Apple seeds iOS 6.1 Beta to developers with Maps Kit improvements

Hot on the heels of fixing numerous bugs with an incremental iOS 6.0.1 update that was released to end-users an hour ago, Apple has now seeded iOS 6.1 Beta to its registered developers. The software is provided for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad alongside the new Xcode 4.6 Beta integrated development environment.

At first glance, it seems iOS 6.1 will allow apps to ask the operating system to programmatically search for map-based addresses and points of interest. A new Reset Advertising Identifier button has been added to Advertising Settings and the date must match for Passbook passes to be relevant …

Downloads links are now live on Apple’s Developer site.

The release contains updates to the Map Kit search in Maps for developers.

Apple explains that the updated framework now lets you “programmatically search for map-based addresses and points of interest”.

The MKLocalSearch class initiates a search for map-based content using a natural language string. In other words, you can enter placename information or portions of an address and have Map Kit return search results that match the information you provide.

Putting this into context, searching for, say, the string “coffee” would return the location of local coffee bars along with information about each one, Apple explains.

Apple also introduces changes to boarding passes that include both a relevant date and a relevant location.

The date must match for these passes to be relevant. If both the date and location match, they are relevant for a longer window of time. You are encouraged to provide both pieces of information when they make sense for your passes.

A new Reset Advertising Identifier button has been added to Advertising Settings which resets the Advertising Identifier “so that future requests will return a different value”.

Let us know if you spot anything else and we’ll update the article accordingly.