Apple Seeds iOS 8 Beta 6 to Carrier Testing Partners, but Not Broader Developer Community

While Apple released a sixth developer preview of OS X Yosemite yesterday, a corresponding sixth beta of iOS 8 was not provided to developers at the same time. As a result, the company's iOS beta 5 released earlier this month may turn out to be the final build seeded to developers before the golden master release.

Though developers may not see another beta version, a new report from BGR claims Apple has released a sixth iOS 8 beta to its testing partners. The release would explain conflicting rumors as to whether there would be a sixth beta version if this version is made available only to carriers and other partners for testing rather than the broader developer community.


According to BGR, this beta 6 version of iOS 8 is being released only to testing partners and will not be seeded to developers for testing because the timing is so close to the golden master build. The build change log obtained by BGR is as follows:

OTA Software Update Paths
Carrier Builds
Not Available
User Builds
Not Available

Issues fixed since Seed 5

Baseband & Telephony
Fixed an issue where incorrect pop up message was displayed when SIM was removed
Fixed an issue where clicking on cancel button turned LTE on
Fixed an issue where excessive registration was tried with dual IMSI SIM

Continuity
Fixed an occasional mail continuity failure from OS X to iOS
Fixed an issue causing continuity to fail after opening control center

FaceTime
Fixed an occasional problem where MT call connection quality would be incorrectly treated as “poor”

GameCenter
Fixed an issue where the active photo cannot be deleted

iCloud
Fixed a problem where document sync would sometimes consume excessive cellular data

iTunes Store
URLs for the store app are no longer broken in received mail
Fixed a problem with excessive prompts to sign in to the iTunes Store

Keyboard
Fixed an intermittent issue keyword shifting when rotating the screen
Fixed an issue where the emoji keyboard was unusable on Safari

Mail
Notes are no longer duplicated when opened through Gmail
Fixed an issue where after withdrawing a draft with attachments, browsing to another message resulted in the attachments getting lost
Fixed an issue where forwarding an email without a photo attachment still sends a photo
Fixed an issue when forwarding an email with an attached photo just brought up the original message without a photo
Fixed an issue where email could be deleted from the lock screen without prompting for a passcode

Maps
Fixed a problem where maps would sometimes consume excessive cellular data

Messages
Added support for SMS relay opt-in prompt
Fixed issue that caused devices to receive SMS via relay for unselected aliases
Fixed failures sending current location via MMS
Fixed an issue where messages partially overlap Chinese keyboards
Fixed an issue where changing a group name didn’t propagate to other devices until a message is sent

Phone
Fixed an issue where an incoming call was being relayed back to originating phone
Fixed an issue where options on declining a call didn’t work with call relay

Photos
Fixed an issue where edited photos did not display properly after restoring from backup
Improved full screen photo sharing
Set default to keep all photos on device for users with 5GB iCloud space
Fixed an issue where a user could not select multiple photos and upload to Facebook via Safari

Push Notifications
Improved push connection management upon account logout with multiple associated devices
Fixed a problem where Exchange push notifications would stop after responding to an invitation from the lock screen
Fixed an issue where a user does not receive a notification for incoming messages when the banner for the previous one is pulled down

Springboard
Fixed an issue unlocking an iPhone while on an active call
Fixed an issue where the keyboard would sometimes become unresponsive when the screen is locked

Visual Voicemail
Fixed an issue where Voicemail could not be played under certain error conditions
Fixed an issue where Phone App hanged when tried to check Voicemail

Testing partners with iOS beta 6 must approve the version by September 5, ahead of the final iOS 8 preview and the introduction of the iPhone 6 on September 9. A public release of iOS 8 for current devices will likely come roughly a week later, just a few days before the launch of the iPhone 6 in the first wave of markets.

According to BGR's sources, Apple may still have some work to do, as this build allegedly has already been rejected for an issue with YouTube playback in Safari.