Alert: Compatibility Issue with Apple iOS 8.3 and External GPS Receivers
DO NOT UPGRADE YOUR APPLE DEVICE TO iOS 8.3 IF YOU RELY ON AN EXTERNAL GPS RECEIVER.
We are investigating reports that iOS 8.3 (released by Apple earlier this week) is not feeding GPS data from most external GPS receivers into 3rd party apps, such as ForeFlight, WingX, JeppFD, Navionics, and others. We have reproduced this issue in our lab and confirmed that this issue is not unique to Bad Elf GPS receivers, but affects other GPS receivers from Garmin and Dual Electronics as well.
Our newer GPS accessories, including the Bad Elf GPS for Lightning (BE-GPS-1008), Bad Elf GPS Pro+ (BE-GPS-2300), and Bad Elf GNSS Surveyor (BE-GPS-3300) do not seem to be negatively impacted.
We are working with Apple to resolve this issue and will provide status updates as we get more information. In the meantime, we recommend you wait to upgrade your Apple devices to iOS 8.3.
Update (Monday 13-April): We've passed all of the necessary information to Apple Support and got confirmation over the weekend that it has been passed to the correct team. We're optimistic it will be fixed in the next iOS 8.3.x release, and will post updates as we receive them.
Update (Thursday 16-April): We're still awaiting any news from Apple. In the meantime, we’re exploring several possible workarounds. We have confirmed that the beta iOS 8.4 released earlier this week has the same GPS issue. Some customers have reported successfully downgrading their iOS back to iOS 8.2, but we can’t recommend that process to our customers — it’s not supported by Apple and requires a complete wipe of your settings/apps/data. If you are a pilot grounded by this issue, please contact us via email to support@bad-elf.com and we’ll see what we can do to help. Rest assured we are doing everything in our power to get this resolved and will send another email when we have any new information.
For future updates on the iOS 8.3 situation, please view the latest information on our supplemental blog post, available here.
I saw, on different blogs and forums, that iOS 8.4 is not likely to be released before June. Furthermore, there is no plan for a 8.3.1 release either.
Everybody has a theory on the subject but nothing tangible is said or done.
While I’m sure this method cannot be advised by Bad Elf, this worked for me….I use a GPS Pro and was also affected by the 8.3 release. I used this site to downgrade to 8.2 and everything is working fine again with no detriment to any function of my iPad. http://www.idigitaltimes.com/downgrade-ios-83-and-restore-82-how-remove-problem-update-your-iphone-ipad-or-ipod-433654
Hi Brett,
I have spoken to Apple again in the last five minutes and their support person was definitive that they are not working on a fix that will correct the problem with external GPS units. This is up to the individual companies and to the app providers as far as Apple are concerned. She, Daniella, told me that she had escalated this to their senior engineers and that was that! I could look for a refund for the app purchases, if I wished. Big deal!!!
Fred — we understand your frustration.
Nobody knows for certain if this iOS bug was in the 8.3 betas, and unfortunately we can’t go back now to check that (we’ve tried). But, let’s assume it was there, in which case it slipped thru the cracks and was not caught by anyone — us/Garmin/Dual/ForeFlight/Jeppesen/Apple. We apologize for our part in this debacle.
We’ve already reviewed our internal testing process and are making changes to do a better job of covering the large test matrix of (iOS device models X iOS versions X Bad Elf device models X Bad Elf firmware X Bad Elf app X 3rd party apps). We’ll do a blog post with debrief of these findings/changes once this is all resolved in the next few weeks.
Unfortunately, there will always be the potential for breaking changes since Apple does not typically do beta releases for point releases (ie: 8.2.x) — which is why everyone recommends NOT upgrading to any new iOS release for the first week it’s available, unless you can risk breaking changes. And many users such as commercial/military pilots are prohibited from doing updates until approved by their management or chief pilots. It’s the nature of the beast.
You can read my comment below re: Garmin “fixing” the issue (they didn’t), and what we’re doing to work around this Apple bug via a firmware update for the Bad Elf GPS Pro in the meantime.
I’ll drop you a note directly to see if there’s anything we can do to help. As always, our support team is standing by, just drop a note to support@bad-elf.com.
Best regards,
-Brett
I have spoke with a senior advisor yesterday at Apple and they have informed me today that Apple does not developed their systems to work with third party apications. Furthermore that the beta had been released to the developers and should have been caught by bad elf. It appears that a firmware update should have been released by bad elf just like garmin glo. From what it looks like bad elf has dropped the ball and now they are looking for their costomers to upgrade for a price. Yes a discount is available but why should the customer have to pay for a mistake that is made by bad elf. I am looking for a phone number to customer service but can not find one. Would love to exchange my 6momth old Gps for one that works. Please help make this happen.