This release includes a new beta capability to install the Circle app directly on select Chromebooks that can run Android apps. This means that you can extend Circle’s coverage of these Chromebooks to manage them outside your home. This release also includes a new feature called Focus Time that lets you set up certain times of the day where only certain apps are allowed.
We would love to hear about your experience with Circle on Chromebook during this beta testing period. To share your thoughts, open the Circle app on Chromebook, tap the Menu button, then tap Share feedback.
Fixes & Improvements
Android Specific
- Added the ability to manage certain Chromebooks using the Circle kid app. See the article here for more details on using Circle with Chromebooks.
- Fixed a crash affecting Android 6 devices.
- Resolved an issue where the Circle account timezone was not being set correctly during setup.
- The Circle kid app will now update its website categorization database upon setup for the latest version.
iOS Specific
- Fixed an issue where the Circle app was not letting a user set up a previously used Circle device. You will now be informed if setting up a previously used device.
- Resolved an issue where annual Circle Parental Control subscriptions could not be restored.
- Optimized some of the in-app subscription flow.
- Focus Time [Beta] - starting with this release, iOS users will be able to enable the Focus Time feature on their Off Times. Focus Times allow you to set up customized times during the day when only certain Apps or Categories of sites are allowed and all other Apps and Categories are filtered by Circle. Read more on this new feature here.
- For improved support of iOS 14 and more recent versions we no longer support iOS 11 and below. The new minimum version is iOS 12.
Circle Parental Controls Firmware - 3.18
On November 18th, 2020 we released firmware version 3.18 for Circle Parental Controls and the Circle Home Plus device.
Fixes & Improvements
- Resolved an issue where some IP addresses were being incorrectly categorized by Circle. This should help with issues related to Google Meets or Microsoft Teams being incorrectly filterd.
- Fixed a problem where local DNS requests were not resolving correctly. This should help some local requests resolve much more quickly.
- We're now correctly handling some requests for sites requiring categorization. This will help some requests for connection complete without failing the first time and should be a big improvement on connectivity issues on less popular sites.
- Updates to our site categorization database.
- We're now categorizing a number of YouTube download sites as "Apps and Downloads". You can set that category to Not Allowed to block that access.
- Improvements to tracking for the "Among Us" game.