wanted to experiment with the Personal Voice feature in a strange way. I currently have a computer with Eloquence and an incredibly silent fan, so I wanted to know whether I would be able to somehow make a voice by recording Eloquence by typing the phrases on that computer. I may have to return the computer soon so decided to finally install Developer Beta 3 Rerelease yesterday, but I couldn't record anything. When I tried to say, "I'm creating a personal voice on my iPhone.", I would be prompted to repeat the recording no matter how hard I tried to reduce background noise and reverb.

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

That is probably because the quality of a human voice versus a text to speech voice coming through speakers is completely different, the iPhone microphone is unlikely to pick that up as any kind of recognisable speech.
Also, the personal voice feature is not very reliable at the moment and although mine is apparently created, I still haven’t managed to get it to work.
It’s only just created and I’ve been on iOS 17 since it was announced

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Yeah, some people never take warnings seriously.
I feel like they are sent out every single day, but what can we do.

By Julian on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

I'm curious to know what is your source for your claim that in the iOS 17 PB, one will be able to roll back without the need for a computer. It would be very helpful now and in the future if you would provide this information when making such claims. For example, you might say something like "According to (insert name of source) if you don't like something in iOS 17 public beta, you will now be able to roll back to the latest stable version of iOS without the need for a computer" and if you want to be extra helpful, you might even include the URL to the article. Thank you in advance.

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Just got the personal voice feature to work on my iPhone,
It sounds really compressed and not much like me.
I have seen this in other places as well and a couple of demos I’ve heard

By danno5 on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

You definitely still need a computer to downgrade.
You still need to restore, just because it’s now public beta it hasn’t magically enabled the ability for everyone to just downgrade

By Dennis Long on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

I have found that Apple does appear to be listening to us. This beta seems pretty stable. I Also consider the source of who makes claims. I knew that it wasn't true that it had gotten easier to role back. I researched to be sure but I was 99.99% sure this was the case even before I double checked.

By tripolice on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Very smooth and mostly unhindered experience so far. Found and reported the below issues as of now:

FB12596158 (Unable to move apps using Voiceover—there is no option to drop the app you have put on a drag session

FB12593516 (Voiceover speaks in a relatively lower volume after music is played and stopped)—this is happening with Eloquence Reed voice. The voice volume does come back to normal after a while.

FB12604445 (Voiceover mispronouncing the Record button in Voice Memos app)

By JC on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Yes, it was iOS 9. I too have been beta testing since iOS 9. the latest developer beta of iOS 17 is stable. Hopefully future betas will arrive faster. keep in mind that developers get betas first, followed by public beta users later on, either a day or a week later.

By Holger Fiallo on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Sane here. I could not find it to drop. I went to second page, selected word, open edit and drag word and went to first page and tried to put it close to weather gods and could not find drap after weather gods. Using first public beta. I will do the report hoping it works. It is very stable and like it so far. Using it on my iPad 9. Did notice that when I went to check battery, VO stated iPad 900. Do not know what that is about.

By Chris Hill on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Most of the U.S. voices pronounce button as buddin. Alex isn't so bad, and of course eloquence isn't effected. I think Ava premium might be unaffected as well, but Tom and Samantha are definitely problematic.
Of course Tom has been pronouncing six as shix for a good while now.

By Chris Hill on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

My bank app won't open if it isn't already in the task manager and you attempt to open it with voiceover running. I've reported the bug, hopefully if others have similar issues they will do so as well.

By Enes Deniz on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

So Eloquence, voices by Apple, or third-party voices are probably unaffected for that reason, which has no understandable reason for itself. Who has been ruining those dicts whenever board, and why on earth is this done without thorough testing?

By Justin Harris on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

Just curious as to whether or not anyone else has had issues with the disappearing keyboard in the public beta. If so, have you been able to find a way to make it come back? Braille entry still works even with the keyboard hidden, but then I can't use emojis. Not the end of the world, but slightly frustrating. Just installed today, and it seems quite stable other than that. If anyone else has already reported this, it would be good to know. In the feedback app, is there a way to just note you are having the same problem as someone else, like a me too button? lol That way if someone else has already filed, you wouldn't have to go through the process of adding feedback, just add on to the one that was already filed?

By Januš Kazakevič on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

All Eloquence synthesizer English voices, when using voiceover, do not pronounce diacritic Latin symbols 'ą, č, ę, ė, į, š, ų, ū, ž' when reading text by words, lines, or continuously. However, if I change the rotor to characters, the voices read out 'ą, č, ę, ė, į, š, ų, ū, ž' just fine. When reading the text words by words, line by line, and continuously, these characters should be pronounced as 'a, c, e, e, i, s, u, u, z'. this issue as it seems to be a bug in Eloquence synthesizer.
This error has been present since the inception of the synthesizer in Apple operating systems. I have informed Apple about it, but it still hasn't been fixed. Please help create more feedback about this issue so that Apple can correct it faster.

Screen recording:

https://1drv.ms/v/s!AhWYIkoKVmSHnTBwbebKCg-eM7JE?e=TAdqyp

Case-ID: 3363357

FB12655051.

FB12643929.

FB11995591.

FB12584964

By Godwin adoyi Agada on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

The workaround for keyboard disappearing is to turn off the caption panel.

By Jim D on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

All:

I need to report this to Apple, but want to track down a few more details and exact steps before I do. However, using Voiceover with the public beta, entering text and navigating that text with the rotor is really inconsistent. Sometimes when I turn the rotor to characters and flick down, I get nothing, sometimes I get full words. I turned auto-punctuation, auto-capitalization and auto-correct off for now and that seems to have made things better. I saw this in the messages app and also in a text entry field in Teams. Like I say, I need to figure out the exact steps to reproduce, but just wondering if anyone else has experienced this.
Jim

By tripolice on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

The way this problem triggers for me is when there's any misspelt word present in the text that one is navigating. Even when one is navigating by character, Voiceover starts behaving very unexpectedly as it encounter's an error. Instead of continuing navigating by character, it starts suggesting replacements. Worse, it does not allow the user to interact with those suggestions.

The expected area where VoiceOver should allow us to interact with errors is with the Misspelt roter. All other navigation should work as they are meant to work.

By Enes Deniz on Friday, July 21, 2023 - 14:16

When not only misspelled words but also predictions/suggestions are present does VoiceOver behave strangely. Every time I try to move to the previous or next character, I here the suggestion popup sound and VoiceOver does not report the current character as expected.