Apple Relaxes iOS Development Tool Restrictions

An anonymous reader writes "Earlier this year Apple caused major upset among developers by updating the iPhone developer program license with clause 3.3.1. It basically stopped the use of cross-platform compilers, meaning Adobe Flash could not be used to develop an app for the App Store. The move also put into doubt which other development platforms could be used and generally caused a lot of confusion. Apple has just significantly relaxed that policy and allowed for the use of development tools, as long as 'the resulting apps do not download any code.'"

Comments

Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

There are still interesting problems in not allowing to download or update any code. With the rise of jailbreaking iPhones and them running unsigned and modified applications (cracked and/or otherwise), there is no way for an anticheat system to update itself. All anticheat systems like Valve's VAC, PunkBuster and Blizzard's Warden rely on downloading updated code from the internet.

What this means for online iPhone games is that when someone releases a hack for the jailbroken iPhones, their users can completely ruin the games and legit players cannot do anything. And since Apple is a control freak, they check every update to your application slowly and ineffectely. All while the hacking is rampant and ruins everyones game.

There certainly are need for updating code and Apple needs to remove that clause too. We don't want walled gardens controlled by mega corporations, we want systems we can use the way we want.

Re:Problem

[Kjella]

And how is the situation you describe any different than every console? If you live in a signed sandbox, you live on the good graces of the signee. Doesn't seem like that's a dealbreaker to anyone.

Re:Problem

[SimonTheSoundMan]

On another note. Mozilla could release their Fenec browser. However, add-ons would have to be disabled as they download extra code.

I only wish!

Re:Problem

[Darkness404]

Look at the differences between the Orange Box version of Team Fortress 2 and the PC version. Yeah, its a pretty big deal. Plus, Xbox live has a team to crack down on modded consoles that could have cheats.

But yeah, its a pretty big deal not being able to have lots of content such as Team Fortress 2.

Re:Problem

[Arrepiadd]

How is this different from the situation yesterday?
Until today you could also crack an application, make your score at the game whatever 999999999 points and so on. Have been people complaining about that?

Re:Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but what you describe is intrinsically insecure and while a PC game can submit that score through code modification means, the consoles can only currently do it by intercepting and editing network packets sent from the device. It seems like what the OP wants is magical DRM hardware, not an anti-cheat system. VAC and PB get *constantly* bypassed, and they would do absolutely nothing to revert illegitimate scores. VAC/PB/Warden like anti-virus are reactionary, they exist to provide a stable and fun gaming experience, not a 100% secure one.

Re:Problem

[mikael_j]

You're comparing apples and oranges. Microsoft Windows is by far the most common operating system on desktop computers (I'm including laptops and such in "desktops" here) while iOS is just one of several platforms for cellphones and other mobile devices. There's also the issue that Windows is a general purpose operating system for general purpose computing devices while iOS and the hardware it runs on is intended to be a fair bit more specialized. Now, if Apple held 90% of the desktop OS market and banned 3rd party dev tools and languages from OS X development you might have a case (hint: they haven't, you are free to install anything you want on your OS X machine, you can also download the source for a large part of the system from Apple's website).

Re:Problem

[blueg3]

The anti-cheat systems require updating code and not updating data that is used by code?

Re:Problem

[tlhIngan]

There are still interesting problems in not allowing to download or update any code. With the rise of jailbreaking iPhones and them running unsigned and modified applications (cracked and/or otherwise), there is no way for an anticheat system to update itself. All anticheat systems like Valve's VAC, PunkBuster and Blizzard's Warden rely on downloading updated code from the internet.

What this means for online iPhone games is that when someone releases a hack for the jailbroken iPhones, their users can completely ruin the games and legit players cannot do anything. And since Apple is a control freak, they check every update to your application slowly and ineffectely. All while the hacking is rampant and ruins everyones game.

There certainly are need for updating code and Apple needs to remove that clause too. We don't want walled gardens controlled by mega corporations, we want systems we can use the way we want.

Jailbroken and/or pirated apps are easily detected. So easily detected, that Apple doesn't really bother, because apps can do it themselves.

Firstly, an app downloaded from the App Store has DRM on it, which consists mostly of encrypted portions of the binary. That binary is then signed. On running the app, the kernel loads the app, validates the signature, then in-memory decrypts the binary, and finally runs it.

A cracked app can't be re-encrypted for a specific device, so they're shipped decrypted. The kernel, however, cannot load unsigned binaries unless a special flag is set to indicate that it's a decrypted binary that's OK.

An app just needs to check for that flag which exists in its info.plist file. It can do several checks - first, is info.plist in text format (it should be binary XML)? Second, do those keys exist in the file?

The apps that do the obvious checks are quickly re-patched to disable those checks, but there's nothing to say that an app has to pop up an "I'm pirated!" notice - it can silently report its pirated status to the server, for example, but otherwise run normally. Most crackers don't check, and most pirates won't bother. Even the ones running Firewall IP (a really nice firewall alert). You need someone to actually go and sniff the WiFi transmissions to ensure it's sending the same data to the server. Use SSL and you're golden. (Sure the pirate could disable all network access, but then who cares about single-player cheating?).

Also, assets are signed as well, so replacing all the textures with transparent ones also have the exact same issue - you have to go and decrypt the binary, make your mods and set the flag. There are also tests for jailbroken phones as well.

Online multiplayer is not a huge thing on iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches - at least, the ones where you can't do server-side validation of inputs (which you should do anyways). Local multiplayer may be a bigger deal, but there are probably social pressures against that behavior as well.

Re:Problem

[MightyMartian]

Might I have some gruel, please?

Re:Problem

[phoenixwade]

What this means for online iPhone games is that when someone releases a hack for the jailbroken iPhones, their users can completely ruin the games and legit players cannot do anything.

it also means that a developer can't "bait and switch" by getting an app approved and then adding code that allows the app to do things that would have prevented it from being approved in the first place. So there isn't a "Certainly a need" as the updates to code could go through the app updates system, and the developer can plug those holes in a normal update. Furthermore, the problem you are referring to should reasonably be secured at the server end, anyway, since, as you pointed out, the game can never trust the client software on a jailbroken phone.

Re:Problem

[QuantumBeep]

For those of us who only have one of those, what's the difference?

Re:Problem

[takev]

I find anti-cheating software an unnecessary evil.

It is very basic software engineering: "never trust input from a user". As the client software of game is in the hands of the user this extends to the client itself. In fact this also extends to the anti-cheating software itself.

Like DRM, anti-cheating software is a mathematical impossibility.

It is far easier to just design your game so that you do not trust the client code, run the simulation/game on the server and let the client be a dumb terminal. Dumb being a relative term, as you do want to implement some sort of prediction in the game to what the game server will do, to make it a smooth user experience.

Re:Problem

[Darkness404]

With the 360 version you only have the basic weaponry and only a handful of maps, so that means for example the Sniper only has the Sniper Rifle, SMG and his knife-sword-thing. On the other hand, in the PC version that same class not only has the basic weapons, but also items like a bow and arrow, a bottle of piss he can throw at people, a shield that can prevent backstabs, etc.

The 360 also eliminates the kill-taunts that were present in the PC version and a lot of other stuff. Every single class has a lot more weapons in the PC version than the 360 version. About the only saving grace is that it means that not everyone is flooding the game as an Engineer every time there is an engineer update, but thats it.

Re:Problem

[uglyduckling]

Anticheat systems can easily update themselves, you do it by informing the user that an updated version of the app is available, provide a link to the App Store app, and then halting. This is no different to a desktop OS requiring a password in order to install an update (e.g. Windows UAC). Surely you don't think it's a good thing for apps to silently download updated code without user interaction?

Your post is also self-contradictory- not the one hand you want to "systems we can use the way we want" and on the other hand you want games manufacturers to silently download and update your apps. If you want total liberty/anarchy then there definitely will be no way to prevent game cheats.

Re:Problem

[rwven]

You wouldn't necessarily need a code download to update a cheat detection system. You could just design a way to update the system based on new "config" (for lack of a better term).

Re:Problem

[s73v3r]

Part of the reason for that, though, is Microsoft. There have been something like 10 updates for TF2 on the PC since it was released. However, on the Xbox, Microsoft pressures its developers to charge for updates like that. Remember the Oblivion horse armor fiasco? If Valve had tried to do the same thing with the Xbox version, Microsoft would be trying to get them to charge at least $5-$10 per update.

The rumors I've heard say that when they've finally updated all the classes, they're gonna release one mega-patch for the Xbox version, to bring it up to steam.

Re:Problem

[dloose]

Why is it always the "then don't use Apple devices" answer when people complain about Apple's restrictions on everything? Imagine the outcry here on Slashdot if Microsoft tried to ban every other browser than IE on Windows. Apple does that on iOS but suddenly it's ok since it's Apple.

Because very few people are forced to use Apple products, but plenty of people are forced to use MS products...

Re:Problem

[Hatta]

Why do you assume that's not a deal breaker for anyone? Every console ever has been hacked, people wouldn't do that if they didn't object to being restricted.

Re:Problem

[headLITE]

First, they don't actually ban other browsers. They only ban other engines. There are a number of third party browsers that use webkit.

Second, it's "then don't use Apple devices" because you apparently aren't in their target market. They are not marketing to people who want systems they can use the way they want. It's hard to understand for the typical slashdot crowd, but most people do not actually want five hundred computers in their home that they all have to maintain themselves. They want a certain type of functionality that just works.

Re:Problem

[Darkness404]

Which is what my original post was about, how having sandboxed sign code causes problems for console games

Re:Problem

[IKnwThePiecesFt]

Or if they didn't object to paying for their games. One of the two.

Re:Problem

[jonbryce]

You send the updates through the itunes store like you are supposed to.

I don't agree with Apple's position on this, but your argument isn't a valid argument against it.

Re:Problem

[afabbro]

I find anti-cheating software an unnecessary evil. It is very basic software engineering: "never trust input from a user". As the client software of game is in the hands of the user this extends to the client itself. In fact this also extends to the anti-cheating software itself. Like DRM, anti-cheating software is a mathematical impossibility.

Much as I hate to step on a good pompous rant, you're oversimplifying and missing quite a bit. For example, there's rendering information the server has to send the client. If the client is altered to make some of the rendering transparent, the ability to look through walls is gained, which is cheating. No "trusting user input" is needed here. It would not be practical to render on the server and send the frames to the client, yet the client needs info that the user can't necessarily see to render correctly and maintain a decent frame rate.

Likewise, imagine there is a weapon that when fired blinds the opponent. If the opponent's client is modified to remove that effect, the server may never know if it's just a visual effect. Or perhaps some bad guys are hidden among the good guys...a modified client could change their color or highlight them. Or maybe I have a couple friends over and our modified clients all share information - we can then see what others see, look around walls, etc.

It is far easier to just design your game so that you do not trust the client code, run the simulation/game on the server and let the client be a dumb terminal. Dumb being a relative term, as you do want to implement some sort of prediction in the game to what the game server will do, to make it a smooth user experience.

And therein lies many opportunities to cheat. Once the client has any information that should not be available to the player, there is an opportunity to cheat. Yet this information may be vital to having a smooth, high frame rate user experience. I suppose the ideal anti-cheat would be a system where the entire GUI was rendered on the server and the client just received frames, but that is not practical from a performance viewpoint. Heck, I still see a little lag when typing in a terminal window connected to an SSH session on the other side of the country...playing an FPS via RDP over the Internet would not work.

I'm just picking random examples off the top of my head, but the problem is not as simple as you imply

Re:Problem

[Mongoose Disciple]

You're going under the assumption that the only form of software cheating possible involves game logic that's on the client and shouldn't be. That isn't the case. For example, aimbots.

Re:Problem

[robmv]

Unreal Tournament for the PS3 allows to install and play mods cooked for it from the PC version, Unreal engine has a scripting language, so technically, it allows downloading code, the on disk release needed manual installation from USB drive, but the updated 2.0 introduced a mod browser and downloader

Re:Problem

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

No, definite deal breaker for me. Haven't purchased a game system since Game Boy Advance. Actually, that was purchased for me as well as a gift.

Re:Problem

[ToasterMonkey]

But yeah, its a pretty big deal not being able to have lots of content such as Team Fortress 2.

OTHER PS3 games get downloadable updates, patches, and free or paid expansions, the first half of which are mandatory to play the game online.

There's only one party to place the blame on for Orange Box being as unmaintained as it is, and that is Valve.

Re:Problem

[tepples]

And since Apple is a control freak, they check every update to your application slowly and ineffectely. All while the hacking is rampant and ruins everyones game.

Anticheat systems can easily update themselves, you do it by informing the user that an updated version of the app is available, provide a link to the App Store app, and then halting.

"An update to the application is available, but we are waiting for Apple to approve it. Until then, we have shut the game down for all players." How well would that go over?

Re:Problem

[ToasterMonkey]

Yah, validate inputs, psssh.

In the _original_ Team Fortress, for Quake, you'd never know for sure if someone who just looked at a flash grenade was really blinded or not, because the system was insecure as f*ck. Ten seconds in a hex editor, _any_ noob could disable visual effects in Quake by renaming a client variable. No amount of input checking will help you there unless you're into some really fancy heuristics with a TON of false positives.

We're talking the very early beginnings of online-multiplayer games with ultra-untrusted (open sourced QuakeWorld) clients here, so this isn't new. You can't fix cheating by watching the inputs. How do you even know if you're really standing in a shadow? That's some pretty profound cheating just not rendering a shadow, or water, or a tree, etc, places the server can't avoid divulging player locations.

Re:Problem

[tepples]

If the config language is sufficiently rich, it would violate the "no code downloaded from the Internet" provision.

Re:Problem

[WNight]

What's okay on a game box you buy and plug into the TV for your kids to play with isn't okay when it's on a (crippled) smart-phone that holds your data.

Re:Problem

[Altrag]

Probably about as well as "Someone has figured out how to cheat. The patch will take us anywhere from 3 to 10 days to implement. Until then, we have shut the game down for all players."

That is to say, it wouldn't happen. If the company is being vigilant for cheaters, then hopefully they'll notice any serious cheating before the hacked clients get too wide-spread, and ban the offending accounts as they're discovered so even if the hole isn't fixed right away, the people who are using the hole will be removed from the game promptly.

And of course, the more serious the cheat, the more obvious it will be that you're cheating. So if you find some minor terrain glitch that allows you to bypass the guards when you try to get into the enemy's base, its probably not going to be too serious (the opposing team will just find the new entrance and adjust until it gets patched). If you're using an aimbot and sniping people with perfect precision from across the map, it will be a little more obvious (some -- or maybe even a lot? -- of aimbots actually started intentionally being a little more fuzzy so that the player would have an "I'm just that good.. but see I'm not perfect!" defense when they got banned).

Re:Problem

[Volguus Zildrohar]

Colour me a firm believer in making backups of games that nowadays cost over $100 (in my currency). I won't buy a console until I know I can play a backup copy on it. I have two small children, and although the older one is learning to handle discs with care, it takes time for them to permanently learn anything.

Even worse than children, I once lived with other twenty-somethings.

Re:Problem

[takev]

I do not know exactly what the blind grenade does, but if the purpose to make the enemy invisible, then maybe the game server should not send update to the client for this enemy.

For looking through walls, it is the same thing, don't update persons that are not visible. This is not super simple, because you may not want to do accurate visibility culling on the server. But maybe there is a happy median.

I don't really have a solution for aimbots, nor can an anti cheat program help against this very well. If one makes one that no one has one, then the anti cheat software may not find the signature for it. Or the aimbot may be build completely outside of the computer; capture video and emulate a keyboard and mouse (I've seen eve online bots that could use this method).

I can see the problem for the games you guys mentioned, with a high twitch element and where the fog-of-war is hard to calculate by the server. I am actually much more puzzled about the aggressive use of anti-cheat software for games like world of warcraft.

Re:Problem

[PopeRatzo]

Now, if Apple held 90% of the desktop OS market

So you're saying that bad behavior by a corporation is OK, as long as they're not #1.

I'll have to think about that a while.

Re:Problem

[uglyduckling]

Actually, in a relatively closed environment, a hacked client would spread a lot less quickly because most users won't have jailbreaked; compare with a desktop/laptop PC where it's easy for a non-technical user to install illegitimate software. I think the slowing down of the spreading of the hacked version by having to jailbreak (which many casual users won't want to do) would more than make up for the slowing down of application updates.

Re:Problem

[mjwx]

And how is the situation you describe any different than every console? If you live in a signed sandbox, you live on the good graces of the signee. Doesn't seem like that's a dealbreaker to anyone.

On the PS3, Xbox and PC a game developer can download signed code without having to plug it into MSTunes on a separate box. On PC, signing is individual rather then centralised with the Xbox and PS, so EA signs it's own code rather then using an MS/Sony provided certificate and MS/Sony allowing EA to update its released products themselves.

Also Sony and MS have been banning hackers left right and centre (so have PC servers, but again on an individual basis and/or subscribing to PBBans), I'd like to see Apple ban jailbreakers. If Apple thought they could get away with it they would have done so already.

Re:Problem

[Narcogen]

Now, if Apple held 90% of the desktop OS market

So you're saying that bad behavior by a corporation is OK, as long as they're not #1.

I'll have to think about that a while.

He's not saying that.

He's saying behavior crosses the line from being bad to being actionable when there is not enough competition in a market to allow for real choice, as in cases of a company that abuses a monopoly position.

I do expect Apple will have to consider banning jailbroken phones from GameCenter. I don't see how that is not analogous to MS banning modified consoles from XBL. Neither party needs to brick the device or disable it in any other way-- just disable the ability to potentially use those modifications on a service where such modifications might grant them an unfair advantage, and ruin the service for others.

Re:Problem

[jeremyp]

"Don't use Apple devices" is a piece of advice that most people can reasonably follow. You don't have to buy an iPhone, there are other mobile devices with equal or better capabilities.

"Don't use Windows" is not a piece of advice most people can reasonably follow because Windows is pretty much ubiquitous in the PC market.

Re:Problem

[PopeRatzo]

I do expect Apple will have to consider banning jailbroken phones from GameCenter. I don't see how that is not analogous to MS banning modified consoles from XBL.

So if they are analogous, what is the big distinction again?

I'm not sure "actionable" was the standard being discussed, Narcogen.

Re:Problem

[mr_mischief]

Umm, "The Orange Box" was available for the PC. I own a copy. If you mean Xbox 360 version, it may be clearer to say so.

Re:Problem

[rainmouse]

Because very few people are forced to use Apple products, but plenty of people are forced to use MS products...

I would beg to differ. Taking a random example, you cant use an ipod without installing endless Apple crap on your computer. I was forced to install quick time and iTunes and they came with other programs that auto run in the background and the updater tried repeatedly to sneakily install Safari and God knows what else. So taking one of the many iPod models, the iPod touch, thats an esimated 45 million people who have been forced to use Apple software products, hardly very few and thats just one of potentially thousands of product examples.
http://www.macrumors.com/2010/09/06/total-ipod-touch-sales-estimated-at-over-45-million/

First app

[line-bundle]

This would have been the first app had it not been for the stupid restrictions.

Yea

[mrsteveman1]

It's refreshing to see Apple wrong so many times in a row. Watching them backpedal is amusing.

Re:Yea

[Tom]

At least they are. We all know companies that'd rather die than admit they were wrong.

Re:Yea

[Zelgadiss]

No significantly complex system comes out right the first time.
Apple has a goal, I believe it's to give as much freedom to 3rd party developers without losing control of the platform.

It's like how Blizzard balances WoW, they have "back-pedalled" countless times.

Re:Yea

[Anonymous Coward]

It's refreshing to see Apple wrong so many times in a row. Watching them backpedal is amusing.

When was Apple wrong? Apple was never wrong. Apple knew this was right all along. There is no evidence of the old license. The old license never existed. It is dead now. Apple never endorsed it. It was a lie made by Apple's enemies to discredit Apple's name. Apple is good. Apple would never hurt you. Apple is your friend. Apple is magic. Apple has never backpedaled. Apple is at war with Google. Apple has never been at war with Microsoft. Why do you hate Apple? Apple only wants to help you. You are clearly disturbed. Apple wants to assure you this is not your fault. Please report to your nearest iThoughtCorrection facility. Apple is your friend. Trust in Apple. Apple is your friend.

Re:Yea

[VGPowerlord]

No significantly complex system comes out right the first time.
Apple has a goal, I believe it's to give as much freedom to 3rd party developers without losing control of the platform.

That's an interesting way of looking at it, considering that it runs completely counter to the iOS 4 guidelines which forbid applications written in any programming language other than Objective C, C, or C++.

No, the truth is that Apple implicitly targeted Adobe's Flash Packager for iPhone (due out the week after the new iOS4 terms were announced), but had the side effect of banning other companies converters due to it.

Re:Yea

[Mongoose Disciple]

At least they are. We all know companies that'd rather die than admit they were wrong.

Such as? I suspect that if you name a company or companies, people can point out similar things they backpedaled on.

Re:Yea

[Qwavel]

Apple rarely backpedals or admits they were wrong.

I think the FTC is to thank for this one. They are being investigated for anti-competitive actions in relation to the app store. Their problem is that anti-competitive behavior has been one of the app store's most important function.

For them, it is much better to backpedal on their own and hope to end the investigations rather then going through the humiliation that MS and Gates went through.

Re:Yea

[Anonymous Coward]

I read this over 15 times and I really felt a warm fuzzy feeling towards Apple.
Someone should mod parent disturbing.

Re:Yea

[Sancho]

That's an interesting way of looking at it, considering that it runs completely counter to the iOS 4 guidelines which forbid applications written in any programming language other than Objective C, C, or C++.

And this whole story is about them revoking that clause.

Re:Yea

[Americano]

Wow, they incorporated?! When did that happen?

Re:Yea

[0xdeadbeef]

We all know companies that'd rather die than admit they were wrong.

Yes, Apple. Does this sound like a mea culpa?

The App Store is perhaps the most important milestone in the history of mobile software. Working together with our developers, we will continue to surprise and delight our users with innovative mobile apps.

They didn't admit that their critics were right, the said that they "listened to their developers". As one of those developers, I assure you that what they really listened to was negative press and Android's rising numbers.

Re:Yea

[sglewis100]

There was a United States of American prior to the formation of the United states of America?

Re:Yea

[Xtifr]

I suspect that if you name a company or companies, people can point out similar things they backpedaled on.

The SCO Group.

Well?

I'm waiting.... :)

Re:Yea

[VGPowerlord]

That's an interesting way of looking at it, considering that it runs completely counter to the iOS 4 guidelines which forbid applications written in any programming language other than Objective C, C, or C++.

And this whole story is about them revoking that clause.

Yes, and adding it in the first place went against what the GGP said Apple's goal was. Which was my point.

Re:Yea

[Sancho]

Unless they changed their minds about what it meant to "control the platform."

Re:Yea

[Kufat]

Friend Computer was manufactured by Apple...it all makes sense now!

Re:Yea

[thetoadwarrior]

It must upset you that they were spot on about Flash.

Re:Yea

[abhi_beckert]

Get off your high horse.

Just because Apple doesn't carry out the wishes of every individual developer doesn't mean they don't listen. The ENTIRE POINT of the app store is to allow developers to create and distribute great software.

Do you seriously think apple doesn't give a shit about developers? If that was true, there would be no app store at all.

Re:Yea

[Wraithlyn]

I seriously think you're splitting hairs. Taking the actual action of reversing a prior decision (the part that actually matters) is tacit admission they were wrong.

Obviously the PR schills are going to dress it up, what company in this world doesn't try to put the best spin on things?

Your larger point about the real motivator being negative press and Android is spot on, of course.

Re:Yea

[Altrag]

I'm sure Apple gives some shit about the developers (at least the big ones that they might have large financial incentives to listen to). But your average individual developer? Pretty doubtful. Developers will always create things for markets, and the iPhone/iPod Touch is a huge market. Developers will still develop for a market that size, regardless of how annoying Apple makes it.

Re:Yea

[Americano]

Never mind that - I want to know where the presidency of George Bush got a fucking time machine!

Is it an apple device? iTime? It must be!

Re:Yea

[devjj]

It worked for Microsoft.

Re:Yea

[SanityInAnarchy]

While I agree, they've got a lot farther to go to gain back the trust they've lost. Why would I commit to a platform where they could, on a whim, outlaw my entire fucking language?

The only way I'd consider iOS for anything serious is if they remove the approval barrier entirely, so that there's no longer a single schizophrenic point of failure for the entire software ecosystem.

Re:Yea

[mjwx]

Apple is your friend. Trust in Apple. Apple is your friend.

Big Apple is watching you.

Re:Yea

[cbhacking]

Are you for real? The point of the App Store is to make money for Apple, both directly (the cut they take) and indirectly (it helps drive device sales).

If Apple just wanted "to allow developers to create and distribute great software" they'd have built the next SourceForge, but without the requirement of open source and with better distribution options (including commercial distribution). That's not what the App Store is, by any stretch of the imagination. They wouldn't charge for developer tools. They wouldn't restrict the functionality of apps. They wouldn't restrict the languages or frameworks you can use. They wouldn't prohibit interpreters or emulators. They wouldn't require that the apps can only be for specific platforms that they have top-to-bottom control over. They wouldn't reject good software just because it does something better than what comes with one of their devices, or does it in a different way.

In fact, if Apples was really trying to encourage development, they'd do the opposite of most of those. They'd encourage frameworks and languages. They'd give the developer tools to anybody who showed any interest at all. If they were really serious about it, they'd open-source their own systems so that everybody could improve on them, customize them, and write code that makes the most of their capabilities.

Re:Yea

[SuricouRaven]

Apple will never apply flash on iOS, for the same reason they will never allow emulators. Both of them would grant access to an instant library of tens or hundreds of thousands of free games. Mostly bad games, yes, but there are some excellent ones in there too. The flash ones are even mostly legal. With access to all that, users would cease to buy the games on the app store - and that means both a loss of Apples cut, and a loss of developer loyalty as the platform becomes less profitable due to the new competition. This isn't just about keeping low-quality software away - it's about making sure that you either give Apple it's share, or go without.

Re:Yea

[thetoadwarrior]

That's a bit of a myth though, imo. I do think people should have a choice to install flash even if it is appearing to be awful on android. But anyway the reason it's a myth to me is because most flash games require a keyboard. Yes people can develop free flash games for the iphone but it won't automatically have access to what's out there now.

Re:Yea

[jeremyp]

The only way I'd consider iOS for anything serious is if they remove the approval barrier entirely.

Why? Is your software really that bad?

Re:Yea

[Tom]

The only way I'd consider iOS for anything serious is if they remove the approval barrier entirely,

Funny, everything I know that simply works and is joyful to use, has a company with an approval barrier behind it (Nintendo or any gaming console is another example).

Everything that is a gamble and sometimes works and sometimes doesn't - does not. PC gaming or the Android store are good examples. Current rumours say that about a quarter of all apps in the Android store(s) are malware.

Re:Yea

[Tom]

Yes, they had to make the mistake before learning from it.

Your point?

Re:Yea

[cowscows]

There are already zillions of free games available on the App Store. Apple isn't worried about free games, it makes their iOS platform way more appealing to users, and they know that.

Re:Yea

[SanityInAnarchy]

Nope. It's that innovative.

Re:Yea

[SanityInAnarchy]

Everything that is a gamble and sometimes works and sometimes doesn't - does not. PC gaming or the Android store are good examples.

I have about similar rates of failure with PC games as I do with Xbox games, for various definitions of "failure".

The difference is, certain kinds of failure -- for example, cheating -- is something I can mitigate myself in the PC world (dedicated servers), but in the console world, we have to wait for a fix from on high.

Also, mods and various indie games. Lugaru is not a gamble, and as far as I know, is not available on any console. Ditto for World of Goo, Knytt Stories, etc.

Current rumours say that about a quarter of all apps in the Android store(s) are malware.

That is a serious problem, but not at all related. I don't care if Android stores have similar review processes -- I don't care if they even restrict languages. The point is, I'm not locked into any one Android store (unless I go with AT&T).

Re:Yea

[Tom]

Also, mods and various indie games. Lugaru is not a gamble, and as far as I know, is not available on any console. Ditto for World of Goo, Knytt Stories, etc.

Accepted, and the main reason that I still play more on my Mac than on my Wii.

I don't care if Android stores have similar review processes -- I don't care if they even restrict languages. The point is, I'm not locked into any one Android store (unless I go with AT&T).

Good point. Yes, having more than one store is certainly a good thing and would also provide a variety of options.

Re:Yea

[ToasterMonkey]

It's refreshing to see Apple wrong so many times in a row. Watching them backpedal is amusing.

I knew this would happen, I've been waiting my whole life for Apple to be wrong!! Oh they couldn't be so wrong, this is rich. Finally, after decades of waiting, they are wrong wrong wrong. I love it! They couldn't be right forever, I knew it, it was a matter of time. Oh, victory is so sweet, hey I just wet myself.

Google Voice

[esocid]

So...when will they be approving Google Voice?

Re:Google Voice

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't be approving Google Voice because it "replaces or duplicates built-in functionality" (the phone already has a contact list and dialer. They didn't approve it the first time because of this. They also had some vague "privacy" concerns because the contacts are stored online with Google. None of the iReasons they cited are mitigated by the change in policy.

Re:Google Voice

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Sure, so how does Skype get through. In fact, how do most apps get around points 2.11-2.13?

2.11 Apps that duplicate apps already in the App Store may be rejected, particularly if there are many of them
2.12 Apps that are not very useful or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected
2.13 Apps that are primarily marketing materials or advertisements will be rejected

I would say the vast majority of apps in the store fall under these points.

Re:Google Voice

[phoenixwade]

Sure, so how does Skype get through. In fact, how do most apps get around points 2.11-2.13?

2.11 Apps that duplicate apps already in the App Store may be rejected, particularly if there are many of them 2.12 Apps that are not very useful or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected 2.13 Apps that are primarily marketing materials or advertisements will be rejected

I would say the vast majority of apps in the store fall under these points.

"May be rejected" != "Will be rejected" - that little semantic out means Apple can violate their own acceptance rules at a whim - meaning All apps in the store are currently in compliance.

Re:Google Voice

[ciggieposeur]

2.11 Apps that duplicate apps already in the App Store may be rejected, particularly if there are many of them

Does this mean that a few shitty apps in the App Store that do function X can prevent approval of a new app that does function X much better?

Re:Google Voice

[shutdown -p now]

They relaxed restrictions on development tools, but not on apps as such.

Re:Google Voice

[SETIGuy]

Potentially, yes. And if Apple decides to do function X itself, all traces of the existence of those apps will be wiped from the timeline.

Re:Google Voice

[abhi_beckert]

2.12 Apps that are not very useful or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected

I would say the vast majority of apps in the store fall under these points.

The keyword there is "may". There are categories where you have to choose through 10 different free applications with not a single feature do differentiate between them. That's annoying for users, and completely pointless for everyone else.

If you can't do something better or cheaper than anyone else in the store, then you shouldn't bother in the first place. 2.12 simply enforces that.

If they didn't enforce it, no developer would make any money at all in those categories (because the revenue would be spread too thinly, so individual apps would have low sales), and users would struggle to find the gems among the garbage.

Re:Google Voice

[abhi_beckert]

Imagine if your city's council allowed 30 gas stations to open in a space of two or three city blocks. Drivers would be spread among them, and most would go out of business.

The only gas station(s) who'd survive, would be the ones who sell the cheapest gas, and with such tough competition their gas would be too cheap for them to do a good job, they wouldn't be able to hire staff for cleaning etc.

But luckily, any good council will tell gas stations to get lost if they try to open too many in a small area. There is no law or government official protecting such things from happening in software, so Apple is doing it.

Re:Google Voice

[nofx_3]

If it does function X much better it's not really duplicating, it's improving. I think they are trying to avoid for example, 10 people who took an iPhone programming class and then submitted identical versions of the class project twitter client.

Re:Google Voice

[nofx_3]

Oh and free flashlight apps for iPhone 4 are another great example.

Re:Google Voice

[cbhacking]

Wait... are you saying they *do* enforce it? As you yourself pointed out, there are obviously cases where they don't enforce it. It's easy to write those apps, and nobody much cares, so they get to vastly inflate their numbers of apps by allowing them. They can still reject anything that they actually don't like, though. This is how you end up with a whole pile of Flashlight and Fart apps, and not a single lisp interpreter.

what about writing apps *on* the device

[line-bundle]

Does that count as downloading?

I am looking at this in the context of scriptability.

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[daid303]

I am looking at this in the context of scriptability.

Wasn't executing interpreted code disallowed?

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[BasilBrush]

"Apps that install or launch other executable code will be rejected."

  For sure you can create an app to write code on the device. (i.e. an editor) But the app mustn't actually execute that code.

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[SimonTheSoundMan]

I don't see interpreted code listed in the guidelines.

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[Lunix Nutcase]

That's because the rules against interpreted code are part of the SDK rules not the app approval guidelines.

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[line-bundle]

[citation]?

I give you a counterexample: SophistiCalc
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/sophistimacalc-programmable/id317192851?mt=8

Re:what about writing apps *on* the device

[SETIGuy]

Shhhh! Don't tell Steve!

More importantly

[BasilBrush]

More importantly, developers will no longer have to second guess the reasons why apps may or may not be accepted. From the statement:

"In addition, for the first time we are publishing the App Store Review Guidelines to help developers understand how we review submitted apps. We hope it will make us more transparent and help our developers create even more successful apps for the App Store."

Re:More importantly

[Pojut]

I think this is the biggest news of all. Why they kept such things secret, I have no idea. There really was no good reason to not disclose these guidelines before.

Re:More importantly

[Sarten-X]

It's to prevent/reduce the lawyer-like arguments. The moment a set of guidelines becomes public, people start trying to find loopholes. Arguments about terminology, implementation, and technicalities ensue. Then the rules get updated to account for what's been argued already, which brings in a new set of loopholes. Soon, a whole new industry springs up around just knowing the rules, and the whole process grinds to an inefficient halt.

It's much easier to keep guidelines internal, and only release very general suggestions.

Re:More importantly

[Anonymous Coward]

We will reject Apps for any content or behavior that we believe is over the line. What line, you ask?
Well, as a Supreme Court Justice once said, "I'll know it when I see it". And we think that you will also
know it when you cross it.

Yes, blocking a bittorrent remote control app because "this category of applications is often used for the purpose of infringing third party rights" was obviously stated from reading that document.

Re:More importantly

[Mongoose Disciple]

However, simplicity/efficiency is often the enemy of fairness. It certainly was in this case.

I mean, I can drastically simplify the American legal system if we toss the laws and move to a system of laws only I know. We'll get rid of all the lawyering and costly trials, and I'll just let the secret police know who they should quietly execute.

Re:More importantly

[Bigjeff5]

How can you change the guidelines to justify removing any app you want if everybody knows what the guidelines are?

Duh.

The only reason they are doing this now is because they've gotten too much pressure not too.

Any reasonable company would have released them from the very beginning. Most companies tell you what their criteria are for rejection specifically so you can avoid and correct any potential issues.

Re:More importantly

[mandelbr0t]

It's much easier to keep guidelines internal, and only release very general suggestions.

Of course it's easier to do so, since less people have a say as to what the guidelines should be. However, it's not really possible to claim that it's a transparent process as a result. The lack of transparency makes people think that Apple has something to hide, especially when it has not really been clear to this point why some apps are being rejected. Allowing input from the community on what those guidelines should be would create a public image that peoples' opinions matter, and that Apple is not arbitrarily deciding which apps will be sold. This is even more important, since the app store is effectively the only way to get new applications. If Apple prevents your app from being sold, there is really no other way to market it.

On the other hand, Apple is well-known for their high-handed, prescriptive approach to technology, so the fact that no other input was considered in determining who would be allowed to profit from the iPhone platform should come as no surprise.

Re:More importantly

[Sarten-X]

Try telling that to the people who try to find them.

Re:More importantly

[shutdown -p now]

More importantly, developers will no longer have to second guess the reasons why apps may or may not be accepted.

Oh yes, indeed. Did you reed those Review Guidelines? Here, let me post the introduction:

We view Apps different than books or songs, which we do not curate. If you want to criticize a religion, write a book. If you want to describe sex, write a book or a song, or create a medical app. It can get complicated, but we have decided to not allow certain kinds of content in the App Store. It may help to keep some of our broader themes in mind:

- We have lots of kids downloading lots of apps, and parental controls don't work unless the parents set them up (many don't). So know that we're keeping an eye out for the kids.

- We have over 250,000 apps in the App Store. We don't need any more Fart apps. If your app doesn't do something useful or provide some form of lasting entertainment, it may not be accepted.

- If your App looks like it was cobbled together in a few days, or you're trying to get your first practice App into the store to impress your friends, please brace yourself for rejection. We have lots of serious developers who don't want their quality Apps to be surrounded by amateur hour.

- We will reject Apps for any content or behavior that we believe is over the line. What line, you ask? Well, as a Supreme Court Justice once said, "I'll know it when I see it". And we think that you will also know it when you cross it.

- If your app is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to. If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps.

This is a living document, and new apps presenting new questions may result in new rules at any time. Perhaps your app will trigger this. Lastly, we love this stuff too, and honor what you do. We're really trying our best to create the best platform in the world for you to express your talents and make a living too. If it sounds like we're control freaks, well, maybe it's because we're so committed to our users and making sure they have a quality experience with our products. Just like almost all of you are too.

It's all one big WTF, to be honest.

Re:More importantly

[shutdown -p now]

How can you change the guidelines to justify removing any app you want if everybody knows what the guidelines are?

By stating in the guidelines that you fully reserve the right to conjure new rules out of thin air if and when needed. Quote:

"This is a living document, and new apps presenting new questions may result in new rules at any time. Perhaps your app will trigger this."

Re:More importantly

[bill_mcgonigle]

The only reason they are doing this now is because they've gotten too much pressure not too.

Naw, the iPhone is, literally, the textbook example from The Innovator's Solution.

Apple's best profit maximization came from keeping everything proprietary for as long as they didn't have significant competition. That they're doing this is likely an indication of a sales slump vs. competition from Android. Now they'll begin the process of competing in a commoditized market.

Re:More importantly

[shutdown -p now]

No doubt it's all completely unacceptable to freetards, libertarians and Al-Qaeda

That's interesting - I haven't seen Apple fanbois use the word "freetard" before. Why don't you use it more liberally in all your posts, to save mods the trouble?

Re:More importantly

[c 0xFF]

Soon, a whole new industry springs up around just knowing the rules, and the whole process grinds to an inefficient halt.

If only our law system ended up that way. Instead it's an inefficient mess that refuses to halt.

Re:More importantly

[internettoughguy]

However, simplicity/efficiency is often the enemy of fairness. It certainly was in this case.

I mean, I can drastically simplify the American legal system if we toss the laws and move to a system of laws only I know. We'll get rid of all the lawyering and costly trials, and I'll just let the secret police know who they should quietly execute.

I would say just the opposite, it's the exceptions and complications that break the system:

• You can say whatever you like, except if it's obscene or compromises national security.
  
• A warrant is required to search your person or your vehicle, except if they suspect you are in possession of drugs or weapons.
  
• In the eyes of the law; everyone is equal, except for the ruling class/the wealthy/a certain race/those born elsewhere.
  
• No-one shall be held without trial indefinitely, except for suspected terrorists.
  
• You shall not be spied on without a warrant, except on the Internet.
  
• Anyone can be filmed in a public place, except for law enforcement.
  

Re:More importantly

[SETIGuy]

I'll just let the secret police know who they should quietly execute.

That's why I've changed my name to "me".

browsers

[hey]

Browsers download and run code (javaScript).
What about them?

Re:browsers

[line-bundle]

webkit is exempt.

Written like a true slashdotter who didn't read the article.

Re:browsers

[wherethewoolzewasnt]

The WebKit JavaScript implementation is essentially the one exception to the downloadable code rule. I imagine that you could still be rejected for implementing core functionality in downloadable JavaScript, as that would open up a potential security hole.

Re:browsers

[unix1]

The WebKit JavaScript implementation is essentially the one exception to the downloadable code rule.

No, it's not an exception because webkit browser was provided/preinstalled by Apple. It didn't have to go through the 3rd party app approval process. 3rd party web browsers (no, Opera mini is not a normal web browser) are still not allowed. Actually, you could say Opera Mini is an exception.

The reason "no download" rule is there is to prevent alternative ways of distributing apps, effectively bypassing iTunes app store. This was the original intent of those restrictions anyway. They just went overboard with them, now they backpedaled but that major restriction is still in place.

Re:browsers

[shutdown -p now]

Makes me wonder... WebKit is embeddable in iOS apps, right? Is it possible to embed it in such a way that it is not visible - e.g. just hide it, or overlay it with something - and use it solely as a JS scripting engine?

Re:browsers

[Foogle]

Yes, but not effectively. You can only interact with the WebKit JavaScript system by passing strings into your hidden UIWebView component. And the JS could only "call out" to the host environment by requesting custom URLs that the host environment could recognize (e.g. custom://show-alert/?message=foo+bar). As a consequence, if you want to do anything requiring back and forth between the two environments, you have to do it asynchronously. It's a real pain.

Applause

[Superken7]

Its good to see big companies backpedal and fix their mistakes, even more if the company is Apple/Ms/Google

Don't get me wrong, I think it made sense for *them* to ban things like Adobe CS5, but I don't think it was good for everyone involved (especially users and developers), and its great to see them do that, for whatever reason it must be.

Clarification

[mr100percent]

Let's clarify, since the description isn't that great. Apple will now allow Adobe's Flash to export in iPhone app format

Also, Apple released their App Store Review Guidelines (PDF). Worth a read.

Re:Clarification

[BasilBrush]

I suggest actual developers access that list on Apple's site. It'll change quite often.

Re:Clarification

[edxwelch]

That document is hilarious, especially this part:
"We have over 250,000 apps in the App Store. We don't need any more Fart apps. If your app doesn't do something useful or provide some form of lasting entertainment, it may not be accepted."
The App Store director himself has fart apps on the App Store: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/08/apple-fart-apps/all/1

Secondly, certain developers submit 100's of spam apps every day and while Apple has banned some of them, it's still happening: http://www.iphonedevsdk.com/forum/business-legal-app-store/40766-worst-app-store-offenders-graaple-hotix-studios-add-yours-here.html

Re:Clarification

[delinear]

Anybody want to take bets on how long it takes Apple to include an approval guideline that lets them reject apps that show unacceptably crappy performance on iOS hardware?

On a first skim through I'd say maybe it'll fall foul of these two:

2.1 Apps that crash will be rejected
13.2 Apps that rapidly drain the device's battery [...] will be rejected

Re:Clarification

[shutdown -p now]

It's even more hilarious than you'd think. Read this part again slowly, emphasis mine:

"We have over 250,000 apps in the App Store. We don't need any more Fart apps."

Which is probably about as close an admission as to how the 250k mark was reached in the first place as you can get from Apple. Now that they're there, and e.g. Android is not, so it still does "need more Fart apps", they can bash it from their high horse.

Re:Clarification

[KarmaMB84]

Adobe's CS5 converts Flash apps into native apps. There's no runtime. That's why Apple banned development tools that translated from other languages into C, C++ or Objective-C. People could probably start submitting apps built with CS5 right away if they felt so inclined.

Re:Clarification

[thoromyr]

I don't know about "quite often", but they are upfront that it will change. They say so at the beginning and end of the document. And I'm fairly certain I know where at least one of those rules came from -- one that made it through the approval process and was later removed (shake the baby). Like the rules or not (there are a couple I find to be excessive) they *are* consistent with Apple's presented view. I wasn't surprised by a single rule I saw in the list. I think it is fairly easy to predict what will and won't be rejected.

Unity

[Xest]

This was all about Unity, which basically does exactly what Adobe's Flash packaging tool did for the most part. The Unity game tools have been used to develop some fairly popular iPhone games, and Apple knew it couldn't continue to authorise Unity based apps whilst denying apps created with Adobe's tools without falling foul of competition laws. Similarly, by kicking Unity off too they'd be throwing away from of the iPhone's most popular games.

So the question now is, does this mean if Adobe tries to release it's tools again that Apple is going to let it, or are they now going to try and find another excuse to deny Adobe access to the platform?

Apple stood to lose far more if it continued to stand by this policy, and if it stood by the policy whilst letting some apps through it also stood to face the DoJ, so it had to decide one way or the other.

Re:Unity

[BasilBrush]

So the question now is, does this mean if Adobe tries to release it's tools again that Apple is going to let it, or are they now going to try and find another excuse to deny Adobe access to the platform?

That's probably the reason they've released App Review Guidelines at the same time. Apple can probably deny most Flash apps based on other rules that already exist. e.g.
"Apps that rapidly drain the device's battery or generate excessive heat will be rejected." and
"Apps must comply with all terms and conditions explained in the Apple iPhone Human Interface Guidelines and the Apple iPad Human Interface Guidelines"

Re:Unity

[samkass]

I'm also interested in what other languages this opens up. The new rules explicitly ALLOW interpreters as long as the interpreter and all interpreted code are included in the original app bundle.

This could open the way for:
* erlang : A few people have ported erlang to the iPhone before but since Apple disallowed interpreters no serious work was done on this front. I think this could change. Especially with the iPad becoming more of an enterprise system, I could imagine embedded erlang services being available in the back-end library of some of these systems.
* Java : Nothing I'm seeing in the current agreement precludes Java anymore. Of course, JIT would be problematic, but interpreted and/or compiled-to-native Java is completely feasible now.
* JavaScript/HTML5 : One could imagine a pretty rich app written in a mixture of HTML5 and native code.

Re:Unity

[AC-x]

So the question now is, does this mean if Adobe tries to release it's tools again that Apple is going to let it

Apple can't prevent Adobe releasing the tools, it can only prevent iPhone apps that were written in the tools from being approved (if they can fingerprint the apps well enough to tell)

Re:Unity

[Rossman]

"does this mean if Adobe tries to release it's tools again "

The tools are already released, they are still included with Flash CS5 (Packager for iPhone). Developers can start using them today if they want.

Re:Unity

[SETIGuy]

Java : Nothing I'm seeing in the current agreement precludes Java anymore. Of course, JIT would be problematic, but interpreted and/or compiled-to-native Java is completely feasible now.

Interpreted Java is still forbidden. Java would need to be compiled directly to native code before the App store would accept it. A JVM with or without JIT or worse (in Apple's opinion) a DVM is still not permitted according to the app store developer agreement. But yes, in theory you could develop an Android to iOS layer and compile an Android app into an iOS binary. Be sure not to have the word "android" in it.

JavaScript/HTML5 : One could imagine a pretty rich app written in a mixture of HTML5 and native code.

JavaScript is already allowed is you are using the javascript interpreter in webkit. This doesn't change that. No non-webkit implementations of a javascript interpreter are allowed, however.

One of the more amusing side effects of this rule set is the the words "android", "droid", "blackberry", "linux" and "java" are no longer permitted in any app or its metadata. So that game you wanted to write about rampaging androids, not allowed. Better make them into robots. Unless someone releases a phone called the "robot", then that's not allowed either. Also, no cookbook apps that feature berry pies or coffee are allowed.

Apple's Statement

[amolapacificapaloma]

This is the actual statement by Apple.

Also, I've read some rumors about the next iLife '11 having a new program for creating iOS apps in a similar way to the Android's AppInventor. This new statement seems a like a pointer in that direction, otherwise they would have a hard time arguing about antitrust issues on the App Store...

Re:Apple's Statement

[BasilBrush]

I doubt it. iLife is a consumer app bundle. The last thing Apple is going to do is encourage non-developers to create half-assed apps and submit them to the app store. They have more than enough real developers developing with Cocoa-Touch.

Re:Apple's Statement

[amolapacificapaloma]

All this is highly speculative, but I'd expect it to be like Automator on OS X, and the "apps" not being submitted to the store, but used but executed inside an apple made app. Easy way for power users to scratch their own itches, and a nice mousehole in the walled garden... Pure speculation though.

Re:Apple's Statement

[amolapacificapaloma]

Well, the thing is that Apple endeavor regarding the approval process for Apps may be seen as anticompetitive because it uses its dominant position to stifle competition (duplicate functionality, etc). It's the same thing as when people say Google should be investigated in case they promote their own products using their search monopoly, demoting their competitors. If such things happen, they should be investigated. There is nothing wrong with monopolies achieved by being better than the rest, but using a dominant position in one market to gain traction in another is a big no-no.

Non-Mac development

[frostfreek]

I wonder if this means that I can develop using Eclipse CDT and an iPod Touch, rather than having to buy a Mac.

Re:Non-Mac development

[antifoidulus]

What in the article even remotely hinted at that?

Re:Non-Mac development

[tonywestonuk]

erm.

  From the header.."..It basically stopped the use of cross-platform compilers..."

Using eclipse on windows to code, with a cross compiler to convert the resultant Java to native Ipad code, would fall fowl of this. And now, apparently it wont.

 

Re:Non-Mac development

[Nick Ives]

Using eclipse on windows to code, with a cross compiler to convert the resultant Java to native Ipad code, would fall fowl of this. And now, apparently it wont.

I bloody hope it wont; the previous situation had me clucking fuming!

You can already run it as a web app

[SuperKendall]

Google Voice is already an iOS web app. Remember, GV is not VOIP (and there are in fact plenty of VOIP apps for iOS).

Re:You can already run it as a web app

[Bigjeff5]

Google wrote an iPhone app for it, and Apple approved, then rejected it.

As you said, GV is not VOIP, so why the hell would Apple reject it?

Re:You can already run it as a web app

[Sancho]

This can be next to worthless if your data connection sucks.

Google Voice on Android doesn't require a data connection to make or receive calls. Google Voice on iPhone does, because you must dial from Google's webpage.

MonoTouch?

[Doc Ruby]

Does this mean that I can use C# to generate a Silverlight app that will run on Windows, Windows Mobile, Linux, Android and iPhone?

Can I write in Java an app that will run on every desktop and mobile?

Re:MonoTouch?

[rjstanford]

Does this mean that I can use C# to generate a Silverlight app that will run on Windows, Windows Mobile, Linux, Android and iPhone?

Can I write in Java an app that will run on every desktop and mobile?

Well, considering that a good app experience on a desktop (with a mouse and keyboard) is by definition very different than a good app experience on a multi-touch device, probably not, no. You might be able to share some code internals, but you could do that anyway.

Re:MonoTouch?

[KshGoddess]

Can I write in Java an app that will run on every desktop and mobile?

only if you distribute it with your own developer-locked-in version of java. (I have fond memories of java version 2.something.{our lead developer's name} for the software written for one version of solaris on specific hardware with specific os patches.)

Re:MonoTouch?

[shutdown -p now]

Does this mean that I can use C# to generate a Silverlight app that will run on Windows, Windows Mobile, Linux, Android and iPhone?

You can so long as it prints "Hello, world" and exits. For anything beyond that you'll need some of the proprietary .NET libraries which Mono doesn't support.

Can I write in Java an app that will run on every desktop and mobile?

No, but you can write one that will limp.

~~~

Re:MonoTouch?

[sideslash]

No, MonoTouch doesn't use Silverlight, it uses the native iOS Cocoa UI. Similarly, the forthcoming MonoDroid will use the native Android UI. However, you can write your core logic in C# and share it between three separate projects/platforms, generating the UI with MonoTouch, MonoDroid, and Silverlight (iOS, Android, and WP7, respectively). Currently that decision would be hard to justify unless you really love .NET (which I admittedly kinda do myself), since the viability of WP7 is a huge question mark and .NET is a somewhat of a weighty and foreign addition to the other platforms.

What's wrong with issuing an update?

[SuperKendall]

there is no way for an anticheat system to update itself.

What's to prevent the game maker from simply issuing a software update, and having software issue challenges to each other related to versions before accepting games?

Online cheating is not as great a problem as with the PC's or consoles.

It only takes a few seconds to update a new version on the device.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[Lunix Nutcase]

Not when each of those versions has to go through another round of approval.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[BasilBrush]

These days it typically takes a couple of days for approval. Sometimes it can be as short as a few hours.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[Lunix Nutcase]

If people are rampantly cheating even a single day can be enough to put off a huge portion of the people playing your game.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[Lunix Nutcase]

How is it false? Why would anyone keep playing a game that has rampant cheating going on when you can easily and cheaply switch to the hundreds of other iPhone games?

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[tepples]

How is it false? Why would anyone keep playing a game that has rampant cheating going on when you can easily and cheaply switch to the hundreds of other iPhone games?

Two reasons: A. Hundreds of other games are likely to have rampant cheating. Or B. The publisher of your favorite game has sent a DMCA notice to Apple and got its close substitutes taken down (case in point: Tetris).

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[mjwx]

Online cheating is not as great a problem as with the PC's or consoles.

Iphone gaming is nowhere near as big as PC or consoles. When you have 20 players, a 5% rate of cheating is hardly noticeable, when you have 200,000 players then it is.

But then again, I believe iphone gaming is a fad. Apple are too hostile to game companies who want to be able to update their own code as they can do on the Wii, Xbox, Playstation, PSP or DS. Not being able to directly update game engines is a massive problem for them, considering how complex modern engines are.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[Pollardito]

That's not my experience, as we saw wait times well over a week for trivial updates as recently as June. I'm sure it goes up and down, but I think you're minimizing a very real problem.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[BasilBrush]

Currently:
New apps approved within a week: 83%.
Updates approved within a week, 87%.

Re:What's wrong with issuing an update?

[Pollardito]

I wonder how that breaks down within that week, because I would consider some time periods that fall "within a week" to be "a long time."

Qt for the iPad?

[RogueWarrior65]

Hopefully that means you can write apps in Qt and hopefully they will be cross-platform with Android so developers don't have an excuse to marginalize one platform.

Re:Qt for the iPad?

[FunkyELF]

Since when can you write Android apps in Qt?

Re:Qt for the iPad?

[gbjbaanb]

since Nokia started the Lighthouse project, nicely hosted on code.google.com :)

See: http://tamss60.tamoggemon.com/2010/03/18/qt-on-android-the-bogdan-vatra-interview/

and instructions for how to do it.

Re:Qt for the iPad?

[codepunk]

I have no desire at all to write android apps, mainly because I am a java hater. Yes I know it is still possible to run native code but it still requires interaction with jni leading to a bastardized app. Now I would not hesitate to write a android app that performed some simple task such as a data bound app but for something that requires actual performance I am quite happy to run the other way.

Antivirus or any update.

[leuk_he]

Most of the time these worries are about anti virus instead. There the updates also contain exe updates.

But the same update mechanism used for an normal application can apply to a any application. Let it bet antivirus, anti-cheat or a simple game. If you want to update it you do it via a the app-store, and don't come up with a own update system. If that is not good enough, that should be updated, not implement it on yourself.

The fact that windows does not have a central update system and every app has to do their own update mechanism is a bad thing of windows. And it is a sad fact that user have come accustomed to that.

Re:Antivirus or any update.

[tepples]

And since Apple is a control freak, they check every update to your application slowly and ineffectely. All while the hacking is rampant and ruins everyones game.

If you want to update it you do it via a the app-store

AC's point is that cheaters update their cheats faster than Apple can approve the app developer's update.

Flash, java, interpreted languages

[codepunk]

What I would like to see apple do is to add performance to it's application review process. Say for instance you app does not boot to a stable runnable state in 10 seconds it gets disapproved. Same goes for memory usage and and processor load. That would solve the whole "user experience" goal that they claim to have. Of course it would keep most of the interpreted apps, flash, java etc off of the phone but I have no problem with that. On one hand I would like to have to option to use interpreted languages on the device on the other hand I know that for performance reasons it is not the way to go.

Re:Flash on android

[rjstanford]

But most people wouldn't have blamed Flash - especially if there wasn't an easy example of a non-flash version to point to. They'd have blamed the iPhone. Most people, even most iPhone users, don't read /. or related sites - that's one of the reasons that the iPhone has been a smashing commercial success, you don't need to be a geek to use it (N70, I'm looking at you here). Keeping Flash off the platform was exactly the right business decision to make.

Even if Adobe would release a version that wasn't a battery killing unstable one - which would be a great start - the usability experience isn't close to being there for multitouch devices. And the iPhone is all about user experience.

Kind of, but more about control of app quality

[SuperKendall]

This was all about Unity, which basically does exactly what Adobe's Flash packaging tool did for the most part.

Actually I thought Unity was more intermediate, producing an XCode project you would compile - the flash tool produced a binary directly.

Apple knew it couldn't continue to authorise Unity based apps whilst denying apps created with Adobe's tools without falling foul of competition laws

Actually it could do that forever because there are no such laws. Anti-Trust doesn't enter into the picture in any way.

The real reason the relaxed the restrictions is, I think twofold:

1) Developer outcry - Apple does respect and listen to developers, and they were having too many people come up with too many perfectly valid edge cases (like using Mono or Scheme for development). Apple had actually pulled back on this restriction a few months earlier letting people submit things developed using alternative languages on a case by case basis, that was probably a lot of work to review.

2) Control of app quality. This I think is key - what Apple is really worried about with Flash developed apps coming out is that a ton a crappy stuff would flood the store and the review process. So what has changed? The fact that they have a stated review policy now, which says in part "we will not allow a ton of crappy small applications that do nothing". The whole limitation made no sense before because Apple benefits from having quality applications on the platform, so now its more clear that wider spectrum of development tools will not be allowed to destroy the level of quality the application pool enjoys, so someone CAN use Flash to compile an iPhone binary but they had better be producing something good. A formal app store review policy allows Apple to be more relaxed in other regards, because it keeps control over the final quality of applications.

Whats really odd is that it took this long to come up with any kind of review policy document!

Re:Kind of, but more about control of app quality

[delinear]

Whats really odd is that it took this long to come up with any kind of review policy document!

Well I guess the reason for that is primarily twofold. Firstly, it benefit Apple to grow the App store massively in a short space of time - if they'd rejected all those fart apps and similar early on, there'd likely be nowhere near the 250,000+ apps there are in there now. Secondly, I guess there's also the question of what the guidelines actually are. As has been said elsewhere, they've probably been largely making these up as they went along. Oh sure they would have had some foundation stones to build on, but really there was nothing exactly like the App store with anything like that kind of success before the iDevices came along. Who could have predicted in the early days exactly how people would use this service, and more importantly how people would develop for it? If they'd released this list on day 1 you could have undoubtedly expected several hundred revisions to it in the interim, that would have angered developers even more ("moving the goalposts"). Now they've had time to test the guidelines and ensure that they produce a desirable mix in terms of quality and quantity (although I'd still expect more finessing, but nothing on the same level).

Re:Kind of, but more about control of app quality

[SuperKendall]

Well I guess the reason for that is primarily twofold. Firstly, it benefit Apple to grow the App store massively in a short space of time - if they'd rejected all those fart apps and similar early on, there'd likely be nowhere near the 250,000+ apps there are in there now.

Right, but that aspect did not have to be in an initial version of the document.

Secondly, I guess there's also the question of what the guidelines actually are. As has been said elsewhere, they've probably been largely making these up as they went along.

As an application developer, I don't think that's really true. All of use knew what the rules were, the basic outline of them. They were just never officially listed. Having a list before wouldn't have stopped them from modifying it often...

But you are probably right that Apple thought the situation was too fluid to bother maintaining a document until now, where they have a really crafted set of rules.

Re:Kind of, but more about control of app quality

[salesgeek]

Apple is really worried about with Flash developed apps coming out is that a ton a crappy stuff

That explains all the fart applications.

Meaningless

[Andy Smith]

Apple seem terribly random and unpredictable. It would be senseless for any developer to begin work on a project that has become permitted by this clause, because tomorrow the terms could change again.

I'm an Android developer, releasing my first game in the next 4-6 weeks. Then I need to consider whether or not to produce an iPhone version. The decision will only slightly be based on forecasted sales, market share of competing products, and demand for my product. For the most part I will need to decide if I can afford to invest the time developing for a platform that may, at any point, "ban" my product for some obscure reason. (For example, all of my graphics are produced in 3D Studio and rendered as 2D sprites. Suppose Apple takes a dislike to Autodesk...?)

Re:Meaningless

[Andy Smith]

Please cite an example of the Android TOS changing in a way that prohibited sales of a specific subset of apps.

Re:Meaningless

[BasilBrush]

(For example, all of my graphics are produced in 3D Studio and rendered as 2D sprites. Suppose Apple takes a dislike to Autodesk...?)

It's always wise to do a risk analysis before embarking on a new project. Don't forget to factor in the possibility that you'll spend so much time posting ridiculous scenarios to slashdot that you never get round to doing the work.

Re:Meaningless

[codepunk]

Sounds good to me I am a iphone developer and have no desire to port any of my stuff to android. In fact it is not even possible for me to port and or recreate from scratch since android is not capable of running the physics while maintaining acceptable frame rate.

Re:Meaningless

[Andy Smith]

"android is not capable of running the physics while maintaining acceptable frame rate"

Surely that is dependent on the speed of the host device? ie: if your app works on iPhone 3GS then it'll work better on Desire / Galaxy. If it only just works on iPhone 4 then it'll hardly work at all on a basic Android-powered device.

Re:Meaningless

[internettoughguy]

(For example, all of my graphics are produced in 3D Studio and rendered as 2D sprites. Suppose Apple takes a dislike to Autodesk...?)

That's a bit of a silly example, because there would be no legal way to establish that they were created in Max.

I can think of a more reasonable one though, suppose all your graphics are rendered to SVG's, and you build a high speed SVG interpreter into your engine; oops you just ran interpreted code.
Suppose your scene graph was made with DG nodes that are parsed from an XML file, that could also be considered an interpreted language (It would be Turing complete).

Re:Meaningless

[PhilipTheHermit]

Exactly.

I'd be reluctant to spend time developing an application that runs only on one platform and which could be unilaterally banned from running on that platform for arbitrary reasons that may not even be fully explained to me.

I much prefer an open distribution environment. Android, while not completely open, at least seems to be a lot more open than Apple.

And of course they support Java, which I already use at work.

Because they don't replace contacts

[SuperKendall]

Sure, so how does Skype get through.

Because it doesn't duplicte existing functionality. There is no built in VOIP client, and it uses the Apple contacts. GV linked back to Google contacts...

In fact, how do most apps get around points 2.11-2.13?

2.11 Apps that duplicate apps already in the App Store may be rejected, particularly if there are many of them

At this point that might be a problem for some applications but there's always a new idea without many apps in the store.

2.12 Apps that are not very useful or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected

I think you might just be able to work around that by writing an app that is useful or entertaining.

2.13 Apps that are primarily marketing materials or advertisements will be rejected

To me that simply repeats point 2.12 since an application that is primarily marketing is also not useful (though I suppose it could be entertaining, and thus possibly accepted).

I would say the vast majority of apps in the store fall under these points.

Like what? Very few of the applications I have seen fall under these points, except possibly for point 2.11 - but that's the thing, the avoidance of replication is more a point going forward than it has been (though Apple has been starting to reject some applications in crowded categories).

Re:Because they don't replace contacts

[Just Some Guy]

Toktumi's Line2 has a dialer that can originate a VOIP call or pass off the call to the iPhone's own voice system. It also has its own address book. Honestly, I don't really see the difference between Line2 and Google Voice for these purposes.

Re:Because they don't replace contacts

[SuricouRaven]

Given rule 2.11, why are there so many fart-button aps?

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[Bigjeff5]

Are you serious?

Wow man, you are a true fanboy.

There are mistakes, and then there is an attitude that the whole world should bow to their wishes. It's only when they realize they don't have quite that much clout that Apple backs down.

A good company that did not believe customers owed their happiness to the company, developers owed their very existence to the company, would not have locked down the tools in the first place.

Apple treats its customers as though it's only because of Apple's great kindness that those customers get to use Apple products. They treat their developers like a necessary evil, and it's only by Apple's grace and mercy that developers are permitted to write code for Apple products.

That's how you get things like the ridiculous hoops needed to write apps for the App store, or the ridiculous policy of no flash when flash is ubiquitous on the internet. That's a "you get what we give you" attitude if there ever was one. The only reason Apple is backpedaling now is because they pushed it too far and received some backlash. That's it. And they are only going to change the policy far enough to reduce the backlash to an acceptable level - they are not going to change their attitude, and if they see an opportunity to lock things down again they will jump on it.

Re:Flash on android

[Bigjeff5]

Flash is a failure on Android? Since when?

It works great on my phone.

Re:Flash on android

[bigtrike]

I agree with you 100% as far as Safari is concerned and I'm glad that I don't need to hack my iPhone just to block flash.

However, as far as apps with a flash runtime are concerned, people will just see them as slow and broken and blame the apps. I don't think people would even use them long enough for it to interfere with the overall perception of battery life.

Re:Flash on android

[Richard_at_work]

I have seen several people make this mistake - this has nothing at all to do with Flash-the-web-content-platform discussion, as in this case we are not seeing Flash hosted by the web browser at all. No, this is about Flash as a generalised development language for the iOS platform, running code natively and replacing ObjC in the development process - it allows current Flash developers to target their skills at more than just the web.

Flash-the-web-content-platform can wither and die while this use of Flash-the-language can thrive completely independently.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[Mongoose Disciple]

What's refreshing to see is a company that actually admits it was wrong, how often does that happen?

If you think Apple does so more than other companies in its industry, you are drowning in the Kool-Aid.

Obligatory Penny Arcade. Except probably swap from to to.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[devent]

Developer pressure? I think it's more because the Android phone market share will soon go through the roof and more developer will just abandon the iPhone because of the stupid approval program, the restrictions and the costs to develop for it. If Apple is not allowing cross-platform development it will soon find itself in a niche.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[MikeBabcock]

That's why I prefer to work with iOS development, because they do listen to developers and take into account feedback or concerns, and really change fundamental policy instead of continuing said policy just because it exists as so many other companies would do

Way to drink the kool-aid.

I prefer working on platforms that have no enforcement policies on my coding style decisions at all and let me write code the way I want, when I want, and run the code I feel like running too.

My favorite new guideline: Don't snitch

[mliu]

I think this line from the guidelines is pretty funny:
"If your app is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to. If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps."

So basically, don't snitch.

To the contrary, however, in the past, it seems like running to the press and trashing them can really help get your app approved.

See, e.g. http://apple.slashdot.org/story/10/04/16/2327219/Bad-PR-Forces-Apple-To-Reconsider-Banning-Mark-Fiores-App

Re:My favorite new guideline: Don't snitch

[WNight]

Why would they waste time telling you not to snitch if it didn't work?

The one thing Apple fears is bad PR - that people will think developing for android is easier and quicker, and (this is all the non-techies will hear) that the cool apps will be there.

What the...I don't...I..I'm flabbergasted

[mliu]

Is this for real? Wouldn't it be better to prefer to work with another platform that does not have to receive negative feedback in the first place? All companies and people make mistakes, but I don't recall any development platform that has made missteps this bad and drawn this much negative press in recent memory.

Also, you say, "That's why I prefer to work with iOS development, because they do listen to developers and take into account feedback or concerns, and really change fundamental policy instead of continuing said policy just because it exists as so many other companies would do..." Has there been any fundamental policy shift before today? If not, what were you saying prior to today on why you prefer to work with iOS development?

Re:What the...I don't...I..I'm flabbergasted

[sglewis100]

Also, you say, "That's why I prefer to work with iOS development, because they do listen to developers and take into account feedback or concerns, and really change fundamental policy instead of continuing said policy just because it exists as so many other companies would do..." Has there been any fundamental policy shift before today? If not, what were you saying prior to today on why you prefer to work with iOS development?

They listened to developer demand and introduced an SDK and stopped allowing only HTML5 web apps. They allowed turn by turn navigation products. And neither of those were really influenced by the rising success of Android, at the time. I could probably think of a few more, but you asked for "ANY", of which two satisfies.

Re:Flash on android

[delinear]

Flash on Android is what now? It works fine for me (well, as fine as Flash can, which is to say slow and buggy but no different to on my desktop).

Opening it up will just prove Apples point

[grapeape]

After the disaster that has been flash on Andoid so far, perhaps this is just Apples way of saying "see we told you". I expect a plethora of sub-par apps flooding the app store soon, in the end this will probably help HTML5's cause much more than Adobe.

Re:Opening it up will just prove Apples point

[TrancePhreak]

You mean apps like iFart (Flash Edition) ? There's already plenty of junk in the AppStore.

Re:Opening it up will just prove Apples point

[Failed Physicist]

After the disaster that has been flash on Andoid so far

I like people that make absurd generalisations. Tells me they're probably too stupid to hold a more complex thoughts or that they might merely have crafted their opinions by briefly skimming a couple articles in the interblags.
Self-deprecating cynism aside, I'm a google N1 user. I've had flash on it ever since 2.2 was released (what, more than a month ago?) and since then, I've only had 2 crappy websites that had flash which wouldn't want to load. So I reloaded them without asking to activate flash (it's a whitelist a la noscript) and had to surf it flashless like any iOS user would. On the other 95% of sites with flash it worked flawlessly and I had all of the "value added".
Some pretentious blogging heads tried to make a huge story out of this, but reality is that it is not a disaster and works quite well, notwithstanding any flaws that you might expect Flash to have.

Re:Opening it up will just prove Apples point

[grapeape]

I know what you mean I like people who bash HTML5 by trying to find things flash can do and HTML5 cant, but when flash performance is questioned suddenly the only important things are buttons and animation which is then followed up by frustration and name calling.

Who really cares if flash can run all the static stuff people tend to skip when visiting web pages, what people want are apps and so far there are not many that have worked well on any handheld device I have. Most run like crap on my Nokia as well as my archos tablet if they run at all. I've found the same spotty at best results on the Droid's and My Touch slides at my clients offices as well. I'd like to believe it's not universal but so far my own experience as well as what I have read on the "interblags" have led me to believe poor performance isnt just a problem I'm running into.

Re:Flash on android

[MozeeToby]

Personally, I would blame Apple even more when I couldn't visit a website at all because the site was designed around Flash. Personally, I just got Flash on my Droid about a week ago and I've already hit at least a dozen sites that wouldn't have been viewable before and it was in situations where I didn't have easy access to a PC and the information was something I needed right away. Everyone here seems to want to blame the site owners because Flash is a PITA (and it is, don't get me wrong), but it sure is handy to be able to actually visit every site on the web even if it isn't designed for mobile viewing.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[Dhalka226]

What's refreshing to see is a company that actually admits it was wrong, how often does that happen?

I'm trying in vain to find where they admitted they were wrong. All I see is "we listened to our developers," which is nothing more than a nice way of saying "we think this is beginning to hurt our bottom line" and is something MOST companies do if they get to that point.

Didn't Steve Jobs make a big hullabaloo about how "intermediate layers between the platform and the developer ultimately produces sub-standard apps and hinders the progress of the platform"[1] when asked about the rule? So is that magically no longer true, or do they just no longer care? Or is it, perhaps, that their transparently self-serving reasoning for instituting the rule in the first place has started to cost them more than it gains?

The about-face is good, don't get me wrong. But trying to frame it as some sort of benevolence instead of ANOTHER self-serving action to mitigate problems caused by the first is misguided at best.

Apple wanted to control everything, and thought they had the clout to get it done. Apparently enough developers made them nervous about it that they changed their mind. Good, but hardly some sign of a great corporate system.

[1] http://www.taoeffect.com/blog/2010/04/steve-jobs-response-on-section-3-3-1/

Re:Flash on android

[wfolta]

Flash on Android is what now? It works fine for me (well, as fine as Flash can, which is to say slow and buggy but no different to on my desktop).

That about sums up one school of thought in the PC industry. I think I'll have to close my web browser for a while and take a walk outside.

Browsers are already allowed!

[drerwk]

According to engadget:

"Apps that browse the web must use the iOS WebKit framework and WebKit Javascript." Looks like there's still no hope for third-party browsers!

But Atomic Web browser is great. It uses Webkit, and Webkit Javascript, so it renders no doubt exactly like Safari. But, it provides a much nicer UI, for Tabs, for Search, and for Fullscreen. I almost never use Safari on my iPhone since I found Atomic.

Privacy Options Also Changed

[Zerocool3001]

What a lot of the articles pointing this out don't mention is that the rules governing advertisers and what information they can get from the user without their knowledge/permission also changed. Ars points out that this change may make it easier for large third-party advertisers (e.g. AdMob) to get data from their users. I'm not going to argue whether the other changes to the agreement are good or not (I'm a little worried that allowing interpreted code, particularly flash, will lower the overall quality of apps available in the store). But some of the changes to the ability of third-party advertisers to get information on their users could be a serious problem.

Re:Too Little, Too Late

[Culture20]

I bet that the most vocal Apple critics here are those that keep buying Macs, iPhones, iPads, iPods and iWhatevers. If you don't like'em why do you buy them.

The only way to be a true critic of a bad product is to have actually used it. Others can decry the nature of Apple as a company; their business tactics, their mercurial licensing agreements, etc., but I can testify about my personal experiences and headaches with an iPhone, iMacs, OS X [Server], etc.

How much javascript can I download?

[OrangeTide]

Or can only Safari download JavaScript?

Re:Flash on android

[tlhIngan]

Apple has a lot less to fear now that Flash has proven to be a miserable failure on Android. Honestly, though, they should have just let Flash fail on its own

Or do the EEE - Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.

Embrace - there are many open-source Flash players out there. All Apple has to do is hire the devs and bring them inhouse to make it work great on iOS. The benefit here is no plugins or other crap to download - iOS just runs most Flash apps.

Extend - new iOS features are put into the Flash runtime. Developers are encouraged to use those features for their code, and an Apple version of the tools (because Adobe's tools won't do it) and runtimes will be released as browser plugins and everything. Imagine opening up a webpage and seeing "You need to install the Apple Flash player to continue", for example. (E.g., location services, accellerometer, gyro, multi-touch - all these things I don't think are in Flash, yet could be added by Apple).

Extinguish - Adobe's a slow moving company. A mobile flash player has been available since Flash 7 many years ago, and yet it still runs like crap on anything but a PC. Mobile flash seems ot have hit it big this year, because it's taken Adobe that long to actually have it ready, even though you could get Flash on your N800/N810 tablets, Archos had mobile flash, etc. The open-source version could actually beocme the Flash player of the future, after Apple pretty much wrestles it away from Adobe to make it Apple's platform. And it'll be Adobe playing catch up on their platform.

And Android and WebOS devices will be onboard, because well, it's open-source and you can be sure developers would want the same features as well. Hell, imagine Apple selling apps for Android this way (Apple can do it because they can sell anywhere they have an iTunes store, while the Android Marketplace has limited the countries which can pay for paid apps).

Flight of fancy, I suppose. But one of Apple's main objections ot Flash was the dependence on a very unreliable third party that moves very slowly. By wrestling control of Flash from Adobe, they not only control it, but they could go and try to make it run well.

Not what the iPhone app did

[SuperKendall]

it replaces the outbound phone number, the mailbox number, and it uses the native interface(!)

Most of the things you list are not possible for an iPhone application - it was already more limited than the Android version because an application is not allowed to basically take over the system to that extent.

You are decrying the lack of an application you could not have on the iPhone. The web app is not that far off what the native app could do.

As for "not being a smartphone user", I'm a mobile application developer (primarily iOS at the moment).

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[s73v3r]

Would you rather they not, "Listen to their developers"? Every free-market libertarian on this site says that the way companies learn what to do is to, get this, piss off customers so that it affects their bottom line.

Seriously, everybody (myself included) bitched about the restriction clause. Now its lifted. And you fucks still want to bitch?

All platforms have negative aspects

[SuperKendall]

Wouldn't it be better to prefer to work with another platform that does not have to receive negative feedback in the first place?

Sure it would. And I'd love to ride a Unicorn through the sky!

Too bad I can't do either. All platforms have some negative feedback from the user community. The question is, do the curators of the platform you are developing to listen to you?

I'm not even saying Google does not, I think they do as well. But Apple is very good about taking in suggestions for enhancements and eventually coming out with really good API's around them, or as in this case responding to something Developers saw as pointless and removing it (and in reality they had backed down on it months ago with a slight revision to the alternate platform clause).

It's not like Google is perfect either after all, like only allowing Skype to be used with Verizon, or allowing really crapping phone company specific UI to be added to Android.

Has there been any fundamental policy shift before today?

Yes, for example they had a no screen-scriping rule in place for camera use (because that was the only way to read the camera data realtime was a private API call) and they specifically allowed use of that private call so that basically every barcode scanner and AR app could function.

They've also backed of policy choices like not allowing free apps to change to paid apps (or something along those lines, I forget the exact details since I wasn't affected). Or they have also changed policy around in-app purchases to change some restrictions.

Basically there are a lot of examples of where Apple came out with some initial policy that had issues, and they fixed it is response to developer feedback.

If not, what were you saying prior to today on why you prefer to work with iOS development?

I'm saying it because I have found it to be a consistent pattern over the past few years. I was a Java developer for many years, I could do Android development just as easily - but I like more what Apple is doing around the iOS platform, and currently I see a ton more potential (and it's much easier to make a living at it).

Re:Flash on android

[gaspyy]

A crappy app is a crappy app, regardless of what's been programmed in and it still has to be reviewed and approved.
If someone creates a flash app that doesn't kill the battery and provides a pleasant experience, it should be allowed.

Conversely, a bad app written in Objective-C should (and will be) rejected.

Re:Flash on android

[mr100percent]

The problem is that Apple can't trust a third party development environment to take over too much of the app share. In the past stuff like that has wrecked OSes as a vital update breaks the third party APIs that are used in bestseller apps. Apple wants to be able to release iOS 5 and 6 without worrying if they break Flash's internal APIs

Re:Flash on android

[mr100percent]

Apple is not microsoft and they won't do EEE on that basis alone.
Second, Apple is not going to favor Flash over Objective-C tools, which they would need to carry out EEE.
Third, promoting Flash will mean promoting subpar apps since they will not have the functionality or speed of Objective-C. Apple is not going to shoot themselves in the foot in order to extinguish a foe.
Fourth, wouldn't Adobe sue them for trying? Look at the current lawsuit between Google and Oracle over Java.

Not seeing the attitude you see

[SuperKendall]

There are mistakes, and then there is an attitude that the whole world should bow to their wishes.

That would suck if it were the case. But I've not found that to be the case at all. I would certainly not develop for a platform that was true of, as I have a choice of what I can do.

Apple treats its customers as though it's only because of Apple's great kindness that those customers get to use Apple products. They treat their developers like a necessary evil, and it's only by Apple's grace and mercy that developers are permitted to write code for Apple products.

As a developer I don't get that vibe at all. Apple realizes the success they have enjoyed COMES from the development community, and offers a ton of stuff in support of developers. As I said they listen to feedback, and have done things like making all WWDC (Apple developer conference) videos free for every registered iPhone developer.

As a user of Apple products I don't get that vibe either. It's not like consumers have no choice, but a lot of them have CHOSEN to use Apple products because they like how they work, and treat the user with more respect than other platforms.

That's how you get things like the ridiculous hoops needed to write apps for the App store,

I never saw how that point was accurate either. There really are no "hoops" at all in application development, and honestly how can you claim there are with 250k approved apps? The restrictions have always been around a limited set of some categories of applications, and outside of that space development is really easy. People like you have been claiming the restrictions are absurd since day one, but from the standpoint of a developer it's been pretty easy all along.

The only reason Apple is backpedaling now is because they pushed it too far and received some backlash.

Isn't that the reason most people back down from a bad position? People tell them they are wrong, and eventually they see the light... but often not, especially with companies. That's my point, that to me it seems rare that customer complaints change anything about how a company works.

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[WNight]

As I said they listen to feedback, and have done things like making all WWDC (Apple developer conference) videos free for every registered iPhone developer.

Wow, free access to developer resources. Well, to registered and paid-up developers. Amazing.

There really are no "hoops" at all in application development, and honestly how can you claim there are with 250k approved apps?

Yeah, except for anyone who wanted to code one in LISP or Ruby. Or oh, I don't know, whatever keeps a huge number of apps from being approved or rejected.

It's a great platform to develop for as long as you don't step on a land-mine and for some reason be unable to sell your hard work. If you like running a business with a huge uncertainty like "Will I even be able to show this to customers, let alone sell it" hanging in the air, it's for you.

The only reason Apple is backpedaling now is because they pushed it too far and received some backlash.

Isn't that the reason most people back down from a bad position? People tell them they are wrong, and eventually they see the light...

Do they see the light, or just stop doing the thing that got pressure while someone's watching? One's right, the other is the behavior of a sociopath.

They still don't promise to reject an app quickly with a good reason. They'll still let unpleasant (for them) apps linger forever while their developers' businesses die.

but often not, especially with companies. That's my point, that to me it seems rare that customer complaints change anything about how a company works.

What's really changed? Apple is changing what they're doing here only because with the rise of android they've got less control over app developers. Next time they've got this much lock-in they'll do the same sort of thing - use it to stifle competition right up until they'd lose market share by doing so.

Beyond enabling them by developing for their devices you're also showing you'll work with the Microsoft of the moment. Damn the industry, and open competition, I'm making money attaching myself to their locked-in users!

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[SuperKendall]

Wow, free access to developer resources. Well, to registered and paid-up developers. Amazing.

Not just developer resources but conference video, which typically is hundreds of dollars.

And there's lots of other material, also all provided for free, that takes a ton of effort to maintain - the equivalent to an MSDN subscription which is most certainly NOT free.

Yeah, except for anyone who wanted to code one in LISP or Ruby.

You can do that now. And you could do that before the provision was added... so a window of a few months where that was not allowed for app store submissions.

Or oh, I don't know, whatever keeps a huge number of apps from being approved or rejected.

What "huge number of apps"? There are a handful of rejections, the vast majority are accepted. Again, 250k apps in the store.

The number of publicised rejections is something like 100 (if that many!) compared to 250k apps...

It's a great platform to develop for as long as you don't step on a land-mine and for some reason be unable to sell your hard work.

I and many others have never run into an issue with that. It's pretty easy to tell what's a grey area.

f you like running a business with a huge uncertainty like "Will I even be able to show this to customers, let alone sell it" hanging in the air, it's for you.

I do run a business solely developing iPhone apps and there is no such uncertainty.

They still don't promise to reject an app quickly with a good reason. They'll still let unpleasant (for them) apps linger forever while their developers' businesses die.

The average approval cycle is still seven days, which has been accurate as far as I can tell through multiple submissions. The "lingering" problem was more of an issue early on, these days you pretty much don't see that anymore.

What's really changed? Apple is changing what they're doing here only because with the rise of android they've got less control over app developers

That makes no sense. Android would enter into the equation, possibly, if Apple felt a lot of developers were going over to Android away from the iPhone. But there's not been much, if any, slowdown of iOS app submissions.

Beyond enabling them by developing for their devices you're also showing you'll work with the Microsoft of the moment. Damn the industry, and open competition, I'm making money attaching myself to their locked-in users!

I don't think so. I'm working to push the industry to quality applications, I'm working to build something users will love. If we can't work ultimately to benefit users, then why even program at all? You would rather harm the users for some kind of purity test that you feel Apple cannot pass, which I think is a pretty piss-poor attitude to really advance the field of computing.

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[darkfire5252]

As a developer I don't get that vibe at all. Apple realizes the success they have enjoyed COMES from the development community, and offers a ton of stuff in support of developers. [...] There really are no "hoops" at all in application development, and honestly how can you claim there are with 250k approved apps?

As a developer, I absolutely get that vibe. Get back to me when I can code for an iPhone without buying an Apple computer. Cross-platform compilation is a non-issue, and has been for some time. If there really are some horrendous dependencies on the _entirety_ of the Apple environment that make cross-platform development impossible, the problem could be solved by providing a stripped-down virtual machine for development.

They don't offer anything like that. They don't intend to ever offer it. Apple is saying that they would rather me not spend my time developing programs which provide added value to the iPhone unless I'm willing to purchase $500 of hardware to do it... That's not "hoops" enough for you?

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[WNight]

Not just developer resources but conference video, which typically is hundreds of dollars.

Seems if they're putting the video up at all it'd be easier to do it without access controls. No, I can't see how that's some great freebie.

And there's lots of other material, also all provided for free, that takes a ton of effort to maintain - the equivalent to an MSDN subscription which is most certainly NOT free.

Sure it is. Every business and interested professional (anyone with an MS cert at any rate) can get a limited MSDN subscription for almost free, or free. They put a large price-tag on it to make it seem valuable.

And isn't that funny, comparing Apple to Microsoft. Quite appropriate really.

The number of publicised rejections is something like 100 (if that many!) compared to 250k apps...

Yeah, and Apple says not to whine about not being approved. How many people (correctly?) hear that as "if you talk to the media you'll never get approved"?

I and many others have never run into an issue with that. It's pretty easy to tell what's a grey area.

So you say. But other developers, including Google, say otherwise. And they provide proof of the otherwises. You offer a low number of reports as evidence that it probably isn't a big deal.

I do run a business solely developing iPhone apps and there is no such uncertainty.

If you ran a public company and said that in your disclosure statements you'd be breaking the law. There's a really large threat and an unknown risk you choose to interpret as low.

The average approval cycle is still seven days, which has been accurate as far as I can tell through multiple submissions.

Unless your experiences aren't a superset of all other developers experiences. Hmmm.

The "lingering" problem was more of an issue early on, these days you pretty much don't see that anymore.

You pretty much never saw any, so why would you see it stop?

there's not been much, if any, slowdown of iOS app submissions. [...] Again, 250k apps in the store.

That's Microsoft's game again - look at how many redundant apps we've got.

And you could do that before the provision was added... so a window of a few months where that was not allowed for app store submissions.

So there's at least a few months of a window where your business, were you unconventional enough to use a different development language, would have been disrupted. That's the threat I was referring to that you refuse to see.

I don't think so. I'm working to push the industry to quality applications, I'm working to build something users will love.

Sure. Whatever Apple says is quality at the moment.

If we can't work ultimately to benefit users, then why even program at all? You would rather harm the users for some kind of purity test that you feel Apple cannot pass, which I think is a pretty piss-poor attitude to really advance the field of computing.

Pft. 'A' for effort fanboy, but ultimately weak. How is, for instance, forcing Apple to disclose its business reasons for blocking apps harming users?

I'm just not so blind that I can't see the same arguments that applied to Microsoft apply just as well to Apple. It's not the name, it's the arbitrary treatment of the users and developers, their profit over progress attitude, and that they'll cripple a product and lock you to it.

They'll tell you they're your friends, and there'll be a lot of people like you who've merely yet to be walked on trumpeting their wonderful treatment, but as soon as anything goes wrong the users and developers are the ones getting screwed.

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[SuperKendall]

As a developer, I absolutely get that vibe. Get back to me when I can code for an iPhone without buying an Apple computer.

Would that be the same day I can run Visual Studio on my Mac?

Sure cross platform stuff has been around for a while, but it takes a lot of work to build a development toolset and I don't begrudge them wanting to only do that for one platform.

It's not like you don't have to have a computer anyway, what's the big deal if it happens to be a Mac? You can still run Windows or Linux on it if you like.

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[WNight]

I didn't bother to read the rest of your response; I'll summarize all of it by stating you're very probably wrong in each particular and leaving the exact details as an exercise to far better informed readers than yourself.

As is customary I give you the last response since Apple Haters never cease talking no matter how far they end up digging a hole in their technical rep.

No, of course you didn't. You certainly didn't read it, fail to answer the points and run away.

You of course have an awesome answer to how you hand-wave away the risk that Apple just stalls your next project. I'm sure the problem is just that by now the post isn't wide enough to contain your wisdom.

Except you have to have access controls around video to limit it to registered developers - Doh! On your part there.

Except if you didn't limit it to developers you wouldn't need access controls. Doh, to you.

Yes, I can tell you're not a developer at all since you have no appreciation for SDK documentation and help. Wallowing in your own ignorance and proclaiming it good is hardly healthy I would say.

Do they want developers or not? I have no appreciation for a company that charges for development tools unless they include hardware.

Once they've had that developer's conference and recorded the video, and put it on the web, why can't they go that extra little bit and make it available to everyone?

Re:Not seeing the attitude you see

[WNight]

Not in the slightest. What's an argument to you kid? Shaking your user IDs at each other while shouting "Nuh uh"? Points are raised, answered, dissected. Claims are made, and tested. He can be the illustrious whatever he wants but if he dodges the issue he's proven nothing.

I'm not challenging him on the iOS build environment, or his UI design skills. I'm discussing issues other developers have that he, by his very admission, has never seen and has heard very little about.

I'm bringing up questions from the news: "this uncertainty, what if it happened to you?"

He on the other hand is saying quite plainly that that never happened and besides, stopped sometime last year, but that reports are largely fabricated.

I see risk. A company I worked for recently was building a PBX and one of the risks they had to disclose to investors, and they weren't even publicly traded yet, was that the whole system simply wouldn't get through regulatory testing despite otherwise working. And this is government regulatory testing at an independent lab, not Apple's totally opaque approval process.

I see that risk here. If you wrote an app, and as a programmer about half of what I write is small dev tweaks - I assume others are similar, that DID step on Apple's toes, what then? I don't see any clear guidelines on exactly what is not allowed. What I do see is Apple sitting on things for months, refusing to say anything, threatening and punishing those who speak out (though being swayed back again by intense PR), but never actually giving a firm reason that you can work with because they don't want to appear to everyone else to be hostile to development.

Instead of talking about the risk and how to avoid it he sidestepped the issue and talked about all the apps that do get approved - as if the trivial approval process for yet another pedometer, or calculator, is in any way related to what goes on when Apple plays rough. It's as if I asked a question about how many people get mugged and the city PR person says "Over a million people safely enjoy our city every day." A total non-answer.

And as for the dev sessions, I simply disagree. They charge to see the presentation in person because seats are limited because of your chance to see people but the video of the presentations are never comparatively useful. Once you get past the extra time spent on introductions and chatter you've still got to slog along at their pace. Far more useful at that point, in a strict sense, is if they've summarized the talk and given the demo code. The video is more about seeing other developers, "meeting" the personalities, and community building. Not useless, but not something the developer should be paying for - it's Apple's community - dev's already bought in with their phones. And especially since it could reach a wider audience if it were open.

But then there's the thing... Charge for something, keep some people out, and you've made it more precious to some others. They could make the dev tools free, to support kids who want to get into it, as I myself started coding on an Apple 2+ long before I could have afforded dev tools. But they don't. It costs them more to host the video with access controls rather than simply make it available, but they feel that barrier is necessary. Why?

Re:Flash on android

[mr100percent]

Probably because of the many youtube videos showing awful flash performance on mobile phones.

Are you sure? I see iPhone contacts in screen shot

[SuperKendall]

Looks like the app is using the iPhone contacts to me... (or at least includes them in addition to supporting toktumi contacts).

Re:Too Little, Too Late

[BasilBrush]

Its the Apple IIe all over again.

After all an 11 year lifespan means that product must have just sucked. Too bad they just settled for that and didn't go on and make the Mac.

After wrestling with itunes and the restrictive nature of the iOS, users are getting more advanced and realizing that the iPhone isn't the only answer out there.

Given that the iPhone has never been close to the market leader, the users already knew that.

Re:Flash on android

[mlts]

Apple also might not have the resources to support another language. Objective-C is essentially Apple's (Well, technically NeXT's) baby, so if Apple decides to make a language change, it is their decision, and theirs alone. If Apple wanted to start using BEGIN and END statements a la Pascal in the next objective-c release, they can and nobody can tell them otherwise.

By absorbing Flash and making it a supported language, Apple would either have to walk lock-step behind Adobe with every change they do to ActionScript, or fork and have a version that "mostly" works, forcing developers to have to make sure they don't do something that isn't supported, or may cause a crash or incompatibilities later on.

Instead, what would seriously sell would be the ability to take Java bytecode made to run in the Dalvik VM for Android, and convert that into Objective-C source code. Of course, this is a lot harder than it sounds, but if someone is able to make a tool like this where software companies can have essentially one code base for Android and iOS, it would rake in the cash big time.

Prior case

[SuperKendall]

That explains all the fart applications.

As Apple even said in its app store submission guidelines, they have "enough" fart apps (one could argue zero is the right number). So the thing about Flash compilation is that it comes into a world where there are already a ton of these small semi-pointless applications, yet it makes it all too easy to make more of them for even novice developers... so Apple is saying "sure you can use Flash, but don't expect to be able to do dirt-simple applications going forward because they have been done".

Depends on what affects bottom line

[SuperKendall]

I'm trying in vain to find where they admitted they were wrong. All I see is "we listened to our developers,"

That and changing the clause so dramatically is saying they were wrong.

which is nothing more than a nice way of saying "we think this is beginning to hurt our bottom line"

That's your interpretation, but it rests on the restrictions "affecting the bottom line". But did it?

I would assert it did not. During the period the clause was in place there was no slowing of app store submissions, nor were there problems getting a ton of iPad specific applications submitted. In fact in no way does disallowing submissions created via alternate toolchains hinder Apple's bottom line, while allowing them poses somewhat of a danger as you noted about intermediate layers and lots of apps potentially failing at once. But it seems Apple though developer demand was sufficient to allow this in the general case, very probably driven by the needs of game developers who rely heavily on these intermediate platforms.

But trying to frame it as some sort of benevolence instead of ANOTHER self-serving action

You'd have to make more of a case for why it was actually hurting Apple in any way other than developer goodwill (which is important but even there was a smallish segment of the developer base).

Because I see more downsides than positive aspects of this change for Apple, to me it appears more altruistic than self-serving (and possibly done only to increase developer goodwill). Apple did not have to make this change as they would have kept having quite a lot of applications flowing through the pipeline as it was.

Re:Are you sure? I see iPhone contacts in screen s

[Just Some Guy]

It uses them alongside their own contact list. A given contact can be in either or both lists. If that were the distinguishing characteristic, it seems like that would be easy enough to handle in a Google Voice app.

It would but they didn't want to change it

[SuperKendall]

It uses them alongside their own contact list. A given contact can be in either or both lists. If that were the distinguishing characteristic, it seems like that would be easy enough to handle in a Google Voice app.

Apple said they'd be willing to work with Google to make the changes that would get the app accepted But Google instead opted for the web app path... in part because Google also has the desire to have you use Google for contacts, not your local phone. So they would rather have you using an app that doesn't present local contacts at all.

There are two powerful forces of will at work in that story.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[cowscows]

Yes. Steve Jobs should personally write a letter of apology to every single person who has complained about the App Store anywhere on the internet. He must apologize and also thank me for my wise business advice. And I want this letter to be personalized, and handwritten on real paper, none of the this bulk email nonsense. Also if he'd send me a free laptop, that'd be great too.

Re:Flash on android

[grumpyman]

User experience is definitely paramount to iPhone success but I think the real issue is about app store revenue.

Bigger Story: Dynamic linking and (L)GPL allowed

[dottrap]

This post on the SDL mailing list thinks dynamic linking is now allowed opening the door for LGPL and even GPL in commercial projects on the devices. http://forums.libsdl.org/viewtopic.php?t=6549

Re:Too Little, Too Late

[osu-neko]

Its the Apple IIe all over again. The company got cocky, started abusing their market domination with laziness, and now they are in deep sh*t.

If "deep sh*t" is the condition that 99% of companies wish they were in, then yes, you are correct.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[MarkCollette]

I like buying apps where I have some kind of guarantee they're not trojans.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[WNight]

What if the Java or Ruby code spends most of its time in library calls and so runs at the speed of a native app? And what if someone writes bubble-sort in that blazing fast Lua?

Your rules of thumb belong, with your thumb, up your ass.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[WNight]

I'd rather deal with someone who didn't act like a jerk right up until the end when they pull a Eurasia/Oceania switch and pretend they were pro-developer all along.

What every free market libertarian fails to recognize is that they don't want a free market. They want a very controlled market where the people being fucked around by those companies can't just pitch a torch through their window and burn them down like you'd remove dangerous wasps. They're very delusional people.

Incorrect

[Chibi Merrow]

There's only one party to place the blame on for Orange Box being as unmaintained as it is, and that is Valve.

"While the Windows and Xbox 360 versions of The Orange Box were developed and published by Valve, the development of the PlayStation 3 port was outsourced to Electronic Arts."

Try again...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_Box#PlayStation_3_version

Re:Are you sure? I see iPhone contacts in screen s

[WNight]

So where is Apple's helpful feedback saying "Simply include the iPhone contacts in your list and we'll approve your app?"

If there was a problem, any real problem, they'd have told Google what it was so that they could fix the software or work around it.

The problem is that they'll walk all over any developer they feel is getting too close to them, or a feature Jobs feels proprietary about. There's no objective user or developer benefit behind any of their decisions. Any time there's innovation that threatens Apple's stranglehold on something they'll do their best to strangle it. If fortune smiles your app sails through, if not it's just lost for no stated reason and nothing but tons of bad PR will ever sway them.

The problem is that Google Voice shows how the specific phone/device doesn't matter any more than the specific PC you do a search from does, the network can route to you. Those fancy iPhone apps won't follow you? Ohhh, burn. And so Apple can't allow it.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[UseCase]

mod +1

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[Altrag]

And no one's stopping you from doing just that.

Its up to you whether or not you want to ignore the entire iPhone/iTouch/iPad market. If you don't care about those markets (or are developing free-as-in-beer software and don't really care about ANY markets) well, nobody's FORCING you to write iPhone apps. Or Wii apps, or PS3 apps, or apps for any other specific system -- closed or otherwise. Heck you could completely remove yourself from all restrictions and just not develop anything.

Other people like to get paid for their work though, and ignoring a huge market just because you don't like one company's decision is a pretty tough thing to do (even moreso if the "developer" is large enough that the marketing team and directors aren't also the programmers -- the marketing people don't really give a rat's behind if you'd prefer to use Java instead of ObjC -- you do what you're told or they'll find someone who will).

Doing well thanks!

[SuperKendall]

But...anyone on this website will know that you are an apple fanboy

I am at times an advocate for the company, mostly because I enjoy the design philosophy they have but also because someone on this earth has to speak out for common sense, good engineering, and against blind hatred. It might as well be me even though some people seem to bitterly hate Apple and attack any who dare speak well of them. If you're pleasing everyone, you're doing something wrong.

and a particularly tiresome one at that

Which means you are tired of me, which means I am once again painfully (for you) on target in dismissing Hater complaints. Thanks for the feedback!

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[WNight]

You were the one who chose to interpret that as Java being slow.

Knowing what the anti-VM crowd harp on is different than choosing to interpret it.

Ruby interoping with native libraries is cheating.

Yeah sure. A well written program spends as much time in native libraries as possible.

Games programmers actually profile their code

If you do, Bethesda has a role you because they sure as hell don't. Oblivion spends most of its time comparing strings. Or maybe they just optimized that strcmp really well.

Re:Flash on android

[__aapspi39]

I've seen quite a bit of evidence to suggest that Flash video runs fine on Android ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stW8gS6rBvg & http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cb9jfdltkUU ) and I don't have any problems myself - so the youtube tests showing awful Flash performance would have to be entirely disregarded.

Unless their phones are faulty - the simplest explanation is that there are some idiots out there with an axe to grind on this issue - something it would be quite difficult to argue against.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[jo42]

Didn't Steve Jobs make a big hullabaloo about how "intermediate layers between the platform and the developer ultimately produces sub-standard apps and hinders the progress of the platform"[1] when asked about the rule? So is that magically no longer true, or do they just no longer care? Or is it, perhaps, that their transparently self-serving reasoning for instituting the rule in the first place has started to cost them more than it gains?

All current iDevices now have an A4 CPU/GPU in them - as in they are now fast enough to run crappy code fast enough for people not to notice (too much). Of course, this will open the flood gates to Crapps and then people will bitch about how slow they are and how fast the battery drains. Damned if they do, damned if they don't Apple is.

Of course

[bar-agent]

I expected them to back down on that requirement as soon as I heard about it. It was rank idiocy to begin with, not least because it was unenforceable and a bad PR move. I'd be surprised if anyone actually paid attention to it.

Apple Relaxes iOS Development Tool Restrictions

[falconwolf]

Apple's App Store Guidelines Don't Change Anything

Falcon

gatekeeper

[falconwolf]

The fact that windows does not have a central update system and every app has to do their own update mechanism is a bad thing of windows.

No, it's a good thing, you don't have a single gatekeeper deciding what can be installed. While a gatekeeper may work for some people many others want to be able to install whatever. While it's obvious many people love iPhones and iPads, if I ever get a smart phone or tablet it's likely to run Android. Well, I'd like to get a tablet like the Modbook Pro, however it runs OSX not the crippled iOS.

Falcon

huh?

[josepha48]

this /. post makes no sense. no downloading code? so no embedding a web browser in a ui that downloads javascript code? Did /. f this up and misunderstand again? Sorry I'm not an apple developer, so I'm not reading their license

Awesome!

[greggman]

Now if they'll relax a few more I might actually buy an iPhone again.

Specifically. Let other music app/stores exist. I want Amazon to be able to download songs directly, not only iTMS. I also want to be able to subscribe to podcasts on my iPhone. I shouldn't have to plug it in to desktop iTunes for that.

Finally, let me read the memory as a USB drive for all data so I can copy music, pdfs, videos, pictures and other stuff on/off the phone without iTunes. Apple doesn't have to add this to iOS they just have to allow apps that make it possible.

Well, here's hoping.

What's wrong with issuing an update?

[SuperKendall]

But then again, I believe iphone gaming is a fad. Apple are too hostile to game companies who want to be able to update their own code

Again, they can simply release a software update through Apple. It's really not like that's as time critical as a potential game crack is...

You think updates for games delivered via PSN do not see any Sony double-checking? Or any other platforms? Dream on.

And if you think iOS gaming at this point is a fad, you REALLY haven't been paying attention to what is going on in this space! Apple is supporting game makers big-time now, and I'm not sure there are any major independent game companies now who have not got a number of iPhone or iPad projects going. Nor have you seen the latest Unreal Engine tech demo...

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[WNight]

It's been established that the Ruby interpreter has been slower than most other interpreters. This was the regrettable case when I used Ruby last. I would be excited to learn that it has improved recently.

I'm sure it's always improving in some ways, but overall, no. And it seems generally accepted that it'll be that way - the syntax is more complex than usual, etc. And the community seems fairly willing, as a whole, to write C to work around the issue.

I simply think that the Ruby compiler issues are unfortunate

Really? Well, I guess you're in something where every percent counts, but I've never found a practical difference, I'm always IO bound, algorithm bound, etc. Whenever I get past inefficient algorithms and down to the last little speed difference I can always get more out by optimizing the rest of the problem, caching, etc, than rewriting in C. (Though I'm not massively C proficient.)

Though there are horrid counter-examples, like trying to write a game cheater that watched a large number of addresses and imported their values into irb. That got a bit slow when evaling a ton of things into various bindings and would have been much-better handled at a lower level.

Scripting engines do tend to make an incredible amount of comparisons.

And doing them with strings. Ouch. This is the sort of stuff I always find though, low-hanging fruit that vastly outweighs the general parsing costs.

Apple: Apple Relaxes iOS Development Tool Restrict

[milanmall]

i can't use iphone4 to make order online on replica hanbdags wholesale website www.milanmall.com ,also can't visit www.idoebay.com

There is a very simple explanation to this...

[awjr]

The FTC investigation would only need to insist Apple play by the rules and remove all apps that were not written only in Objective C.

You would probably lose 99% of the games on the store.

Seems to be a very volatile license..

[Seth Kriticos]

How long will it take until they change it again, 2 months? I'm not exactly sure developers rejoice in such a dynamic legal landscape. Can't they just work it out right one time and stick to it?

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[MikeBabcock]

That guarantee (which I can't find in Apple's store details anywhere) has nothing to do with the restrictions I eschew.

Re:What other company even backpedals...

[MikeBabcock]

I'm pretty sure you just said "Nobody's forcing me to do something I don't want to do but if I were someone else I might prefer to do otherwise."

In other words, you didn't actually respond to my point at all. I expressed a preference in terms of platform restrictions both as a user and a developer. That preference does not change what I sometimes must do, but it does change whether I like doing it, and whether I'll make a fuss about it.

That fuss got this change made, and hopefully more people making a fuss about systems they don't like will keep getting other good changes made.

Telling people they need to put up with the status quo to make money is pointless. Some people actually bother trying to make the system better.

Re:Flash on android

[__aapspi39]

I didn't say anyone was dumb. When i referred to idiots i was talking about fanboys that might deliberately introduce bias into their test.

The point is that if I've seen evidence that something works (youtube vids) and i also have direct personal evidence that it works (my own experience) then when someone suggests that this something does not work then i will tend not to believe them, and will question whether they are testing in a fair way.

Let me know if this is clear or i can rustle up a car analogy for you :)