Apple Pushes Back HomeKit Launch to August or September

Lame. Get your act together apple, you have 200B large in the bank

The optimistic way to view this (we shall see if it is the correct way...) is:

Apple are aware that they have some pretty damn serious problems in their network stacks. Whether it's dynamic naming (mDNS), raw WiFi (iOS devices randomly no longer sync with a mac, Macbooks randomly fail when moved from home network to work network and back), SMB (Finder randomly hangs --- and caches stale data) or Bluetooth (Apple keyboard/trackpad randomly disconnect).

This is reaching a crisis point. They have built their empire on "look ma, no wires" and "it just works", but every day you see someone (and people who are serious fans, not haters) exploding with rage at the lack of "just working" of the Apple ecosystem --- reboot every device you own twice a day is NOT an acceptable solution in 2015.

This is going to become beyond problematic into serious "I will sue you and your 200 billion dollars into the ground" territory if HomeKit fails to work properly --- if burglars can enter because a network fault that can be proved to be Apple's fault, or a smoke detector that didn't call the authorities, or whatever. And god knows, these problems WILL occur, and WILL be easy enough to prove given how riddled with bugs is the current networking infrastructure.

So, as I said, the hopeful way to view this is its Apple drawing a line in the sand, saying nothing will be released until it is ready, and it's not ready until the networking for the entire Apple ecosystem, from base station to discoveryd to Finder to WiFi sync can actually run unattended for months on end without weird random failures, undetected errors, and a constant need to reboot.

Lame. Get your act together apple, you have 200B large in the bank

Lame. Get your act together apple, you have 200B large in the bank

HomeKit has been "available" to developers for less than a year and unlike other updates to the SDK, it requires new hardware to truly be effective. Apple's cash balance doesn't mean much when HomeKit requires 3rd party companies to define and develop entirely new hardware/software products to utilize it. Of course it's going to take some time.

Yeah I think we can forget the whole notion of the Apple TV as a home hub.

I mean if you think about it, the Time Capsule is the perfect platform for an all in one: Apple TV - Home Hub - Router - Media Server - NAS - Time Machine.

They just don't think that way. Different devices, different connectors, different dongles = more revenue.

Your average Joe is not capable of buying and setting up a router especially if they are already paying Comcast 5 bucks a month for theirs.

Average Joe can connect a box to a television with a Hdmi port.

Eh. I'd rather see them get it right than get it out a few months sooner.

With the delay, of course, now they really really need to get it right.

For the last 5 years (at least) I've been hopping from one network to another, on one Apple device or another (Core 2 Duo MBP, i7 MBP, original iPhone, iPhone 4s, iPhone 5s, iPad 2), usually copying my old account from the old device to the new. I don't know what you're talking about. Sure, I've had the occasional hiccup in that time, but nothing like what you describe.

The mid 2011 15" MBP I'm using now has been running for just over 5 days (because I haven't bothered to shut it down) with no problems. I often leave it on longer because I don't like to wait the 20 seconds it takes to reboot and reload my apps. It's been on coffee shop networks, my work network, and my home network. I did need to reboot my cable router today, but you can't blame Apple for that! Even that's a rare event.

Apple fans did not do their company any favors when, throughout the 90s, they kept insisting that Apple did not need fancy technology like virtual memory, pre-emptive multitasking, and multi-core support. Likewise they do the company no favors by insisting that, because their systems (generally very simple limited systems) work fine, everyone else's systems also work fine.

I listed a number of specific problems:
- automatic naming and discovery is completely broken
- WiFi sync is frequently broken
- Finder frequently hangs when engaged in file sharing, and file sharing caches material inappropriately (ie there is either no cache invalidation protocol, or the protocol is broken)
- BT peripherals (eg Apple keyboard and trackpad) randomly disconnect and then (sometimes) reconnect.
- WiFi frequently "breaks" on macbooks that constantly move between different networks

I am not making these up. HOWEVER you may not see them if you do not engage in this behavior.
You will not see the naming problems if you do not have an Airport Base Station (I think. The problems seem ultimately to result from the Base Station's attempt to proxy for sleeping Apple devices).
You may not see the WiFi sync stuff if you don't have multiple iOS devices. (Or perhaps it's again dependent on having an Airport Base Station)
You will not see Finder hanging on file sharing transfers if you don't have multiple macs at home, or don't engage much in transferring material between them.
etc etc

I cannot speak to the last problem directly (ie I don't know exactly what "WiFi breaks" means insofar as I can't say exactly what breaks) because I don't engage in this particular pattern. But I DO know that it is real because I see it happen with my girlfriend's MacBook Air all the time. Probably every three days or so she'll get home and her internet connection will be slow to non-existent, so she'll just reboot.

As just one example of the fact that these are real issues, and that serious engineers have investigated them and found Apple wanting, I give you:
http://furbo.org/2015/05/05/discoveryd-cluster****/

(BTW I was a senior engineer at Apple for 10 years through the 90s to early 2000s, so I'd like to think I'm neither reflexively against the company, or incapable of figuring out small problems that are NOT the fault of broken Apple software.)

I hear from a reliable source that everyone is busy working on Ping 2.0. I am super excited :D

Homekit = Skynet

I'm calling it now....

This stuff is hard to get right, and Apple isn't up to the task. A system like this has to be 100% reliable. Apple can't even get the Remote app to reliably work with the Apple TV. Sometimes the Apple TV chokes and needs to be powered down and rebooted. That's acceptable for a set top box but not when you want to turn the lights on.

If they can't get the simple interaction between an iPhone and an Apple TV on a WiFi network to be bulletproof, I'm not expecting great things for HomeKit.

Seriously, WTF MacRumors? Unnamed "sources" tell Fortune something and you run a declarative banner. A _named_ Apple spokesperson refutes that and ..... You let the BS banner stay unchanged. Stay classy MR. Stay classy.