5 ms·

The complaints are: $200 price to develop with 10 app limit. Multiple registration forms. Requiring multiple downloads. Requiring to purchase vmware fusion.

The complaints are: $200 price to develop with 10 app limit. Multiple registration forms. Requiring multiple downloads. Requiring to purchase vmware fusion. Installer that just copies an iso. Having to password protect the simulator. Bad documentation on how to load an app on the simulator. The comparative ease with which you can do these things with android and ios.

jammur 16y ago
Now I feel like an idiot for spending an hour and half writing it, lol.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- acangiano 16y ago
  Articles can often be summarized in a few lines which make them seem trivial. What really counts for me is why those points mentioned above are worth complaining about.
- foresterh 16y ago
  The summarized points are good, but the article is great. I might read those points and think "hmm... not too bad", but read the article and think "hmm.. wtf!"
- pkulak 16y ago
  Yours was a lot more funny than the bullet points.
- kgutteridge 16y ago
  You did well to pull out early if you found this part of the process painful, unfortunately end to end it feels like death by a thousand paper cuts. Theres nothing glaring wrong through out but lots of annoyances which really add up, when compared to iOS or Android development We recently developed this so speaking from some experience http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/28561 http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/28561 The bb version took far far longer than the equivalent iOS, simply because of other nonsense such as the pain in the signing process (isthesigningserverdown.com the fact it exists tells you all you need to know). Random exceptions being thrown that have no useful meaning and of course the joy of RAPC throwing errors such as "CreateProcess error=87, Parameter is incorrect" which we eventually found was due to the classpath being too long for RAPC to handle However once complete the application it is something we are very proud of!
  - zzzmarcus 16y ago
    Ha. Clicked the link and came to a full page error: Our apologies: It looks like you are using an unsupported Operating System. BlackBerry App World was designed to support the following: Windows Although you can browse BlackBerry App World with your current browser, some features may not be functional. To their credit they did let me continue.
    - kgutteridge 16y ago
      This ones even more amusing on the actual Blackberry App World http://failblog.org/2011/02/04/epic-fail-photos-blackberry-app-fail/ http://failblog.org/2011/02/04/epic-fail-photos-blackberry-a...
- mcclung 16y ago
  I enjoyed reading it however. I will now mercilessly mock RIM along with you.
- donniefitz2 16y ago
  No time wasted. And you're a good writer to boot. I thoroughly enjoyed the article.
- GrandMasterBirt 16y ago
  I feel that RIM is still missing the big picture. If RIM makes a phone/tablet that is 3x superior to the iPad and half the price, they'll still sell next to nothing. Why? The answer is quite simple. Their software is shit. Their developer relations is shit. They are competing not vs hardware, but vs hardware + software. They made great decisions too... lets ship the "Curve" model with such shit hardware and new software it was a downgrade from the previous top BB model (the one with side wheel). Old model = 3 seconds cold boot, new model = 3 minutes. The curve could not run any software that was remotely useful. It turned into a glorified email/phone device. The internet browsing sucked so bad I had no use for it. Not to mention that the hardware could barely handle the rendering. So with good decisions like that, can you really expect any more out of RIM?
jarek 16y ago
Isn't the requirement to get VMware Fusion Mac-specific? Might as well complain about not being able to write iOS applications on Windows.
- AlexandrB 16y ago
  Judging by the fact that the dev kit shipped with an ISO for running the simulator, I suspect you would need some kind of VM package in Windows as well. However Windows has the free VMWare Player.
  - Zak 16y ago
    The choice of VMWare over VirtualBox is worth complaining about then.
- Locke1689 16y ago
  Until RIM makes its own desktop operating system I don't think it's comparable at all. And, once again, iOS is the market leader. They get to be different. RIM doesn't.
  - jarek 16y ago
    Except iPhone OS was also different back when Symbian was the market leader and Blackberry was the #2. People complained then. It still rose.
    - Locke1689 16y ago
      False dichotomy. Everyone knew that RIM and Nokia weren't even playing the same game. This is clear from the fact that neither had App Stores. You'll also remember that when the iPhone was introduced there was only web development, meaning iPhones had no special restrictions.
      - jarek 16y ago
        Native applications and the App Store were introduced in iPhone 3G / iPhone OS 2.0, when iPhone was still far from being the bestseller it is now: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IPhone_sales_per_quarter_simple.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IPhone_sales_per_quarter_s...
lallysingh 16y ago
Honestly as an ex-indie PalmOS developer, I'm having trouble being sympathetic. I don't do blackberry myself, and don't have any particular affection for RIM, but this is just a little much. As I understand, RIM's gonna do all the fulfillment & billing for you in the app store? This is the SDK for an unreleased product? On a new, unreleased OS? On a different architecture than your dev machine? Yeah, it may require some paperwork, and the SDK & dev docs might not be where all their developers' attention currently is. Actually, the 10 app limit impressed me. I don't want my apps as #13 in middle of 25 variations of the same app from another developer. $20 a product just isn't expensive. Also, why do you have to use VMWare fusion if it's an ISO? Couldn't you use any of its competitors if it's not in a proprietary file format? Finally, as for all the 'cryptic commands'... write a shell script. ( http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ ) If you want a button, write an applescript app that shows a button & runs the shell script. ( http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.21/21.04/IntroToAppleScriptStudio/ http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.21/21.04/IntroTo... )
- jammur 16y ago
  It's not a question of whether you CAN make it work, but whether you should have to. RIM is in competition for developers with Apple and Google. Why would a developer choose to go with RIM when the experience is much better elsewhere. I think we can all agree that apps are one of the things that will make or break a smartphone platform in the current market conditions. If RIM can't attract talented developers to write apps for their platform, the outlook can't be good for them.
  - lallysingh 16y ago
    RIM's got two nice advantages to it: (1) Employers often pay for the BB, and the data plan. You're getting access to a lot of users who wouldn't otherwise be customers in the smartphone arena. (2) As the phones are already part of the business's primary operations, you have some nice opportunities to sell apps that integrate with the business. Considering that RIM's product isn't even out the door yet, and the specific strengths RIM holds, it's not 100% comparable to the iOS & Android side. You've got the chance to provide something that isn't a (a) fart app; (b) casual game; (c) train schedule; or (d) local wrapper for the website. Frankly, the superficial weaknesses of the form fillout and download procedure just aren't substantial. That's what, half a day? The next few months are gonna be in the APIs, and the next few years are gonna be in the customer base, app market, maintenance, and support of the app.

jammur 16y ago

Now I feel like an idiot for spending an hour and half writing it, lol.

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
acangiano 16y ago
Articles can often be summarized in a few lines which make them seem trivial. What really counts for me is why those points mentioned above are worth complaining about.
foresterh 16y ago
The summarized points are good, but the article is great. I might read those points and think "hmm... not too bad", but read the article and think "hmm.. wtf!"
pkulak 16y ago
Yours was a lot more funny than the bullet points.
kgutteridge 16y ago
You did well to pull out early if you found this part of the process painful, unfortunately end to end it feels like death by a thousand paper cuts. Theres nothing glaring wrong through out but lots of annoyances which really add up, when compared to iOS or Android development We recently developed this so speaking from some experience http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/28561 http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/28561 The bb version took far far longer than the equivalent iOS, simply because of other nonsense such as the pain in the signing process (isthesigningserverdown.com the fact it exists tells you all you need to know). Random exceptions being thrown that have no useful meaning and of course the joy of RAPC throwing errors such as "CreateProcess error=87, Parameter is incorrect" which we eventually found was due to the classpath being too long for RAPC to handle However once complete the application it is something we are very proud of!
- zzzmarcus 16y ago
  Ha. Clicked the link and came to a full page error: Our apologies: It looks like you are using an unsupported Operating System. BlackBerry App World was designed to support the following: Windows Although you can browse BlackBerry App World with your current browser, some features may not be functional. To their credit they did let me continue.
  - kgutteridge 16y ago
    This ones even more amusing on the actual Blackberry App World http://failblog.org/2011/02/04/epic-fail-photos-blackberry-app-fail/ http://failblog.org/2011/02/04/epic-fail-photos-blackberry-a...
mcclung 16y ago
I enjoyed reading it however. I will now mercilessly mock RIM along with you.
donniefitz2 16y ago
No time wasted. And you're a good writer to boot. I thoroughly enjoyed the article.
GrandMasterBirt 16y ago
I feel that RIM is still missing the big picture. If RIM makes a phone/tablet that is 3x superior to the iPad and half the price, they'll still sell next to nothing. Why? The answer is quite simple. Their software is shit. Their developer relations is shit. They are competing not vs hardware, but vs hardware + software. They made great decisions too... lets ship the "Curve" model with such shit hardware and new software it was a downgrade from the previous top BB model (the one with side wheel). Old model = 3 seconds cold boot, new model = 3 minutes. The curve could not run any software that was remotely useful. It turned into a glorified email/phone device. The internet browsing sucked so bad I had no use for it. Not to mention that the hardware could barely handle the rendering. So with good decisions like that, can you really expect any more out of RIM?

jarek 16y ago

Isn't the requirement to get VMware Fusion Mac-specific? Might as well complain about not being able to write iOS applications on Windows.

AlexandrB 16y ago
Judging by the fact that the dev kit shipped with an ISO for running the simulator, I suspect you would need some kind of VM package in Windows as well. However Windows has the free VMWare Player.
- Zak 16y ago
  The choice of VMWare over VirtualBox is worth complaining about then.
Locke1689 16y ago
Until RIM makes its own desktop operating system I don't think it's comparable at all. And, once again, iOS is the market leader. They get to be different. RIM doesn't.
- jarek 16y ago
  Except iPhone OS was also different back when Symbian was the market leader and Blackberry was the #2. People complained then. It still rose.
  - Locke1689 16y ago
    False dichotomy. Everyone knew that RIM and Nokia weren't even playing the same game. This is clear from the fact that neither had App Stores. You'll also remember that when the iPhone was introduced there was only web development, meaning iPhones had no special restrictions.
    - jarek 16y ago
      Native applications and the App Store were introduced in iPhone 3G / iPhone OS 2.0, when iPhone was still far from being the bestseller it is now: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IPhone_sales_per_quarter_simple.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IPhone_sales_per_quarter_s...

lallysingh 16y ago

Honestly as an ex-indie PalmOS developer, I'm having trouble being sympathetic. I don't do blackberry myself, and don't have any particular affection for RIM, but this is just a little much. As I understand, RIM's gonna do all the fulfillment & billing for you in the app store? This is the SDK for an unreleased product? On a new, unreleased OS? On a different architecture than your dev machine? Yeah, it may require some paperwork, and the SDK & dev docs might not be where all their developers' attention currently is. Actually, the 10 app limit impressed me. I don't want my apps as #13 in middle of 25 variations of the same app from another developer. $20 a product just isn't expensive. Also, why do you have to use VMWare fusion if it's an ISO? Couldn't you use any of its competitors if it's not in a proprietary file format? Finally, as for all the 'cryptic commands'... write a shell script. ( http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ ) If you want a button, write an applescript app that shows a button & runs the shell script. ( http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.21/21.04/IntroToAppleScriptStudio/ http://www.mactech.com/articles/mactech/Vol.21/21.04/IntroTo... )

jammur 16y ago
It's not a question of whether you CAN make it work, but whether you should have to. RIM is in competition for developers with Apple and Google. Why would a developer choose to go with RIM when the experience is much better elsewhere. I think we can all agree that apps are one of the things that will make or break a smartphone platform in the current market conditions. If RIM can't attract talented developers to write apps for their platform, the outlook can't be good for them.
- lallysingh 16y ago
  RIM's got two nice advantages to it: (1) Employers often pay for the BB, and the data plan. You're getting access to a lot of users who wouldn't otherwise be customers in the smartphone arena. (2) As the phones are already part of the business's primary operations, you have some nice opportunities to sell apps that integrate with the business. Considering that RIM's product isn't even out the door yet, and the specific strengths RIM holds, it's not 100% comparable to the iOS & Android side. You've got the chance to provide something that isn't a (a) fart app; (b) casual game; (c) train schedule; or (d) local wrapper for the website. Frankly, the superficial weaknesses of the form fillout and download procedure just aren't substantial. That's what, half a day? The next few months are gonna be in the APIs, and the next few years are gonna be in the customer base, app market, maintenance, and support of the app.