By Graham K. Rogers

An early morning check shows me that Apple has made a new version of iTunes available. Version 12.1 has "a new iTunes widget for Notification Center in OS X Yosemite".

We are told that the new feature will allow users to see what is playing, skip ahead and buy songs while listening to iTunes Radio, from the Notification Center. There are also performance improvements when syncing with iOS devices (perhaps that will be the way iTunes and the iPhone sometimes fail to recognise each other).

The download is shown as 212 MB in my App Store panel and came down in a minute or so. I see the icon in Notification Center and, as before, the tune playing is shown. I was initially unable to link to any purchase process.

However, a description of the update process in an item on iClarified. The Edit button in my Notifications Center, "Notifications", just closes the panel. Switching to the "Today" section displayed an Edit button at the bottom and I was able to install the widget.

iTunes Widget in Notifications Center - Station and Tune Chosen at Random

Maybe I should go back to bed and start the day again. . . .

Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand where he is also Assistant Dean. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs. He is now continuing that in the Bangkok Post supplement, Life.