Wednesday, October 2, 2013

iOS 7 in Education: Thanks for nothing, Apple

We have had so many problems with this update that I can't count them all. Here are two HUGE problems so far if your environment Supervises the devices using the Configurator.

1 - If the devices are backing up to iCloud, the profiles are not backed up and restored on the devices. What this means is if a student with a Supervised device breaks the screen and you restore a backup created on that device to a new one, the new one will not be Supervised. And of course, you can't supervise after the fact, so now what? On iOS 6, if you backed up a Supervised iPad and restored it onto a new device, Supervision and all profiles restored with the backup.

2 - Students who update to iOS 7 over the air lose the Supervision profile once they update. The device will appear to be Supervised if plugged into the Configurator; however an MDM like Meraki will begin reporting that the device is unsupervised. Oddly, on our devices, the restrictions that were put into place by the Supervision profile are still in effect on the devices; however, since Meraki is reporting it as unsupervised, future profile refreshes will not install on these "Unsupervised" devices if the profile contains settings that are Supervised-only elements.

More to follow...