Erica Sadun

Where technology meets something or other

Archive for June, 2018

Simulators gone bad

Recently, some of my simulators launched and loaded just fine. Others simply went black. It didn’t seem to matter which firmware I was simulating. Some devices were just happier than others.

Naturally, I turned to the system console, which provides device-by-device logs, but I couldn’t really find anything.

I tried restarting and rebooting the sims. I tried resetting the core simulator service. I tried a lot of things. (No actual chickens were harmed.) Finally, I stumbled across a Apple Dev Forum thread about issues with the beta system. The advice offered in-thread was this:

  • Quit the simulator. (I also killed com.apple.CoreSimulator.CoreSimulatorService because reasons.)
  • Run xcrun simctl erase all
  • Set a framebuffer renderer hint: defaults write com.apple.CoreSimulator.IndigoFramebufferServices FramebufferRendererHint 3

It worked.

Yay! \o/

From the thread, apparently hints 1 and 2 do not work but 3 does. An Apple Engineer noted that, “hint 0 is auto (currently prefering Metal and then falling back to OpenGL if unavailable). Hint 1 prefers Metal and hint 3 prefers OpenGL. Hint 2 used to mean OpenCL, but we dropped OpenCL support.”

Upshot is that I lost many hours but I seem to have a working solution for dealing with a common problem. I hope this write-up helps you if you encounter the same issues.

Update: Guru Russ Bishop recommends against using this long term. He writes

If you (as I) have deadlines, and cannot wait for this problem to be fixed, this fix will get you back to work. Russ reminds me, though, “Use it temporarily only if you have this problem, and don’t forget to delete the pref in the future”

Pedants love this one secret MBP trick: Nifty going out of business

I know, the post title sucks. I have to work harder on my clickbait headline writing. Anyway, if you own a MacBook Pro, check out Nifty’s going out of sale special. (“Last chance to buy – Nifty MiniDrive closing down… it is now time to close the chapter on Nifty. Thank you for being part of that journey with us. We have reduced all our stock to clear…”)

The Nifty “MiniDrive” (terrible name) is just an SD card adapter. You can pick one of those up just about anywhere for about three bucks fifty. It’s not hugely surprising that selling the same product for $40 plus shipping and handling wasn’t a solid business strategy.

The reason I’m recommending you plonk down $10 (or $12 with s/h in the US) is that the device works seamlessly with MacBook Pro (and, I suppose, Air, although I’ve never tried it in one). I have one in my 2015 MBP-Retina and like it very much.

The MiniDrive hides the card and lies completely flush with the unit. It’s basically invisible, adding what is essentially a slowish internal extra drive (hence the name) that you don’t have to remove when you put your laptop into your backpack.

Make sure you order the right one. A MBP-13 is not the same as a MBP Retina-13, and 13 and 15 are different sizes. I expect they won’t be in business much longer, so take a few moments and ensure that the unit you think you’re getting is the one you’re ordering. If they fold early, you’re out twelve bucks. If they deliver, you get a nice little feature for your system at a price that’s pretty reasonable.

Happy WWDC: Watch the keynote live

Apple’s keynote (aka it’s Special Event) will be streamed live at 10AM PDT (11 Mountain, 12 Central, 1 East coast, etc etc). If you didn’t score a golden ticket, you can watch along on the Apple event web page or on your Apple TV.

I’ll update this post with thoughts and reactions as the event unfolds.

  • iOS 12 announced as a free update. New measurement app for supporting devices will allow you to measure and scan physical scale using an AR experience. Lego’s demo shows that multiplayer AR can be a fun and exciting experience. Sample code going home with developers today.
  • Enhancements to photo search and sharing put the focus on the user-product experience. Today’s keynote, more than ever, seems to be focused on selling their existing products.
  • I love extensible Siri (aka “Siri Shortcuts”, with a dedicated drag-and-drop Shortcuts app), with custom end-user phrases to perform app integration and tasks. Siri will suggest these custom items. Create a macro for common tasks you group together and launch with a custom phrase. A great way to perform everything you need to get to work, hit your commute, or head off to lunch.
  • Several redesigned apps: News, Stocks (with integrated Apple News’s business section, adding iPad support), Voice Memos (also with iPad support), iBooks which is renamed to Apple Books.
  • CarPlay will now support third party navigation apps, so you can Waze your way home.
  • Lifestyle improvements continue with “Goodnight Moon, Goodnight Watch” do-not-disturb mode for bedtime and other naturally concluding cycles. Enhanced notification control, including grouped notifications, diminishes notification burnout.
  • Screentime lets you analyze how addicted you are to your devices, with full activity reports that summarize how often you pick up your device and what apps you spend the most time in. App Limits provide an alternative to 12-step Appholic programs.
  • Animoji enhancements adds tongue detection to improve language and emotional expressiveness. Memoji adds an iOS “mii” customization to animoji.
  • Group Facetime now supports up to 32 participants. With Animoji and special effects support, it’s like you’re doing drugs while sober.
  • Apple Watch gets some enhancements for health and fitness, including group competitions to motivate participants. Apple has added Clippy for automatic workout detection: “It looks like you’re starting an exercise routine”. New watch-to-watch walkie-talkie feature adds a little fun for kids and anyone who wants to harass the cook in the kitchen. “Whaaaaats for diiiiiiinnnner?”
  • Gymkit sounds like fun.
  • Apple TV adds Dolby Atmos sound and is Dolby Vision certified. Better integration with cable TV partners including Charter Spectrum in the US. “Zero Sign-on” means that all the channels you pay for are automatically configured on your behalf. Beautiful new whole-Earth aerial joins the lineup.
  • macOS Mojave: Inspired by the desert at night. Desktop stacks allow you to group material together to save space. Preview markup moves to the Finder! Markup augments screenshots. You can also capture video demos from your screen using a built-in video recorder. Integration between your Mac and your phone allow you to use the phone camera to capture pictures for use in iWork. (Apple Work?) Voice Memos, Home, News, and Stocks are now on macOS.
  • New privacy measures are in place. Today I learned: you can be tracked by a “fingerprint” including the fonts you have installed and other “public” customizations. Scary.
  • Redesigned App Store is redesigned. Pretty.
  • CreateML lets you develop assets and train models for Machine Learning. CoreML 2 is 30% faster and quantization reduces model size by up to 75%.
  • 2019: iOS Apps come to the Mac. A multi-year roadmap converges design and a whole new generation of developers flood the platform for the benefit of the Mac as well as iOS.

Happy WWDC: Time to unenroll your devices

It’s that special time of year: new announcements, new APIs, and new betas. If you’ve got a device you depend on, don’t forget: it’s a great time right now to unenroll your beta profile so you don’t accidentally upgrade to beta 1. A big thank you goes out this morning to Jeff Forbes, who reminded me about the timing!

Unfortunately, all the developer support docs are currently offline before the event. I’ve reconstructed the following from memory and web searches as I deleted my iOS beta profiles about a month or so ago. If I’ve gotten anything wrong, please let me know and I’ll correct.

If you’re on macOS, open System Preferences > App Store, and click the “Change” button next to Your computer is set to receive beta software updates. Confirm “Do Not Show Beta Software Updates”. I chickened out from actually clicking the button this morning on my dedicated primary beta system so I don’t know the steps from there.

On iOS, hop into Settings > General > Profile to delete the iOS Beta Software Profile. I believe you tap “Delete Profile”, enter your passcode, and then tap Delete. Once deleted, the device should longer subscribe to the iOS public betas.