We're trying to decide between these two services for an upcoming beta. The new TestFlight looks much improved but we are still concerned about 3 things:
The user experience for testers (iTunes reviews of the TestFlight app imply this can be confusing)
The possibility of rejection or delay by apple when reviewing our beta releases.
Limited to IOS8
Hockey, on the other hand, seems to have a better tester UX. It supports multiple OS versions. And of course, no review is required.
The downside with Hockey seems to be a limit of 100 devices: http://support.hockeyapp.net/kb/client-integration-ios-mac-os-x/adding-new-devices-to-your-provisioning-profile
Here's our comparison grid: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CuYlsLsZPW-79hEre7jLppfwQpG4WmW3fDvHvIJ86wY/edit#gid=0
Would appreciate any feedback.
We've been beta testing our App via both HockeyApp and Apple's new Testflight within the last few weeks as well. I would recommend using both in parallel and seeing the pros and cons for yourself and from there you can choose one over the other. Here are our insights from the last few weeks:
HockeyApp Pros:
no need for an approval process
quick upload of new versions while maintaining access to old versions
HockeyApp Cons:
requires a bit more work to initially set up each beta tester (need
to have their device registered with HockeyApp so that you can
register their UDID with a provisioning profile and then a new
archived build needs to be uploaded to HockeyApp containing that
updated provisioning profile)
Only 100 tester slots (although unless you're really close to app store submission, you probably don't even need 100 spots)
TestFlight Pros:
Don't have to deal with UDID or provisioning profiles, strictly
emails only
1000 10000 slots
Now includes sharing of public links, so that other testers outside your organisation can use to download your beta builds.
Beta Approval process is pretty short (1.5 days for us)
TestFlight Cons:
Need iOS 8 to install TestFlight
Only 25 internal tester slots
Only can have one active build at a time Now supports having multiple active builds
Related
My Apple Dev account says : "Your Apple Developer Program membership has expired." I can run my xcode projects on my real world iPhone.
I have build an App that should be running on several friends iPhones (different versions, iOS´s etc)for testing in the next time.
So, is it necessary to have a paid dev Account for testing on several devices of other persons/accounts? Maybe that my Apple ID allows the access to my iPhone only without a membership. How long will the test apps be running?
THX
So, is it necessary to have a paid dev Account for testing on several devices of other persons/accounts?
Yes. The ability to run on a device is exactly what a paid account gets you. A free account lets you run on your own device, but only under very limited circumstances; it is intended as just a way of seeing what iOS development is like.
How long will the test apps be running?
Hard to say, but you'll find out soon enough. Probably only three or four days, would be my guess.
The correct strategy for distributing apps to your friends' devices is (1) get a paid membership, and (2) create Ad Hoc builds or a TestFlight build.
Anyone know when the annual development device limit of 100 for Apple gets reset? Given that in each app development there can be a need to deploy up to 10 to 20 test devices it seems like its pretty easy to bump into this limit over the course of a year.
Only when you renew your developer account you can reset the devices.
How do I reset my list of iOS development devices in the iOS
Provisioning Portal?
At the start of your new membership year, Team Agents or Admins can
sign in to the iOS Provsioning Portal to remove listed devices and
restore the available device count to 100 devices. Be sure to remove
all devices you no longer use for development prior to adding any new
devices.
from apple support articles
You can reset the set of of devices yourself once every 12 months.
So, if you get to 99 devices, you can reset it and clear out the existing list of devices, and then that's it for another 12 months.
This seems like quite a low limit (and one that I'm running into).
The problem is that resetting the list [presumably] invalidates existing ad-hoc provisioning, so existing beta testers would need to be re-added and update their Beta installations.
Not ideal, imo.
I'm making an iOS app for a client, and need to share my progress with them in a convenient way.
At the moment I know of two options:
add their device to my provisioning profile then send an IPA to them
send an app through to them, built for the simulator, and have them run that directly
Neither of these are ideal, as the simulator doesn't give the full experience, and getting UDIDs off non-technical people can be painful.
Are there any other options I should know about?
I use testflight - iOS beta testing on the fly. I used to battle with the same problems you mentioned but once I started using testflight, I didn't look back. What testflight allows is -
You can add the specific customer to send the IPA to.
Progress reports
No need for your customer to go through the complicated Provisioning certificate
No need to register your device
You can even create groups and send different builds to different groups. Like "Test Group" would get more bleeding edge builds whereas the customers might get a more stable build.
Free over-the-air beta distribution. Apps are installed in one tap over-the-air and users will be notified of future builds.
Recruitment: Promote your beta app and select new users that sign up
Works within Apple’s guidelines and rules for ad hoc provisioning and device # limitations
You don’t need to jailbreak or alter your phone.
It is not a replacement for Apple’s ad hoc provisioning profile and device limitations.
Hope this helps...
PS: I do not work at testflight & this is not a promo. Just appreciating a good product...
UPDATE: Recently test flight has launched TestFlight Live, pretty awesome for tracking launched apps. This is all with detailed flowcharts et al. Definitely worth a dekko. Defunct after Apple buying TestFlight (or available in different name)
LATER UPDATE: Apple has bought TestFlight. Links updated.
https://testflightapp.com takes a lot of the pain out of circulating iOS app builds. It's free and it's worked very well for me.
I have a beta application that I want to show to 100+ people and I can't figure out how I can do it without the app store. The thing is with the app store it's a beta. In the app it has pages that do nothing because I want to show the people what I'm working on next.
What adds to the problem is that the application is Push notification enabled.
I'm guessing if I sent the files of the code that the certificates would change because they would have to make a new provisioning cert.
http://testflightapp.com is a great tool for distributing beta tests. As for the 100+, it will only support 100 a year as per Apple's ad-hoc constraint, up to 200 devices. To test with more people, you'll need to sign the app again with another developer account and distribute to a second list. Other options include enterprise deployment or having some testers build and deploy for themselves, signing with their own developer account.
I want to build an application for the iPhone to be used inside a customer enterprise (very small, only 5 to 10 devices). But since they will be paying the application development, I don't want to distribute that application to the world inside the App Store in iTunes. How can I distribute this app to my customer? Should I get the Enterprise level subscription from the Apple Developer Program? Since I work as a freelancer, I think I can't subscribe to that program.
You should have the client purchase the Enterprise subscription.
The alternative, since there are only a few devices, is to regularly provide provisioning profiles for all devices. This sounds like a huge hassle to me. The profiles expire every 3 months last I checked, but it has changed before.
If you really want to scrape the barrel, there is also jailbreaking :)