Hey everyone, I wanted to make a post to provide some information on potential WiFi issues with iOS 14.2.
Apple informed us today that iOS 14.2 has a known issue that prevents our WiFi communication from working inside the Rachio app. They’ve said a future version of iOS will fix the issue, but we don’t have a timeline on that.
Areas affected by this currently include WiFi update and adding a Rachio controller to your account.
WiFi update can be completed via the Settings app. Here’s how:
Note this will be holding the DOWN ARROW + SELECT BUTTON on a Generation 2 controller or holding the WIFI button on a generation 3 controller.
Open your settings app on your phone (the gray icon with the gears)
Go to Wi-Fi settings
You should see a “SET UP NEW DEVICE…” and your Rachio listed there. Tapping your rachio’s name will start the connection process to set it up on WiFi.
There currently is no way to add a Rachio to your account with this issue. I am working on an app update that will fix this, but it won’t release until later tonight or tomorrow. Until then, you can use another device that isn’t running iOS 14.2 or wait for version 4.2.7 to release soon.
I will update this post when the update is released with a fix. Thanks!
The current Rachio version in the App Store is version 4.2.6. The next version we release that will contain a work around for this issue will be version 4.2.7. Hope that helps to clarify.
I was trying everything to get a new Rachio setup and was about to request an RMA but found this. Knowing how long Apple can take to approve apps, are you guys requesting an expedited approval since this is a result of their bug? Anyway, glad to hear you’ve got a fix in the works.
They’ve been pretty quick lately. Sometimes getting it through approval in under an hour. Right now we’re going through testing.
The workaround unfortunately isn’t exactly a full on fix, since the issue is in the operating system. But it should fix getting stuck when trying to add a controller to your account. I still expect that tomorrow we’ll hear back from them and be able to push to the store.
Please do something simpler that IMO is far more useful. When you click Add Device in the web app, instead of the error message “You’ll need a smart phone and our mobile app to add a controller”, you should say “You can use our mobile app with your smartphone to add a controller. Or, enter the serial number and MAC address in the boxes below and click Submit.”
There is no good reason for a Rachio controller to require a smartphone. Allowing a device to be added via the website will help users with employer-supplied restricted devices, flip phones, smartphones other than Android or iOS, smartphones too old to run the app, etc. It also will provide an easy workaround when the next OS update causes trouble.
And, fixing this in the website completely avoids the App Store and Google Play police.
I followed the steps above, and successfully added my controller to my wifi network, but the app (4.2.7) still attempts to add the controller to my wifi network and fails (or at least go out to lunch and never comes back). Now what?
Hmm, what kind of Rachio controller do you have and what iOS version are you using? That may help me see if there is a code path that still attempts to add the controller to WiFi through app.
I have a Rachio 3 controller. I’m running a pre-production version of iOS 14.3.
By going to “Settings” on my phone I was able to get the Rachio onto my 2.4GHz network, but the app still wanted to add it. Although the error did change to “unable to find your controller” or something like that.
The work around only happens when running iOS 14.2.0 currently.
Apple hasn’t given us the version of iOS they are looking to resolve this in, so I didn’t expand the workaround outside of what is currently broken.
I expect a 14.2.1 release may fix this and some other issues with iOS 14.2, but that’s just a guess. It’s possible too that future betas of iOS 14.3 resolve the issue as well. But since iOS 14.3 isn’t final, we don’t support it from the workaround perspective.
Okay. That’s fair enough. I think I’ve got a phone that has 14.2 on it.
Meanwhile, if I can give some preliminary feedback: there’s no recovery from the failure to connect with wifi that I can see. The screen has no cancel option, so the only way out that I could think of was to force quit the app and start over, which is irritating once it’s happened half a dozen times.
Also, it was only through trial and error that I discovered that the app only detects the barcode on the unit if it is held in landscape orientation. When held in portrait orientation it will not detect the barcode. I did not see any affordance in the app that indicated the orientation was important.
Looking forward to getting this thing running, but it has been a frustrating experience so far.
Yeah the issue on Apples end is that their process errors and then doesn’t tell our app (or other 3rd party apps that use this wireless configuration) that an error has occurred. Due to that, it never times out either. That’s why we rushed to get a workaround in and not a fix, since the fix was confirmed to be needed on Apples API side.
So I agree, it’s not a good experience, but hopefully one that gets resolved soon. If more iOS releases come out and don’t fix the issue, the app will be updated to provide the work around for those versions as well.
Why not time out? Give the user a way out of your app or at least some feedback and an option to exit the process gracefully. Even though the problem may be that iOS isn’t informing you of an error, to the user (me) the problem seems to be your application and that’s not a good look for Rachio.
This still seems like an issue. When is the fix going to happen? Trying workarounds d but it is giving me an error when I follow your instructions. Meanwhile my plants and grass are dying.
What exactly is the issue you’re seeing? Like what steps are you performing and what issue are you seeing? That will help me understand what you’re seeing.
With the update of the app, the work around instructions are given in app and tie in to the flow for adding a controller to an account or when updating WiFi.
