It’s been a busy couple of weeks for troubleshooting news. Unless you’ve carefully scoured your newsfeed each day, you may have missed a few troubleshooting stories worthy of your attention. To help out, here’s a roundup of the five items I found of most interest:
Flash zero-day exploit. Take this one very seriously. On March 14, Adobe confirmed that a “critical vulnerability exists in Adobe Flash Player… that could cause a crash and potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system.” On March 21, Adobe added that “there are reports that this vulnerability is being exploited in the wild against Flash Player in targeted attacks via a Flash (.swf) file embedded in a Microsoft Excel (.xls) file delivered as an email attachment.”
To fix this problem, Adobe recommends that “all users of Adobe Flash Player 10.2.152.33 and earlier versions upgrade to the newest version 10.2.153.1 by downloading it from the Adobe Flash Player Download Center.”
Mac OS X 10.6.7 crashes iTunes. As noted in an Apple Discussions thread, a number of users are finding that iTunes crashes on launch after installing Mac OS X 10.6.7. It appears to most affect owners of the 2010 13-inch MacBook Air models. For what it’s worth, I have this MacBook Air model and have never seen this symptom. Others confirm this as well. So this is not something that will affect all users.
However, if you are a victim of the bug, a simple restart of your Mac may fix it. Otherwise, the next recommended fix is to delete com.apple.iTunes.plist file(s) in the ~/Library/Preferences folder and relaunch iTunes. The cited Apple Discussions thread goes on to discuss other more extreme potential fixes, including a complete uninstall and reinstall iTunes. In the end, none of these fixes may prove to be a permanent solution. It looks like the ultimate fix will require an update from Apple.
iOS 4.3 vs. Layar. As confirmed by Layar, the company’s augmented reality app did not play well with iOS 4.3. Specifically, “the update to the iPhone’s operating system… causes some images and icons in Layar to display incorrectly or not at all.” A bug-fix version was quickly submitted to Apple and is now in the App Store. If you see similar glitches in other apps, expect updates for them as well.
iPad 2 crashes. A Bugs &gs & Fixes reader alerted me to an Apple Discussions thread detailing frequent crashes of the iPad 2, including “spontaneous” restarts. This appears to be a hardware issue, likely only affecting a small number of iPads. Several of those reporting the problem were able to get their iPad replaced at the Apple Store. Even though the Stores had no iPad 2s available for retail sale, they apparently retain a special stock just for dealing with such exchanges.
Apple TV 2 update. Apple pushed another update out for the second generation Apple TV. According to Apple, the 4.2.1 update addresses issues that may cause: (1) the screen to flicker or display incorrect color on some older TVs, (2) the Apple TV to not wake up from sleep, and (3) audio not be heard on some TV models after switching from another input.