Mono Devloper: iPhone developer program is a joke

News Type: Event — Seeded on Mon Mar 17, 2008 3:44 PM EDT

Article Source: zbowling.com

The developer program is turning out to be bunch of hype for something stupid. The restrictions on what your application is allowed to do is total, laugh-out-loud, crap.

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{"commentId":1589098,"authorDomain":"onlineapps"}

Andy Min

In all fairness, I really don't think it's THAT bad. But he does have some valid points.

{"commentId":1589098,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"onlineapps"}

2 votes

#1 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 3:45 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589294,"authorDomain":"tom"}

tom

The problem being, if i go out an write an application for the iPhone, and it's poorly written, crashes often, leaks memory, and maybe even forces a reboot of the iPhone itself, the "blame-assignment" will go to Apple, not to me.

In other words, a user of said app, upon crashing yet again, will [falsely] conclude: This iPhone sucks.

Qualcomm did even more than that with BREW (it's cell-phone O/S). You had to sign up for the developer program, and then once you had your app running in the emulator, you applied for a key code to load it onto a SINGLE phone. When your app was ready for prime-time, you had to submit it to "True-BREW" testing so Qualcomm could verify that your app was of sufficient quality to make it onto a phone.

The tests they did were pretty rigorous - they degraded the heap until your app failed, and when it did, it had to fail gracefully, or you were DENIED.

Once your app passed the tests, it could be made available for loading onto other people's phones.

{"commentId":1589294,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"tom"}

5 votes

#2 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 4:34 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589403,"authorDomain":"jaybutler"}

Jay Butler

I agree. Primarily, Apple has to make sure that the device with third-party software remains reliable. They may eventually open more and more of the functionality to the SDK when they are confident that the developers are writing good quality code.

What annoys me is that Apple only played it off like their was only restrictions around application acceptance criteria for the application if was porn or a bandwidth hog.

I just love bloggers and their creative interpretations of the English language...

{"commentId":1589403,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"jaybutler"}

1 vote

#2.1 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 5:05 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589506,"authorDomain":"electricblanket"}

electricblanket

I worked for a developer who developed for Brew devices. The "true-Brew" tests weren't really all that rigorous. Certainly there were a couple of hoops to jump through that we didn't have to for Java phones. But Qualcomm did fail an ap. or two for completely inane reasons though, outside the scope of what they claimed to be testing for...

either way, I can understand apple not wanting shotty applications plaguing their neat device, but on the other hand, if they aren't letting any developers do much of anything with their phone, what's the point of letting 3rd parties work on apps for the iphone at all?

{"commentId":1589506,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"electricblanket"}

#2.2 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 5:32 PM EDT

{"commentId":1590645,"authorDomain":"hemphill"}

hemphill

if they aren't letting any developers do much of anything with their phone, what's the point of letting 3rd parties work on apps for the iphone at all?

marketing, the same reason microsoft claims to have an open source license.

{"commentId":1590645,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"hemphill"}

1 vote

#2.3 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 10:42 PM EDT

{"commentId":1590666,"authorDomain":"jaybutler"}

Jay Butler

if they aren't letting any developers do much of anything with their phone, what's the point of letting 3rd parties work on apps for the iphone at all?

Using the API's that Apple has exposed, I would bet that we see a lot of very good applications this year. Just because Apple isn't letting the developers do everything does not mean that the are not letting them do "anything".

{"commentId":1590666,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"jaybutler"}

2 votes

#2.4 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 10:49 PM EDT

{"commentId":1592175,"authorDomain":"poremland"}

Paul O

So I totally agree that Apple needs to watch it's own back and that users and consumers don't typically separate the application from the platform when it comes to the application crashing.

But with that said... The iPhone SDK still needs to stay relevant. It isn't as though Apple is the first to market with this technology. If that were the case then I would say their restrictions are acceptable given the volatility of an unknown market. But they aren't first to market. They are able to learn from Palm and (god forbid) Microsoft who already have successful SDK's that have been available for years.

So UI acceptance criteria is acceptable to me. I can understand Apple wanting to maintain the look and feel of the iPhone across applications on their entire platform. But to offer such huge restrictions when there are two other major SDK's out there (really three if you count google's yet unproven SDK).

{"commentId":1592175,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"poremland"}

1 vote

#2.5 - Tue Mar 18, 2008 11:22 AM EDT

{"commentId":1589827,"authorDomain":"masternav"}

MasterNav

I love devs that demand full root level control with complete multitasking on whatever equipment they code for. Throw the user experience out the window for I am the mighty dev who is all-knowledgeable and will dictate to the humble hardware/OS minions what I will allow to happen on their equipment.

Ummm no. In fact that line above was out of a tav convo with a group of my friends who dev cross-platform and routinely decry limitations, because they know best what the user experience should be. period. And they don't recognize the sheer arrogance of the attitude. It would be like having a new drive-train put in my car that, while giving me 120mph will, for no apparent reason suddenly slip into reverse, or send power to only one side of the car.

Toooo funny. You're living in a consumer-driven world and you mess with the user experience, kiss your bucks good-bye.

{"commentId":1589827,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"masternav"}

3 votes

#3 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 7:00 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589923,"authorDomain":"kyleb"}

Kyle Baxter

Sounds like a bunch of whining to me, with few exceptions. I hope eventually that Apple integrates access to syncing, but other than that, the rest makes sense.

{"commentId":1589923,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"kyleb"}

4 votes

#4 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 7:28 PM EDT

{"commentId":1589994,"authorDomain":"brianford"}

Brian Ford

I was willing to live with Apple being only distributor of Apps and getting a cut of the profits. I was willing to live with an entrance criteria to get into the App Store.

Apple is probably willing to live without his contributions to their platform.

(And, somehow, I doubt many of us will notice the omission, once the apps are released.)

{"commentId":1589994,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"brianford"}

2 votes

#5 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 7:46 PM EDT

{"commentId":1590699,"authorDomain":"hcokim"}

hcokim

If the restrictions ensure that my iPod touch won't be filled with crappy applications or dangerous programs, then I'm all for them. I'd much rather deal with a limited set of apps that actually work well, than a heaping pile of half-guaranteed-to-work apps.

{"commentId":1590699,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"hcokim"}

1 vote

#6 - Mon Mar 17, 2008 11:01 PM EDT

{"commentId":1592645,"authorDomain":"STatWar"}

STatWar

I had a pretty bad experience with @!$%#ty apps on my Palm Treo, so I'm looking forward to the slightly restricted apps that Apple will be letting me load on my iPhone. I think once devs get used to working with/around the restrictions we'll see some great apps get written.

{"commentId":1592645,"threadId":"235950","contentId":"1372582","authorDomain":"STatWar"}

1 vote

#7 - Tue Mar 18, 2008 1:23 PM EDT

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ANDY MIN

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Mono Devloper: iPhone developer program is a joke

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