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Students are failing AP tests because the College Board can’t handle HEIC images

(www.theverge.com)
669 points danso | 1 comments | 20 May 20 19:36 UTC | HN request time: 0.464s | source
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crazygringo ◴[21 May 20 16:55 UTC] No.23260987[source]▶
I thought iOS was supposed to convert HEIC images to JPEG automatically behind-the-scenes in any file transfer situation where HEIC isn't supported. The article itself even says:

> iPhones convert HEICs to JPEGs automatically when they’re attached to emails in the Mail app

I'm just curious technically why the same didn't happen with the testing portal? If you have a webpage that accepts image uploads, is iOS Safari not smart enough to do the same conversion?

Or was the portal programmed badly or in a non-standard way that that couldn't happen? Or is there a way to do it that the developers ignored?

Just curious for the technical details of who's more to blame here -- Apple not providing enough backwards compatibility, or the testing portal being designed poorly.

Because blaming students for not following obscure instructions to change their phone's overall configuration is not the right path. A national testing portal ought to support the default image format taken by the world's most popular phone, period.

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NikolaNovak ◴[21 May 20 17:37 UTC] No.23261741[source]▶
FWIW, as is the norm, my experience is that it works brilliantly --as long as you stay within apple defaults.

As soon as I stray from golden path - text using anything but Apple MEssages, email using anything but apple mail, post using anything but safari, use/process with anything but Apple Photos - HEIC has been an absolute positive pain in my keister ;-(

Other people may have more luck; note that my work iPhone is an isolated island - my other devices are either Android, or Windows/Linux - which probably explains my troubles to a large degree. Apple's selling point has always been the well-integrated ecosystem so I understand I'm an outlier.

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1. beezle ◴[21 May 20 19:23 UTC] No.23263690[source]▶
Which is why IOS should default to sending JPG or PNG to/between any non-bespoke Apple product until such a time that HEIC is universally common. That should be transparent to both the end-user as well as the receiving end.

One can moan about the test site not being more robust/careful but it is Apple/Samsung that are using the new, non-standard format and expecting others to accomodate in short order.