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Today in Apple history: Apple fixes ‘life-threatening’ Maps glitch

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Australia Park
This probably isn't the spot people wanted to reach!
Photo: Papphase/Wikipedia CC

December 10: Today in Apple history: Apple fixes Australian Apple Maps glitch December 10, 2012: Apple fixes an Apple Maps error that caused several motorists in Victoria, Australia, to become stranded in the remote Murray-Sunset National Park.

The glitch showed the town of Mildura about 45 miles from its actual location. In the aftermath, Victoria police describe the app as “potentially life-threatening.” That’s pretty much the opposite of “it just works.”

Today in Apple history: Scott Forstall gets forced out of Apple

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Forstall
The disastrous Apple Maps showed Scott Forstall the way out of Cupertino.
Photo: Apple

October 29: Today in Apple history: Scott Forstall gets forced out of Apple after disastrous Apple Maps launch October 29, 2012: Scott Forstall, Apple’s senior vice president of iOS software, is ousted from the company after the disastrous Apple Maps launch.

Apple divvies up the roles previously handled by Forstall, who once seemed on a path to the top, among other high-level execs. Jony Ive assumes leadership of the Human Interface team. Craig Federighi becomes head of iOS software. Eddy Cue takes control of Maps and Siri. And Bob Mansfield “unretires” to lead a new technology group.

Today in Apple history: Tim Cook becomes Apple’s chief operating officer

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Cook
Tim Cook was on his way to the top spot at Apple.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

October 14: Today in Apple history October 14, 2005: Tim Cook takes the reins as Apple’s chief operating officer, continuing an upward climb through the company’s ranks that will make him CEO less than six years later.

“Tim and I have worked together for over seven years now, and I am looking forward to working even more closely with him to help Apple reach some exciting goals during the coming years,” Steve Jobs says in a statement.

Scott Forstall told Pandora to jailbreak iPhone to build a native app

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Scott Forstall told Pandora to jailbreak iPhone
Pandora become one of the first third-party iPhone apps.
Photo: Pandora

Scott Forstall, a former senior vice president at Apple, allegedly encouraged Pandora to jailbreak the original iPhone so it could get a head start on building a native music streaming app, according to a new report.

Forstall met with Pandora co-founder and CEO Tim Westergren during iPhone’s early days — before it had an official App Store — and encouraged the company to use “back door toolkits” while “we get our act together at Apple.”

Apple says it doesn’t have Scott Forstall’s phone number

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Scott Forstall 2
Scott Forstall left Apple in 2012 after the Apple Maps debacle.
Photo: Philosophy Talk

It wasn’t all that long ago that Scott Forstall, Apple’s former SVP of iOS software, was being talked about as a possible CEO successor to Steve Jobs. Then came the disastrous Apple Maps launch in 2012, and Forstall’s subsequent departure from the company.

Forstall has shown up a couple of times since then, but otherwise maintained a low profile. Now, as unearthed by the Epic Games v. Apple lawsuit, the Cupertino company says it doesn’t even have a current phone number for Forstall — only a Twitter account and P.O. Box reference.

Former Apple SVP Scott Forstall will give free coding lesson for Code.org’s Code Break

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Forstall
Scott Forstall was a key figure at Apple for many years.
Photo: Apple

Scott Forstall, the former Apple executive some people once speculated would take over from Steve Jobs as CEO, is making a rare appearance this week as part of Code.org’s free Code Break event.

Code Break is described as the “world’s largest live interactive classroom.” It features weekly computer science challenges for students of all abilities, hosted by founder Hadi Partovi alongside special guests. In addition to Forstall, this Wednesday’s Code Break will feature rapper Macklemore.

Scott Forstall reveals the surprising origins of Apple TV

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Scott Forstall 2
The Apple TV started as a passion project.
Photo: Philosophy Talk

Scott Forstall has been largely absent from the tech world since leaving Apple following the Apple Maps debacle in 2012. However, in recent times he’s been giving a few more interviews about his time at Apple — when some people predicted he could even be a potential future CEO.

In a new interview on Philosophy Talk’s The Creative Life, Forstall talked about (among other things) his work on the iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Including a rather intriguing anecdote about the creation of the Apple TV.

Apple wanted to bring the best of iMessage to every phone

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Messages iOS 10
Carriers didn't want to adopt.
Photo: Apple

Apple will never bring iMessage to third-party platforms like Android, but there was a time when it tried to convince carriers to adopt a standardized version for everyone.

Former iOS chief Scott Forstall has revealed that the company approached operators in an effort to convince them to take a number of features that make iMessage so great and bring them to traditional texting. But due to a number of reasons, the “explorations didn’t pan out.”

The Apple design process of demos, decisions and feedback with Ken Kocienda [Apple Chat podcast]

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Former Apple programmer Ken Kocienda has written a great insiders account of how the company makes its products.
Former Apple programmer Ken Kocienda has written a great insiders account of how the company makes its products.
Photo: Leander Kahney/Cult of Mac

“It’s this long process of demos and decisions and feedback that creates this long, iterative progression … that leads you from not-very-promising ideas to products you can ship.”

Curious what it was like to work at Apple during its Golden Age of design? What exactly did the creative process look like? On this episode of the Apple Chat podcast, I sit down with Ken Kocienda, a programmer who spent 15 years at Apple during the Steve Jobs era. He worked on the first versions of the Safari web browser, iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch. His new book, Creative Selection: Inside Apple’s Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs, chronicles his experiences working at the company and offers an inside look at the creative process that made the team successful.

On the podcast, Kocienda discusses his role in the development of the iOS keyboard, explaining how text entry evolved and offering insight into the autocorrect algorithm. He walks us through the Darwinian process of creative selection, describing how the demo pyramid functioned to provide feedback and move an idea from prototype to product. Listen in for his experience presenting a demo to Jobs himself and learn how the original spirit of the Macintosh lives on at Apple today!

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