Apple Addresses iPhone Alarm Bug

Every year, we all have to set our clocks back 1 hour as we switch from Daylight Savings Time. Many of us rely on our computers and smart-phones to keep track of time as it changes in our regions. Apparently, relying on your iPhone alarm to go off after this change is not such a good idea. Apple iPhone is suffering from a bug that could lead to people getting alarmed an hour late. Your time on your iPhone gets updated but your repeating alarms won’t. Apparently, the U.S. Congress is to blame for this bug (as reported by BusinessWeek):

The software bug has its roots in the U.S. Congress. In 2005 legislators amended the Uniform Time Act to extend Daylight Savings Time, starting in 2007. The change, intended to prolong the number of daylight hours and thus conserve energy, means Americans move their clocks back a week later than Europeans do.

The problem has aggravated some iPhone users so much that Apple has updated its knowledge-base to give its customers some hints on how to solve this issue:

In some regions, shortly before or after the daylight saving time (DST) change, repeating alarms created in the Clock app may work incorrectly. To resolve this behavior for existing alarms, set the repeat interval to Never. You will need to reset these alarms for each day you need them. After November 7th, 2010, you can set your alarms to repeat again.

All Apple phones are affected by this bug. The good news is this is such a temporary issue that could probably be addressed by Apple with a patch. Apple iPhone has had these types of issues in the past. It does seem as though Apple has trouble accounting for exceptions when people set their clock 1 hour forward or back in certain regions. Considering that iOS 4.2 could be released as early as Nov. 9th, we are sure iPhone owners will forgive Apple soon enough.