MacRumors

Apple today seeded the fourth beta of an upcoming iOS 10 update to developers and public beta testers for testing purposes, one week after seeding the third iOS 10.1 beta and more than a month after releasing iOS 10 to the public.

Registered developers can download the new iOS 10.1 beta from the Apple Developer Center or over-the-air once the proper configuration profile is installed. Public beta testers can download the update over-the-air after installing the configuration profile from Apple's beta testing website.

iOS 10.1 introduces a new "Portrait" mode for the iPhone 7 Plus that allows it to use the two built-in cameras to create shallow depth of field portrait photos with blurred backgrounds.

The update also likely includes bug fixes and other under-the-hood improvements to address issues that have been uncovered since iOS 10 was released, such as an ongoing CallKit bug that has caused CallKit to function unreliably.

iOS 10 has been described by Apple as the "biggest release ever" for iOS users, with features that include a redesigned Lock screen, a Siri SDK to allow third-party apps to integrate with Siri, and a completely overhauled Messages app with stickers, a full App Store, Digital Touch, Bubble Effects, and more.

Other features include a dedicated "Home" app for HomeKit users, new facial and object recognition capabilities in Photos, and redesigned Maps and Apple Music apps. For more details on iOS 10, make sure to check out our iOS 10 roundup.

Carnegie Mellon University professor Russ Salakhutdinov has been hired by Apple to lead a team focused on artificial intelligence, according to a tweet Salakhutdinov sent out this morning. He will continue to teach at Carnegie Mellon, but will also serve as "Director of AI Research" at Apple.

In his tweet, Salakhutdinov says he is seeking additional research scientists with machine learning expertise to join his team. An included job posting asks that candidates have experience with Deep Learning, Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Reinforcement Learning, Optimization, and/or Data Mining.

Salakhutdinov specializes in statistical machine learning and has authored many papers on neural networks, deep kernel learning, reinforcement learning, and other related topics.

His expertise may be used to improve services like Siri, which has been in the spotlight recently after journalist Walt Mossberg wrote a piece calling the personal assistant "limited," "unreliable," and "dumb." Siri is powered by a neural network and uses machine learning techniques to improve over time, as do other Apple features like Spotlight, QuickType, Photos, autocorrect, Maps, and more.

Salakhutdinov's hiring comes as rumors suggest Apple is aiming to improve Siri as part of an effort to build the personal assistant into an Amazon Echo-like smart home product that would be able to do things like control smart home accessories.

Apple is also on the verge of finishing an R&D research center in Yokohama, Japan, which will focus on "deep engineering" and developing Apple's artificial intelligence services.

Apple today released the second official update to the iOS 10 operating system, nearly one month after releasing iOS 10.0.2 and a month and a half after providing the new iOS 10 operating system to the public. iOS 10.0.3 comes ahead of iOS 10.1, a more significant update that brings a Portrait mode depth-of-field effect to the iPhone 7 Plus.

iOS 10.0.3 can be downloaded as an over-the-air update on all iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus devices.

Today's update includes a fix for a bug that could cause issues with cellular connectivity, a problem that only affected the new iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus. Shortly after the iPhone 7 was released, a number of Verizon users began experiencing a serious issue that caused them to regularly lose LTE connectivity on their new device. It was later discovered that the issue affected iPhone 7 and 7 Plus devices associated with other carriers as well, and it should now be fixed for all users.

iOS 10 is a major update that includes features like a redesigned Lock screen experience, a revamped Messages app with a full App Store, a Siri SDK for developers, new looks and features for Maps and Apple Music, and tons more. Make sure to check out our iOS 10 roundup for details.

A class action lawsuit filed by four former Apple retail employees over alleged California Labor Code violations commences tomorrow in San Diego Superior Court.

A civil jury trial is scheduled to begin Tuesday at 9:00 a.m. local time in a courtroom presided over by the Honorable Eddie C. Sturgeon, nearly two years after Apple's appeal and motion for dismissal was denied in the case. The lawsuit, titled Felczer vs. Apple Inc., falls under the court's Department 67.

The lawsuit, originally filed in 2011 and elevated to class action status in 2014, accuses Apple of failing to provide timely meal and rest breaks, failing to pay all wages due upon ending employment within the required time, and failing to provide accurate wage statements, according to court documents filed electronically.

The proposed class would involve all current, former, or prospective employees in California who have worked for Apple between December 16, 2007 and the time of trial, which totaled approximately 18,000 employees as of 2014. Any settlement awarded would be divided evenly between class members.

California Labor Code dictates that employees must be provided with at least a 30-minute meal break when the work period is more than five hours, and at least a 10-minute rest break for every four hours worked. The defendants claim Apple failed to always provide these breaks for at least four years prior to the lawsuit.

Meanwhile, the complaint notes Apple took several weeks to send out a final paycheck to multiple employees. As a result of these unlawful business practices, the lawsuit asks for compensatory damages and repayment of all wages owed, along with interest and legal fees, but it does not specify a damages amount.

Apple has informed retail employees it will be removing the Lead Creative role at its stores, according to multiple sources. The changes should take effect by mid November at all stores except select flagship locations.

Apple will be relegating current Lead Creatives to the role of Creative as part of the transition. A source said pay will remain the same for existing leads, but their current leadership responsibilities will be slowly removed.

The move comes less than three months after Apple introduced a new "Creative Pro" position above Creative. Retail employees holding this position are considered the most knowledgable about Apple products and services, providing customers with advice and expertise about products such as the iPhone. Creative Pros are situated on the sales floor, internally described as the Product Zone.

Apple has given its automotive team a late 2017 deadline to "prove the feasibility" of its self-driving car system, and decide on a final direction for the platform, according to Bloomberg.

Apple's ambitions no longer include building its own car "for now," but it could return to developing its own vehicle in the future, or partner with existing carmakers, the report claims.

The project's shift has allegedly resulted in hundreds of employees being reassigned, let go, or leaving on their own terms since August, including more than 120 software engineers.

The remaining members of Apple's car team, which comprises about 1,000 people, are said to be working on "autonomous programs, vision sensors, and simulators for testing the platform in real-world environments." Apple is said to have kept staff numbers in the team steady by hiring people to help with the new focus.

The report follows months of internal struggles as Apple's so-called "Project Titan" team is believed to have faced delays and internal strife.

"Apple Car" lead Steve Zadesky reportedly stepped down from the project earlier this year, with his responsibilities shifting to Apple's hardware engineering chief Dan Riccio until longtime Apple executive Bob Mansfield took over the team in April and shifted the project's direction.

About a month later, Mansfield took the stage in a Silicon Valley auditorium packed with hundreds of Titan employees to announce the strategy shift, according to people who attended the meeting. Mansfield explained that he had examined the project and determined that Apple should move from building an outright competitor to Tesla Motors Inc. to an underlying self-driving platform.

While plans for an Apple-designed vehicle by the early 2020s are seemingly in flux, the company's research and development plans could change over the coming months and years. Nevertheless, Tesla CEO Elon Musk believes Apple will not have its own vehicle ready by 2020, calling it a "missed opportunity."

Apple and Huawei will be the biggest beneficiaries following the discontinuation of Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 line, according to research conducted by KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. The two companies will mainly see orders increased by users looking for a smartphone with dual camera support, including Apple's iPhone 7 Plus and Huawei's upcoming Mate 9.

While Kuo believes Apple will benefit majorly following Samsung's troubled Note 7, the analyst also says that those benefits are "largely reflected in raised forecasts," and not as much in actual iPhone shipping numbers. Of the original 12-14 million Note 7 units expected to ship in 2016 before the exploding battery drama, Kuo estimates 5-7 million Note 7 users may switch to iPhone, mainly expected to be the iPhone 7 Plus.

Consumers that have switched from Note 7 to iPhone after the recall and halted production can be identified as having the following characteristics: (1) no trust in the Samsung brand anymore; (2) could be former iOS users; (3) like dual camera feature; and (4) like the subsidy packages of telecom operators (iPhone 7 and 7 Plus were the most promoted flagship models in September).

Because of this, the analyst believes Apple's biggest benefits of the Note 7 discontinuation have already "peaked out." It's estimated that it will take Apple between 3 and 5 weeks to accommodate additional orders of the iPhone 7, especially "if the company does not expand the current production capacity of the iPhone 7 Plus."

Right behind Apple, Kuo believes that Huawei will gain the second biggest benefit of the Note 7's failure, particularly due to its foothold in China and Europe. With the impending launch of the Mate 9 in the fall, the analyst looks at Huawei as the best alternative for Note 7 users who are leaving Samsung's smartphone lineup but seeking to remain in the Android family.

Ultimately, Kuo notes that while the impact of the discontinuation of the Note 7 will likely not last very long, if Samsung makes the same mistakes on the Galaxy S8 -- expected to enter mass production in Q1 2017 -- the analyst believes its brand "will be hurt immensely." It's expected Samsung will be more patient with the S8, however, since the smartphone's 10 nanometer production process is facing yield issues and as a whole the company will "make greater efforts with quality control" after rushing to production with the Note 7.

The Note 7's discontinuation began with a recall of the devices in early September following a few user reports of exploding batteries in the smartphone. After the recall, Samsung faced a series of unfortunate events as its shares plummeted, supposedly safe replacement phones began exploding, and a Bloomberg report painted it in an unfavorable light, indicating that the company rushed the Note 7 into production to do battle with Apple's iPhone 7.

Prior to launch, rumors that eventually became true were suggesting that the iPhone 7 would not receive a major design change, so Samsung could therefore benefit from being an enticing alternative to users on the fence. The Note 7 is now officially discontinued, banned from all United States passenger flights, and expected to cost Samsung around $2.3 billion, essentially erasing "all the mobile business profit" from the company's revenue for the quarter.

Apple CEO Tim Cook hinted that Japan has a big part to play in the company's ongoing development of AI, as he continued his travels around the country via bullet train on Monday.

Speaking to Nikkei Asian Review, Cook revealed that Apple's new advanced R&D center in Yokohama, currently scheduled for completion in December, would focus on "deep engineering" and would be "very different" from the R&D base Apple is building in China, without giving away specifics.

"AI is horizontal in nature, running across all products, and is used in ways that most people don't even think about," said Cook. "We want the AI to increase your battery life, to recommend music to Apple Music subscribers... [to] help you remember where you parked your car."

Japan's robotics heritage is legendary, coming on the back of years of successfully building industrial robots, however the state of its AI research remains ambiguous, given its relative lack of investment in deep learning from large amounts of analyzed data, which U.S. companies like Facebook and Google are already heavily researching.

To improve on this front, Japan has just opened a Center for Advanced Integrated Intelligence Research in Tokyo (RIKEN), which specifically aims to develop systems of AI that will be able to solve problems using "Big Data". The institution will work with several large companies including Sony, NEC and Toyota, and is set to receive state funding of $99.7 million over the next financial year.

Elsewhere in his interview, Cook talked up the Japanese model of the iPhone with regard to its hardware integration with Sony's contactless FeliCa standard, which is widely used across the country for making quick payments. "Japan is important to us. FeliCa was born in Japan. So by extension, FeliCa is important," he said.

Cook also said he hoped the use of Apple Pay, the iPhone and the Apple Watch would promote a cashless society: "We would like to be a catalyst for taking cash out of the system," he said. "We don't think the consumer particularly likes cash."

In addition, Apple is said to be working with IBM and Japan Post Holdings to offer health care services for the country's elderly, with the iPad being at the center of the program. Given the rapid aging of the country's population, Cook said "Japan is in the best position to lead" the way on such technology.

Previously during his Japan visit, Tim Cook met with Nintendo's legendary game designer Shigeru Miyamoto and played Super Mario Run, which is expected to arrive on iPhones by the end of the year. It's unclear what else Cook is planning during the rest of his stay in the country.

With the introduction of the iPhone 7, Apple did away with the classic click-mechanism home button in favor of a "solid-state" pressure sensitive one that uses haptic feedback to mimic traditional button presses.

The programming that controls the Taptic Engine-powered feedback is deeply integrated into iOS 10, so much so that it appears Apple's latest iPhone is able to automatically offer a temporary workaround when its diagnostic software senses that the technology is playing up.

MacRumors forum member 'iwayne' shared the above picture of his iPhone 7 display after the device unexpectedly turned itself off while charging and the haptic feedback began malfunctioning after a restart. A dialog prompt warns that the home button is in need of repair, but presents an alternative onscreen home button for temporary use until the phone has been turned in to Apple for servicing.

MacRumors has previously noted that the Taptic Engine can become unresponsive if the OS freezes, which forced Apple to change the reset process for the iPhone 7 series. Apple has also apparently safeguarded against instances when the button's haptic sensor system breaks completely, but whether or not its failure rate is any better than a physical button remains to be seen.

Rumors suggest Apple will ditch the iconic home button entirely for next year's "iPhone 8" in favor of one built directly into an edge-to-edge display, but it's unclear if Apple intends to implement the same button-based recovery methods for instances in which devices freeze or stop responding completely.