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Can I force an iPhone user to upgrade an application?
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Closed 5 years ago.
I am about to upload my Iphone application to the apple store, however I intend to release more versions in the near future. Is there anyway to make my application auto update once I upload a new version to the apple store?. That is as I am about to upload version 1.0, once i upload version 1.x, can the user be notified of this or can the application be auto-updated?. Can anyone point me in the right direction?. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
-Oscar
No, this functionality is not available on the iPhone. The AppStore provides updates through the store only, and Cydia provides updates through Cydia only.
The direction i've seen many applications take is at start, check an XML file that you host for information on newer versions, and typically display a message to the user (preferably in a news ticker or non-obstructive manor) about a new version being released, and why they should upgrade.
You can't auto-update, however as far as I'm aware nothing prevents you from notifying the user that a new version is available, within your app. For example you could contact a web server to find out what the latest version is, and compare that to a build number in your app bundle, then display an appropriate alert/notification to the user. Or, you could get fancy and use the 3.0 push notifications for this.
In theory the appstore app/itunes will do this anyway, but it's clear that a lot of users don't see that.
Another thing you can do using the method I outlined (that the app store won't do) is tell the users that a new version is available, what it does, and that it's waiting for apple.
Even simpler is just to embed an 'announcements' channel in your app somewhere. That lets you talk to your users without waiting for apple - you can tell them there is a new version on the way, etc. I do this with an app I'm beta testing - a button on the main screen shows announcements, which I pull from my server.
Maybe if enough app developers did this, apple would start turning the approvals around quicker. Or change the legalese to prevent it [assuming it doesn't already] :-)
This is functionality provided by the app store. When you submit new versions, after apple has approved them, they will become available through the app store as updates to users that already have the app installed.
User will see new available updates to apps he owns in iTunes. User can then choose to get the update.
I'm not sure about updates via iPhone but if you pay for data downloads you would prefer to download apps/updates over iTunes on your Mac and then sync to iPhone. It's cheaper that way.
My guess is automatic version updating is intentionally left out. Think about it: what kind of strain will they have on their server if everyone on the planet with an iPhone downloaded An update to Fruit Ninja at the same time? I think their passive notification to the users via the red circle and white number allows them to spread out/stagger the update downloads and reduce server load.
Related
The app has a different bundle identifier and the old app is not enable for push notifications. We want to update the old app with one screen and a button that sends the users to the app store to download the new app. Will Apple even approve that? Any ideas on a better way to do it?
If it has a different bundle id it's probably possible. I've seen many apps doing this. For example free apps! They seduce the users with new features to buy the full app. So it wont be a problem to connect both apps via link to itunes. If you use Push N be sure to set up all correctly. My idea is to set the old one to a free app and connect them. And why dont you make the budles the same? Like a normal update?
We had to do something similar when an App we developed needed to change from our account to our customer's account (to comply with their internal brand standards). We updated the old app to say "We've Moved." and had a link to the itms: for the new version. We did let the user dismiss the notice and keep using the old version, though.
I'm sure they'll approve it if you let the user put off upgrading. Maybe not if you force them to upgrade as you suggested in your question.
After making an update to an iPad app I released some time ago, I've been getting reports that people are unable to actually update the app without deleting and re-installing. However, as far as I know, nothing in the update should be causing this. (All the update deals with is letting people email PDF documents, nothing major.) When people attempt to update, they're asked for their iTunes password, but after entering it, it merely goes back to the update screen and nothing happens. Additionally, it would seem that this only happens with my app, the people in question aren't having any issues with the other various apps on the App Store. Does anyone know what might be causing this and how I could fix it?
Thanks in advance!
(Also, if it matters, the app is a custom B2B app, the general public can't purchase it.)
I'm removing the text of my answer because it's so inaccurate it's embarrassing. I mistook "B2B" for "Enterprise" and answered based off of that. To make up for it, I'll look into the problem a bit more and if I find anything I will edit this answer accordingly.
Edit:
Okay, I can see why you put a bounty for this question on SO; there's not really any data on a problem like this anywhere. Frankly, there's not much available information on B2B in general. I'll post what I found anyway, in case it can be of any help to you.
I found the details reason behind Maggie's question, there. Per Editing and Updating App Information:
Updates keep the same Apple ID and bundle ID, which means they are
associated with your first version and free to your customers
Also, apparently, "You can't change the CFBundleIdentifier of a released app if you want to release updates for it, the App Store will automatically reject it when you upload." which is something I can vouch for, having experienced this with a normal app. I do know that for a B2B app you do have to submit it to Apple for review, but I can't tell from the documentation I found if you need to actually submit it to the App Store, so it may not go through the various checks that normal apps go through, so this could be your problem.
Aside from that, according to the VPP guide, if your customers are installing the apps on the devices with Apple Configurator (broken right now, per app store reviews) the updates also have to be done with the Configurator. You haven't said that Configurator was involved, but I did find this tidbit.
• Use Apple Configurator to install apps on new or supervised devices.
Apple Configurator on a Mac makes it easy to mass configure and deploy
devices that are centrally controlled. Redemption code spreadsheets
acquired through the Volume Purchase Program can be imported by Apple
Configurator, tracking the number of apps installed on each device. To
update deployed apps using Apple Configurator, you must reconnect to
the same Mac from which the apps were installed. Learn more at
itunes.apple.com/us/app/apple-configurator
Anyway, good luck. Wish I could be more help.
What you are describing (assuming that it is accurate) would certainly be a bug on Apple's side. If users are trying to update the app and the update is not being processed, then in one way or another that is a bug that Apple needs to address. Nothing that you do as a developer should be able to cause that situation to happen. I would suggest contacting Apple and possibly filing a bug report.
It seems that apple wants you to develop the Iphone apps in the latest build. Sometimes this cause issues between realeases (diferent versions of Itunes, OSX, IOS, etc) when you try to update your apps.
Try to publish the app in the latest version of xcode.
That happens a lot in iphone development testing.
Hope this help.
When updating an app, iOS looks for the bundleId and if there is another app with the same bundleId, it updates the app with the highest version number. Maybe the version number is not set correctly or maybe people have issues because an other app (from the AppStore or an other B2B app) have the same bundleID but a higher version number.
I'm by far not an iPhone expert, but it seems something related might have been fixed in iOS 6.0.1.
Fixes a bug that prevents iPhone 5 from installing software updates
wirelessly over the air
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When my iPhone application start, I want to notify the user if there is a new updates / version released on App store.
Does anybody have any ideas or has anybody else achieved anything similar?
Thanks
Use Nick Lockwood's iVersion library. It's whole purpose is to notify the user when new updates are available.
iVersion is a library for dynamically checking for updates to Mac/iPhone App Store apps from within the application and notifying users about the new release. It can also notify users about new features in the app the first time they launch after an upgrade.
Purpose:
The Mac and iOS App Store update mechanism is somewhat cumbersome and disconnected from the apps themselves. Users often fail to notice when new versions of an app are released, and if they do notice, the App Store's "download all" option means that users often won't see the release notes for the new versions of each of their apps.
Whilst it is not permitted to update an App Store app from within the app itself, there is no reason why an app should not inform the user that the new release is ready, and direct them to the App Store to download the update.
And if your app is not on the App Store, either because it's an in-house/enterprise iOS app, or a Mac app delivered to customers outside of the store, you can't use the App Store update mechanism anyway.
iVersion is a simple, zero-config class to allow iPhone and Mac App Store apps to automatically check for updates and inform the user about new features.
iVersion automatically detects when the new version of an app is released on the App Store and informs the user with a helpful alert that links them directly to the app download page.
Or if your app is not on the store, iVersion lets you specify a remote plist file to check for new releases, and a download URL where users can get the latest release.
iVersion has an additional function, which is to tell users about important new features when they first run an app after downloading a new version.
These excerpts were taken from the Github page here, where you can download it. There is also a comprehensive tutorial on installing and configuring iVersion, so I recommend that you check it out.
Hope this helps!
To give a comprehensive answer. There are basically two ways you can go here. Depends on where you want to put the responsibility.
App checks for new versions on server
Using this approach, you would add a method to your app that is being called on every launch to compare the current version of the app (wherever you want to save that) with the version stored on the server. To achieve this, the server must implement a small web service that returns the latest version as a string or something else very simple. No rocket science there.
Server pushes new version information to app
This way you implement more code on the server-side to do a Push Notification to your app which informs the app about the new version. Advantage here is: Less client-side code and less effort to check, because the version check does not happen every time the app is started but instead only once the new version is actually released.
you can do a call to your server when the app starts.
and that way check for a news item in your database, for example.
When the server gives you something. show it in an alert.
On the other hand, when there is an update in the appstore, doesn't the iphone give a warning?
APNS - Apple Push Notification System
Try it and google for ready server solutions.
Update: Okay, lets get it longer -
APNS is the best way to inform user about something new. It works with every state of the app - even when app closed - and it helps to avoid unnecessary requests to server.
But you will need server to send pushes - if you can write it by yourself - it's nice, but the are some services to create backend for your app (no links - no ads, just google it).
To find out how to start with APNS on the client side and how to create all needed certificates and keys read this one
Just check the latest version by communicating with your server and compare with the current version of app when the app starts up, if there is a newer version, notify the user.
Apologies in advance for the plug - but I think a service I built extending the concept from my experience building many apps solves this problem. Look at CleverStork - an Update Manager for Apps
There is something known as Silent notifications from iOS 7 and above, you can use that for
this
This link shows a video where an app upgrade is "forced" from within the app itself:
http://buzzworks.de/blog/update-ios-beta-apps-from-within-the-app
The App Store is not called in and it's said to work only for AdHoc
apps.
Anyone knows how is this possible?
edit: please give a look to the video before answering. AdHoc apps are signed by the developer and they do not come from the App Store. This sort of forced update is useful when doing beta testing and in enterprise applications.
I've found that it's all explained here:
http://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/featuredarticles/FA_Wireless_Enterprise_App_Distribution/Introduction/Introduction.html
The developer should create an .ipa with the app and a manifest in plist format with the URL to the .ipa and a few other things.
The app can optionally implement its own way to find if an update is available and open
the URL to the manifest.
I didn't it's really possible because the app has to somehow sign itself. The best I can think of right now is that the app is not signed?
You can always force people to go to the app store when a new version is out. Simply make the app connect to a webservice first. Other solutions are not accepted by Apple, or will quite simply not work because of other issues (signing is one of many).
You could also design your app in such a way that forced updates are never a requirement. You can load your user interfaces from the web (Apple has presented some valuable information about that during the previous WWDC), your data can come from the web, and if there is any other correction to do just ensure your app is backwards compatible.
That's how the app store works. And it never requires a 'forced update' ... Well, almost never ;-)
If my company is a member of the Enterprise program where we can distribute apps internally for any number of users is there a good way to handle app updates? Everything I see on installing such apps is saying I have to send the .app and a profile to the end users for them to add to iTunes and then sync their device to install. Is there any way to have the user's computer or device know when I have an update to the app available or do I just have to redistribute the app file manually again and hope for everyone to update manually?
Although you can update configuration profiles over-the-air, it doesn’t appear that you can do this. Your best bet would be to implement a notification in your app when it starts to tell the users to upgrade. See the Enterprise Deployment Guide [PDF].
It might be a little late to answer this, but I'm facing the exact same problem.
After spending some time looking for a solution we've come to the conclusion that this can be done in two ways:
You can achieve a lot of things with a Mobile Device Management (MDM) server. You can force installation of applications, and perhaps this can work if you want to update. You can collect information on what version the app is running, and then perhaps directly target users with outdated versions of the app: http://images.apple.com/iphone/business/docs/iOS_MDM.pdf I don't have access to an MDM, so I haven't tried this out.
Finally, build in some kind of deprecation functionality that tells the user to update. This is what apple recommends ( http://help.apple.com/iosdeployment-apps/#app43ad802c ) (and the solution we are going for).