App synchronization gap is too large

Question

Hello,

A lot of iOS devices are not compliant because of this message - App synchronization gap is too large

The iOS device are synced but the SMC app synchroisation is not actual. So we also don't get position information for this devices. How can we force a SMC app synchronization?

Thanks Torsten

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RL · Accepted Answer

Hi Sandy,

Thanks for dropping me the mail. I've sent you a reply.

Now back to this post, I believe there is still some confusion...

1. Excerpt from the 'Sophos Mobile Control Administrator Guide' (Product version: 4, May 2014), Section 12.1, "Available compliance settings", page 30: 
 
 SMC app Synchronization gap : 
 Specify the maximum interval between iOS app synchronisation processes for devices. For further information, refer to the Sophos Mobile Control user guide for Apple iOS.

Note: This setting only applies to devices with an iOS version below iOS 7. It has no effect on iOS 7 devices. 
 
 2. Except from Sophos KB article 120888 ' Requirements for the Sophos Mobile Control iOS app to support automatic sync and locate ':

Note: This article only applies to devices running iOS 7.1 or higher. Former iOS versions did not support the automatic background synchronization correctly 
 
 3. SMC App sync DEFECT: 
 
 From my knowledge and communication with Sophos support, the background refresh should work on iOS 7 devices, however there is a confirmed defect with the current version of SMC (4.0.0.4) in that the messages are being sent from the SMC iOS app back to the SMC server, but they are not being processed correctly by the SMC server. 
 
 As a result, the phones become non-compliant because they don't appear to have contacted the SMC server within the timescale set in the compliance settings. 
 
 I have been requested by Sophos to disable the compliance setting "SMC app Synchronization gap" until a fix is supplied, apparently " within a a few days "... 
 
 NB: This maybe specfic to my set-up, so if you think you have the same problem, I suggest you raise a support case with Sophos technical support. 
 
 4. Except from Sophos feature pages ' Ability to Force Sync of iOS SMC app '... 
 
 With SMC 3.6 and iOS7, we can trigger the app to sync data back to the server. This works in all cases, the app is running in the background. If the app is completely stopped, it does not work. This is a limitation of the iOS platform. 
 
 NB: In SMC v4, this is performed by a 'Refresh data' action. 
 
 Regards, 
 
 John 
 
 P.S. If you want a better understanding of the sync mechanism, my understanding is that the Sophos Mobile Control server tries to send out an APNS trigger once a day so the iOS Sophos Mobile Control app (which must be either active or running in the background ) will synchronize. 
 
 Here's a must read on APNS for techies who look after Apple devices: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/RemoteNotificationsPG/Chapters/ApplePushService.html

:51210

RL · Answer

The SMC iOS app sync defect was resolved for us with the release of the SMC iOS app version 4.0.2.3. This was released on 26/June/2014 to the Apple app store.

Regards,

John :51826