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The Subtle Developer Exodus From the Mac App Store
An anonymous reader writes: Milen Dzhumerov, a software developer for OS X and iOS, has posted a concise breakdown of the problems with the Mac App Store. He says the lack of support for trial software and upgrades drives developers away by preventing them from making a living. Forced sandboxing kills many applications before they get started, and the review system isn't helpful to anyone. Dzhumerov says all of these factors, and Apple's unwillingness to address them, are leading to the slow but steady erosion of quality software in the Mac App Store.
"The relationship between consumers and developers is symbiotic, one cannot exist without the other. If the Mac App Store is a hostile environment for developers, we are going to end up in a situation where, either software will not be supported anymore or even worse, won't be made at all. And the result is the same the other way around – if there are no consumers, businesses would go bankrupt and no software will be made. The Mac App Store can be work in ways that's beneficial to both developers and consumers alike, it doesn't have to be one or the other. If the MAS is harmful to either developers or consumers, in the long term, it will be inevitably harmful to both."
"The relationship between consumers and developers is symbiotic, one cannot exist without the other. If the Mac App Store is a hostile environment for developers, we are going to end up in a situation where, either software will not be supported anymore or even worse, won't be made at all. And the result is the same the other way around – if there are no consumers, businesses would go bankrupt and no software will be made. The Mac App Store can be work in ways that's beneficial to both developers and consumers alike, it doesn't have to be one or the other. If the MAS is harmful to either developers or consumers, in the long term, it will be inevitably harmful to both."
This story isn't about the iOS version of the App Store, it's about the Mac OS X version.
Either way, it doesn't surprise me much. When I want a Mac version of an App, I just Google the product name and download the .dmg file from the vendor's download site.
The developers probably like it better that way anyway, since they don't have to wait for Apple to review product updates before they are posted AND they aren't giving Apple a 30% cut of any sales if I decide to buy it after the trial is up.
You do realize that iOS app store and the Mac app store are two different things, right? This article is about the latter.
I'm seeing a lot of comments about iOS, smartphones, Android, etc. This article is about the Mac app store (for OSX, NOT iOS).
Or as at the end of Spaceballs, "Oh sh*t, there goes the neighborhood."
Actually, it's "Oh sh*t, there goes the planet."
I have a Surface 2, and I really like the trial option that MS worked into their store. Apps can be time limited, feature limited, or have many other limitations. With Android apps, it's usually possible to trick the trial version of the app into giving you a longer trial by uninstalling and then reinstalling the trial app. The way MS has designed it, once you've tried an app, you're no longer eligible for the trial. You can either purchase it or uninstall it, but there's no way to revert the trial back and get the functionality back. It allows apps to give you a full trial with all functionality, without having to worry about people cheating the system and getting the entire app for free.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
I've had an iPhone and I will happily choose not to swim in the Kool-Aid.
The Apple store has the same problems as the Android store. Apple has no real advantage in this regard. People that think they do are just stupid fanboys kidding themselves.
Your chosen consumer brand fixation is not a special unique snowflake.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
they are manifestly unsuited to it.
I wouldn't necessarily go that far. I support both professionally, and there are certainly things about Windows that are easier. For example, Windows domains provide a lot of great tools. Microsoft Office is much better on Windows than on Macs.
But then there are some ways in which I've generally found easier on Macs than on PCs. They're all unixy, really. They come from the factory supporting php, perl, ruby, and bash. Imaging Macs isn't much harder than copying the contents of a bootable disk, and then running a command to make the disk bootable. There's no activation to for Apple's OS or apps. Many of the application install/uninstall consists of drag-and-drop (or just using a script to copy a directory in place). A lot of the configuration is stored in text files. The support is generally pretty damned good. And there *are* actually administrative tools that work pretty well, once you dig into it.
What sales goals do you have if you are worried about a $600 instment?
Well, if you're just "looking into" app development, then that's a barrier. With android, you can "look into" it more or less for free. Then maybe get interested, then hey presto you have an app.
sure if you already have a business plan and money, the nputting $800 of that into kit is a drop in the ocean.
As for me, I'm never even going to bother looking at iOS app development because I don't want to burn $800 on a computer I won't enjoy using much and then have to use the wretched thing.
It doesn't stop business plans, but it does stop the causal developer. Casual developers are what serious deelopers come from.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Come on. There have been bugfix for both regularly.
There is nothing arbitrary about it. IBM acquired Transitive in 2009 and wanted them focused on software. Transitive stopped making the Rosetta application.
That's kinda odd. How old is your pro and which bugfix did you desperate need?
Your points about have little to do with development.