Apple has now released iOS 5.0.1, an update many have been waiting eagerly for to fix issues of excessive battery drain on iOS 5 devices.
An issue that had gone on far too long for anyone suffering the ill-effects, caused by unspecified software bugs, led to numbers of Apple devices running iOS 5 to suffer mild to extreme battery drain, with some users able to watch per cents flow from their battery meters every few minutes, whilst users with a milder version of the bug were having to charge their devices twice per day.
The good news is Apple now claims that the issue is fixed, backed-up by reports from many Apple customers, though with a few randoms claiming the fix has had no effect; it's difficult to solidify these claims, help us by letting us know what effect this fix has had on your device's battery life.
Apple has snuck in a few security related fixes with this update, including the revocation of insecure Malaysian certificates, five further security vulnerability fixes, and a fix to the recent and very serious exploit discovered by Charlie Miller, primary research consultant for security firm Accuvant, and the only person to win the Pwn2Own hacking contest four times.
Charlie had discovered that since iOS 4.3, it had been possible to place an application on to the App Store that, without Apple's knowledge, was able to download new, unverified code at a later date, once the app had passed the review process; Charlie demonstrated the ability to have complete remote control over a device through a legitimately downloaded app he had placed on the store earlier. Apple's first action was, of course, to revoke Charlie's developers' licence; though we likely have this man to thank for the unexpected, early arrival of the 5.0.1 update.
The security flaw, allowing bypassing of a password with an iPad 2 cover has now also been fixed, Australian voice recognition by Siri has been improved and various bugs relating to syncing documents to iCloud have also been resolved. Multi-tasking gestures are now also present on the first-gen iPad.
It's worth noting that this is the first, completely over-the-air update that Apple has issued, which does not require a physical connection to a computer running iTunes. To force the update wirelessly, head on over to Settings > General > Software Update and tap Download and Install.
