The Weirdest iOS 7 Beta Feature (?) Yet

By Kyle Wagner on at

So here's something strange. Syncing from iCloud seems to have changed a bit and I honestly can't tell if it's a good thing or a bad thing.
After installing the newest beta for iOS 7 and loading up a backup from iCloud I noticed that my apps weren't automatically downloading as they do in iOS 6. Instead they were just sitting there, greyed out. The iOS 7 beta's had some trouble syncing and updating apps so I didn't think much of it, figuring the downloads got stuck, and tried turning the iPad on and off, restarting the network, everything. Nothing worked until I randomly just tapped on a few and they downloaded right away.

What iOS 7 is doing it seems, is downloading the metadata for what is supposed to be there, a lot like SkyDrive's new space saving feature,but then not downloading the app itself until you specifically request it. That keeps 200 apps from all cramming themselves through your Wi-Fi network and onto your iPad at once. They show up and display as icons, but only download when you need them.

It's not necessarily a bad feature. It clears up the headache of only being able to backup at night, because for the hour or so after you do your iPad or iPhone will be more or less unusable. That's not a very good experience. On the other hand, if you have dozens of updates (which I did and often do!), that gets to be a pain. A single 'download all' button to avoid the tap tap tap tap tap tap of forcing every single app in your library to download would be nice.
