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Apple Spin-Off Hosts Enterprise App Stores
An anonymous reader writes "Last year Apple quietly authorized private-label app stores with its OTA (over-the-air) protocol, and now an Apple spin-off is offering the first hosting service to uses OTA to create alternative app stores for iOS devices like the iPhone and iPad. One of the first is Cisco's App Fridge (for cool networking apps), but a dozen other Fortune 500 companies have also signed up. And this fall, Apperian promises to add Android apps to its service, enabling one-stop-shopping for private-label apps store hosted in the clouds. So far these store are for employees only, but by 2012 Apperian claims it will be offering alternative app stores for the rest of us."
The article is poorly written and formatted. I can't get past the first few sentences.
Apple allows other app stores? The world really will end in October!
Palm trees and 8
Apple allows other app stores? The world really will end in October!
These are enterprise apps for internal use by an organization. Enterprise apps have always been handled differently than the regular apps for consumers on the Apple App Store.
My understanding is that the organization maintains a list of device IDs allowed to use the app. They submit the list to Apple, Apple signs it, and returns the signed list as a provisioning file. The enterprise then distributes the app and the provisioning file to users, there is even a wireless method that the enterprise can set up. There is no Apple approval process for enterprise apps. I've not done an enterprise app myself but it sounds like the ad hoc distribution process used by regular developers and their testers.
http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#featuredarticles/FA_Wireless_Enterprise_App_Distribution/Introduction/Introduction.html
That was my first reaction, too. It's like it was copy & pasted out of a PDF. I wouldn't be surprised if it was a press-release originally.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
While not insignificant, I'm not sure that I would consider Apple's $99 fee to be "large"
Where I work, we (meaning the IT support people) have been dreading the rumblings of having iPhones and iPads approved for use within the company. The biggest fear was that the security folks would try to lock down the devices, and having to listen to people complaining that they couldn't load music and applications, blaming us for the resulting mess. But this would not only help us in being able to remind folks that the devices are company devices, but that instead of having to deal with iTunes on the machine, we'd have a much simpler interface to work with. From my perspective, this would be a perfect way to go. People get their iPhones, but the company can keep them secured and still provide a limited number of applications (business related) that they can utilize. And we don't have to worry about iTunes and the resulting messes that would make supporting their machines a major hassle.
Which browser are you using? I'm not having any problems here with Chrome on Fedora.
Looks fine on FF5 Windows. Either they fixed it or it's some kind of Browser specific problem.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
That is per year. For $99 a year you can buy devices that don't require rent be paid to use your own apps on them.
Looks fine on Safari 5 on Mac OS X.
That's $99 for the ordinary developer program, which gets you App Store apps as well as Ad-Hoc apps, limited to distribution to a few devices picked from a list that may only contain 100 devices per year. The Enterprise program, which gets you arbitrary distribution apps that you're only supposed to use inside your company, requires $299 and a DUNS number (some sort of business identifier) to keep the commoners out. (There used to be a prerequisite of hundreds of employees which was recently removed, so there's that.)
Hey troll, Apple never said app store was short for Apple store. Plus it could now stand for Apperian Store.
Basically, Apple tried to sell iPhones and iPads as enterprise devices. IT departments looked at them and laughed, pointing out that they need to be able to deploy custom in-house apps to them. Apple for once listened to a customer (so maybe the world really is ending) and agreed to allow in-house app stores for customer enterprise apps.
No. This is nothing new. Enterprise apps have always been distributed internally. If not from day 1 then from *very* soon afterwards. I recall having to select regular or enterprise accounts when signing up with Apple in 2008.
What may have been added in recent history, a year or so ago (?), is the wireless distribution option.
good grief, I hope you're joking.
I chose to end my comments, not with a rim shot, but a long decaying F#7sus4
Interestingly, they fixed it.... Or it's working now or something. Odd. (Firefox 3.6, OS X 10.6.8).
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Yeah, that whopping $99 dollars that might pay for half of a single phone! Such amazing savings!
And how is that an advantage over every other type of device?
Because you get to use Apple devices instead of every other device.
Especially important with the iPad, which is very robust and has excellent battery life.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apperian isn't a spinoff from Apple. It was founded by the SE director (Chuck Goldman) in the old enterprise sales group who got his ass canned for any number of things done out of sorts. In no way shape or form is this even related to Apple other than it's a product for iOS.
However, it does NOT look fine on IE5 for Windows.
What does?
about:blank?
Plenty of crappy tablets that a business could use for inventory are available at that price.
Sounds great. Maybe by the time iOS 6 gets here it'll actually be doable. http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/020711-ipad-security-how-a-hospital.html
-]Phreak Out[-
The device is fine. The speed at which they are being adopted is blinding. If you have ever worked in health care then you know this already.
Those windows apps are going to fall by the wayside faster then you can imagine. The iPad been on the market less then a year and it is taking the computing world by storm. The iPad 2 will further fuel this technology and drive it further and further into every aspect of every business. I predict that within one year that you will see your doctor charting you on one at any major medical facility and within two years you will see even small practice general practitioners using them. This is THE device for doctors.
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
http://www.apple.com/business/vpp/
Freedom for enterprise customers and trusted computing for the rest of us. Thanks Apple!
Only corporation (not people) should be entrusted will the ability to run code.
If by less than a year you mean a year and ~3 months, then yah.
-]Phreak Out[-
Wow, what a deal! You can use your savings to buy a shitty tablet that will break in a couple of months! I can't understand why businesses aren't jumping out of their seats over such a grand idea!
> Apple spin-off's ultra-secure cloud-based provisioning service Wonder what ultra-secure means.. short of "we never turn it on ;)"