An iOS 6 bug discovered on New Year’s Day that keeps users’ Do Not Disturb function switched on even after it was scheduled to switch off will not be fixed by Apple, but will apparently correct itself after 7 January.
Do Not Disturb is a new feature on Apple’s latest operating system that lets users block incoming calls and notifications. Settings can be adapted so that selected contacts will still be able to get through while a scheduling feature lets users decide when the mode should be automatically switched on or off.
But the bug, which appears to have resulted from a glitch in the changeover to the 2013 calendar, keeps Do Not Disturb active past its scheduled end time. This means that users were inadvertently missing out on calls and notifications on New Year’s Day, unaware that Do Not Disturb was still switched on.
Embarrassingly, the very day that the bug was discovered and complaints began appearing online, Apple launched a new advertisement promoting the iPhone 5 based on this very feature.
The bug only seems to have affected the scheduling feature and Do Not Disturb can still be manually switched off. In some cases, however, it was reported that users needed to restart their phones in order for it to recognise the switch.
Apple has since published a note on its tech support pages acknowledging the issue. Instead of issuing a fix immediately, the company claims that the issue will resolve itself on 7 January and, in the meantime, users are advised to enable and disable the feature manually instead of relying on the scheduling feature.
