Yesterday finally came the moment that both Apple fans and technology lovers in general were waiting for, one of the biggest and most important technological events of the year, the Worldwide Developer Conference. With new Mac computers, new iPads, new smart speaker, new operating systems, and great advances in Artificial Intelligence and virtual reality, WWDC 2017 has been one of the most prolific known.
And although the new Apple TV and the next new version of its tvOS 11 operating system were shipped in the first minutes without relevant news beyond the announcement of the Amazon Prime Vide landingor "later", the great novelty is that, for the first time, tvOS will be included in the public beta program of the company.
tvOS Joins Apple's Public Beta Program
Following the inaugural WWDC 2017 conference held yesterday from San Jose, California, Apple has updated its Beta Software Program website to announce that iOS 11, macOS High Sierra, and tvOS 11 Public Betas Will Be Available for beta testers in the near future.
Despite the shortage of news for the operating system of the set-top-box of the bitten apple, in fact, the only novelty does not affect the operating system but is the announcement of the upcoming arrival of the video streaming service Amazon Prime Video, the opening of the tvOS system to the company's public beta program is important news in that in this way more users will be able to verify the proper functioning of the news and thus reduce the chances of errors once the official launch occurs.
For several years now, the company has made the public macOS and iOS betas available to anyone who wishes, upon registration, allowing both developers and users to test new software features before public release, which facilitates the detection, correction and improvement of possible failures and errors however, this is the first time tvOS has been included in this program.
How and when we can install the first public beta of tvOS 11 on our Apple TV devices
In a very short time, registered non-developers will also be able to install tvOS beta software on their Apple TVs. Nevertheless, the system will not be as simple as in iOS or macOS that, after installing the corresponding profile, you already download it, it is as if it were the official version, via the «Software update» section, or, at least, it won't be so simple at the beginning.
Users who wish to participate must first sign up for Apple's beta update program, if they are not already registered. After completing this essential step, they will be able to download the tvOS 11 beta package on their Macs; This will be installed on the Apple TV through iTunes, for which you must connect Apple TV to your computer using a USB-C cable. From then on, the successive updates will arrive in the usual way via OTA (over the air).
Although this is not an insurmountable obstacle, it is true that the installation requirements are somewhat more complicated and time consuming than with iOS or macOS and this is probably the reason why the previous beta versions of tvOS have not been incorporated into the program. Apple's public beta.
Regarding its availability date, the first beta of tvOS 11 is already available for developers, as well as those of the rest of systems. However, during the keynote, Apple said that iOS and macOS High Sierra would be available in its public beta version at the end of June, so it is expected that tvOS 11 will also be on that date.
As for the features and news, as we have already mentioned Apple has not yet detailed what tvOS 11 brings back, which suggests that it will be a version focused on performance improvements. The only news mentioned was the upcoming arrival of Amazon Prime Video to Apple TV, presumably after the summer.