A reported glitch in the operating system’s compass/gyroscope is impacting AR apps.
A potential bug has been discovered in the most recent release of the Apple operating system, iOS 9, which seems to be affecting certain mobile apps that run on the brand new iPhone 6S, such as those that are based on augmented reality, as well as others that use compass and gyroscope data.
This has had an impact on some of the central elements of these mobile apps and has made several features unusable.
A number of different developers and reviewers have noticed this issue with the operating system in the new Apple iPhone 6S and have pointed out that augmented reality and certain other features have been behaving bizarrely on the device, as a result. It was pointed out at AppleInsider that reports were coming in from its readers that the popular Sky Guide mobile app for stargazing – which is dependent on the advanced sensor suite of the smartphone – was acting strangely.
The augmented reality app was supposed to provide an interactive night sky map, but the iPhone 6S isn’t displaying it properly.
Previous versions of the Apple operating system and smartphone had used that AR app to allow users to aim the device at the night sky in order to see an onscreen view of the planets, constellations, and other astronomical features. However, the iPhone 6S that runs on the latest iOS version, including the iOS 9.0.1 update, causes an uncontrollable drifting of the map.
Confirmation of this issue was made by mobile app developer Fifth Star Labs, which stated that the “compass” feature issue existed on the iPhone 6S and did not exist on any previous hardware, including that running on the same version of iOS.
Other AR apps that require data provided through the smartphone’s three-axis gyroscope, digital compass and accelerometer have also been struggling to run properly and have had certain features rendered unusable. That said, certain other apps that use those sensors, such as the Apple Maps, are functioning perfectly. This indicates that the problem may be based in a faulty iOS API and not in the device, itself. Fifth Star Labs is currently working to repair its augmented reality app so that it will function on these latest Apple smartphones.