10 ms·

I/O Thoughts

323 points by ismavis 12y ago

cheald 12y ago
> ever since we’ve had success on the Android platform [Our Apple developer rep has] made it very clear that his services are no longer available to us. Wow. That is shocking to me - is that typical of Apple? I know they're very much about having people their ecosystem, but I didn't realize that there was this kind of animosity towards people who stepped out of bounds.
- jbigelow76 12y ago
  Maybe the Apple rank and file took Jobs's "thermonuclear war" vow to heart[1] [1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-20/jobs-regretted-not-getting-cancer-surgery-sooner-biographer-isaacson-says.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-20/jobs-regretted-not-...
  - fpgeek 12y ago
    That makes me wonder if they'd have gotten the same reaction for a successful Windows Phone app (though, for practical reasons, I don't expect many developers to end up testing that).
    - aceperry 12y ago
      That's pretty funny, because Microsoft has been actively courting Apple devs. They've had special events featuring Apple devs and companies associated with Apple, making the case for developing on the Windows 8 platform. Including Windows phone, which I suspect Apple and their fanbois aren't too concerned with at the moment.
  - jjoonathan 12y ago
    Or they get performance pay based on converting/retaining their assigned customers.
- fpgeek 12y ago
  Well, taking 2+ years (and at least one lawsuit) to fix the "iMessage switcher" bug seems to fit the same pattern.
  - aviraldg 12y ago
    Why is the truth being downvoted?
    - MBCook 12y ago
      Because it's not directly developer related?
    - cheald 12y ago
      I can actually understand them dragging their heels on that - it only manifests when you leave iOS, at which point they've already lost the customer, and it causes a worse experience on their new non-Apple device, which could drive the user back into Apple's arms. It's slimy, but switching ecosystems is a high-friction event, and Apple may have just determined that the cost of supporting former customers is greater than the winback they'd get from doing so. Alienating developers, on the other hand, seems like a losing play. Publishing on Android doesn't mean you stop publishing on iOS, but giving them the cold shoulder might drive them to do so.
      - xxchan 12y ago
        They're actually hurting their current customers, those that can't get a text message through to their lost Apple brethren. Shame on them for having traitors in their flock, I guess.
        cheald 12y ago
        Certainly, but the common factor is that the friends they're having problems with are dirty Android users. I have no doubt they've been content to let people believe that the problem is that Android can't handle text messages.
      - 12y ago
- chimeracoder 12y ago
  Anecdotally, I've heard horror stories from friends who develop apps for multiple platforms of being "punished" by Apple for releasing features to their Android application first, or similar things. Those friends don't talk about it publicly for fear of further retaliation, but given their experiences, what OP wrote doesn't surprise me in the least.
  - fpgeek 12y ago
    > Those friends don't talk about it publicly for fear of further retaliation, but given their experiences, what OP wrote doesn't surprise me in the least. But what is surprising, especially given the prevalence of these anecdotes, is that OP wrote about it. I have the feeling he made the calculation that there isn't much left that Apple can do to them (other than kick them out of their app store, which would probably backfire spectacularly, of course).
- robryan 12y ago
  Seems like a weird attitude. Almost everyone with the resources to do so is going to want their app distributed as widely as possible across multiple platforms. Personally if I was at Apple I would be accepting that and trying my best to make iOS the platform you have the best dev experience on so that you are encouraged to put as much time as possible into the iOS app and update it more or at least as regularly as elsewhere.
  - zak_mc_kracken 12y ago
    Very logical and absolutely not the way Apple operates. Steve Jobs' ghost is going to be haunting these walls for a very long time (well, at least until the new campus comes).
- zak_mc_kracken 12y ago
  > Wow. That is shocking to me - is that typical of Apple? Yes it is. We have a pretty successful app in the iTunes store and as a consequence, we have privileged access to the entire team, including engineers and executives who advise us how to word the description of our app and telling us all kinds of tricks to increase downloads. A few months ago, we released an Android app and since then, we have fallen into a complete Apple black hole. The Apple people we used to exchange daily emails with are not even responding to us any more. Apple is very, very serious about exclusivity. And probably feeling very, very threatened too.
  - cheald 12y ago
    That's...well, bizarre seems too kind. As an outsider who hasn't ever dealt with Apple in that kind of capacity, it seems downright childish. I'm not sure that I was in danger of developing iOS apps any time soon, but these kinds of tales make me want to run screaming.
    - threeseed 12y ago
      How is it childish ? It's business. Apple has finite resources and there are thousands of amazing, exclusive apps that don't get any direct assistance. Why would they invest their time if it doesn't benefit their ecosystem. Also as someone who has worked on some of the most popular apps there is always the problem of feature equality. Companies don't want to annoy their customers by only offering features on one platform. So they don't. In which case you end up with a lowest common denominator of features.
      - hahainternet 12y ago
        > How is it childish ? It's business The two are not mutually exclusive.
      - vacri 12y ago
        It's uncommon for businesses to see a client flirting with another vendor, and in response cease all communications. Usually it's just the opposite - wow the client with attention, and woo them back. Apple certainly has the resources to shed clients at will, but it's still childish behaviour. Why make it harder for a client with a good history to develop on your platform?
- izacus 12y ago
  Yes, we were told directly by Apple that we will not be featured on AppStore or get any dev contacts if we release Android app together with the iOS version.
  - morsch 12y ago
    That certainly explains why there are so many iOS exclusives. Here I was blaming the Android platform or foolish developers, when in fact Apple's aggressive business practices were -- at least partially -- to blame. Also serves as a reminder what we, both as devs and users, gave up when we put ourselves at the mercy of approximately 2.5 app store operators. There's no need to remind me what we gained, I'm aware. The question is rather if we can get a system that combines the best of both worlds.
- kreeger 12y ago
  When I worked for Universal Uclick, we released the GoComics app all at the same time for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone. I worked on the iOS release until its launch, and we had the ear of its developer support team up until and well after its release. We even were able to get the app 'featured' in the App Store shortly after its release. We didn't experience a cold shoulder at all from Apple after putting out the app for other platforms. But then again, that was just us.
eitally 12y ago
I agree with everything you wrote -- thanks for taking the time to put it to paper! Two other things: I've been to five I/Os and this year's keynote was absolutely the worst in terms of quality of presentation. It honestly seems like they didn't plan to announce L until it was leaked a couple weeks ago. I'm glad they did and I think, given the lack of prep, it went pretty darn well. Secondly, before they started charging $900/ticket, I'm absolutely sure a lot of locals applied just for swag. I don't think that happens anymore, and you can tell from what they handed out this year that there will be no more free phones and tablets. If there is hardware swag, it will be new tech, not the stuff everyone already has. Additionally, I was truly surprised at the heavy focus on Android at the expense of nearly everything else. I think with Sundar in charge we're seeing a sea change at Google in terms of platform focus, and this is -- while a little confusing sometimes -- a good thing. It also means I/O is turning into truly a hardcore developer conference with a unified theme (or several big themes), rather than a sort of dog & pony show ("Hey, look at this shiny, useless crap we've been working on!") like in the past (Nexus Q anyone? Android @Home? Google TV?). There was no mention this year of anything besides Android platform products & services, except the expected general purpose dev platform stuff (Compute Engine, App Engine, etc). I was surprised at the lack of mention of anything enterprisey, nothing about Google+ or identity management, anything about ChromeOS (just a small plug in the keynote about schools adopting Chromebooks), or any of their X projects. I at least thought they'd have some robots there to ogle. If the keynote was subpar this year, the 'box talks were a highlight. The speakers were almost universally awesome, the open fora allowed high quality engagement, and if one topic didn't interest, it was easy to stroll to the next whiteboard/screen and see if that one did. Jake Archibald's talk on browser quirks was my favorite. http://www.html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/speed/script-loading/ http://www.html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/speed/script-loading/ http://vimeo.com/77497239 http://vimeo.com/77497239 Btw, I was fully expecting Android Wear to be a novelty I had no use for, but I very quickly came around and already find myself talking to my watch, James Bond style. I completely agree with this Ars post: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-smartwatches-make-google-glass-obsolete/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-smartwat.... My wife & I have a "no phones at the dinner table" policy but even my kids have been telling me to "ask Google" for answers to questions. Having the knowledge graph so handy is awesome.
alecco 12y ago
How sad it is we are so easily seduced to take sides on a false dichotomy. How easily we forget our work becomes just a cog on someone else's platform. Relations centralized, us with the big player, very one-sided.
suprgeek 12y ago
"...is that it highlighted just how insular and superior a lot of Apple developers act and feel. If you don’t believe me, just join a group of them at WWDC and whip out your Android phone. Within moments, you’ll wish you had whipped out something less offensive, like your genitalia instead." Can relate to this a little bit...A coworker who is completely in the Apple camp argued fiercely how consistent the iOS keyboard was when I mentioned to him that the Android one changes case to match the Caps lock setting.
- jonah 12y ago
  > Android one changes case to match the Caps lock setting. My primary mobile device runs Android and it's always a shock to me that the iOS keyboard doesn't do this. Are they taking their skeuomorphism too literally?
- MBCook 12y ago
  As a die-hard iOS user... that was a stupid argument to be in. There is a reason Apple does what it does (supposedly to match a real keyboard) but it's not strong and doesn't matter. And the iOS 7 shift key symbol stupidity should automatically lose him the argument.
  - bollockitis 12y ago
    > There is a reason Apple does what it does (supposedly to match a real keyboard) but it's not strong and doesn't matter. Wow. Really? That a silly reason for an otherwise indefensible UI decision. I really wish the iOS keyboard changed case. Ever since iOS 7, I can't tell whether shift is on or off. Maybe I'm just an idiot, but sometimes I fumble with it a half dozen times before getting it right. It's worse than trying to plug in a USB cable.
    - MBCook 12y ago
      I see nothing wrong with only showing uppercase letters on the keyboard as they seem easier to read. The major flailing is the shift key. Right now it's white with a black arrow. That means the sentence started with an initial cap. At any other theme, say mid sentence, it's different again. Mid sentence it's a white arrow on darker gray. So, in short: about to type cap? Black on White. Mid sentence? white on dark grey. Want to do all caps? Double tap it and get a new version. I'm not sure how these semantics are different enough from iOS 6 to cause confusion but it does ALL THE TIME.
jgh 12y ago
meh...I've been in the "Apple Camp" since they released the SDK in 2008 and I've yet to work with anyone who would find it offensive that someone has different tastes than them when it comes to their device choices. it really doesnt matter that much. That said I'll probably be looking to do more non-iOS work as well in the near future, I need to expand my horizons again.
timothya 12y ago
One of the things that I've always seen as an interesting difference between how Google and Apple run their developer relations teams is the title that they give their employees. Apple has Technology Evangelists, suggesting that they promote the use of certain technologies (typically Apple's own technology or Apple-supported web technology). Google, on the other hand, has Developer Advocates - these are people who actually represent non-Googler developers internally at Google. While they may just be titles, my experience has been consistent with their titles. Apple representatives you see once a year at WWDC, while Google representatives you see at Google I/O and also at a number of Google-hosted events year-round, including the regular videos they put out (and the "office-hours" type Hangouts they have so that you can actually talk to them and get your problems resolved) - just look at all of the events they have scheduled on the Google Developer Events page[0] or all of the videos they have on their YouTube channel[1]. I've also seen a lot of them give talks at tech conferences, while Apple employees are rarely seen at conferences. And you can see that Google's Developer Advocates really do talk directly to the actual teams directly and file bugs against them when necessary on behalf of developers everywhere. It's a system that has worked pretty well in my experience. I will also agree that Google's Developer Advocates don't care too much about what platform you're using and just want to help you. I've been to a number of Google-run technical workshops and codelabs, and the people there are willing to help you with whatever problems you run into, no matter what it is. [0]: https://developers.google.com/events/ https://developers.google.com/events/ [1]: https://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleDevelopers https://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleDevelopers
- murtza 12y ago
  The difference between a developer advocate and a developer evangelist is inbound vs outbound. Developer advocates are focused on helping address developers' problems. Developer evangelists are focused on increasing product use and adoption. That said, the responsibility of these positions mostly overlap. In my personal experience as a developer evangelist at Marketo, my day-to-day work has encompassed the function of both titles. My goal is to create a great developer experience [0] in order to drive platform adoption [1]. Anecdotally, I have noticed a shift towards the developer advocate title. At Facebook, Dropbox, and Twitter, the role is called this. [0] http://murtza.org/creating-a-great-developer-experience/ http://murtza.org/creating-a-great-developer-experience/ [1] http://murtza.org/driving-the-api-adoption-funnel/ http://murtza.org/driving-the-api-adoption-funnel/
zmmmmm 12y ago
> Android is now clearly their platform of choice, it runs on TVs, cars, phones, tablets, watches and in your home. The same OS, different screens was their message. This was one of the big surprising take aways for me. The minute Pichai took over I had the feeling that Android's future was limited - they would keep investing in it for sure but it would be on a long term road map for convergence and eventual transition to ChromeOS. I expected to first see Chrome apps running as first class citizens on Android, then a new SDK for Android that was all about ChromeOS and then finally a deprecating of the Java SDK. It always felt to me like internally Google preferred ChromeOS and the web as a platform and Android was a sort of accidental success that they were just running with until they could somehow meld it into their pure vision of computing, as represented by ChromeOS. So now I'm having to significantly revisit all that thinking, as if anything Google seems to be pushing Android everywhere and little was said about ChromeOS.
- fidotron 12y ago
  I got the distinct impression Sundar has changed his tune now he's not threatened by Android, but instead runs it. Anyone that had thrown their lot in with Chrome Apps or similar probably felt this year how Android devs did last year.
  - SquareWheel 12y ago
    Though if you're invested in Chrome apps, at the end of the day it's still web technologies. It'll run anywhere, even if Google is backing off. In some ways it's a safer bet for developers.
  - general_failure 12y ago
    This is not some single person dictatorship where Sundar can just call all the shots. They are so many people vested in Android at Google. I don't think Sundar has a choice. I really dislike how everyone thinks the too management can sweepingly do anything they want. It does not work like that.
- DCKing 12y ago
  There is a bit of convergence going on. Chrome is now a first-class citizen of Android; its tabs will now appear seperately in the multitasking menu. Android apps are coming to Chrome OS in windows. If this is to be interpreted as a first step, I imagine that Chrome OS will eventually become yet another variation of Android. A variation focused on windows, and instead of bundled installed apps a greater focus on Chrome. But still with it all being Android underneath.
dewitt 12y ago
Not directly related to his post, but if you haven't tried Pocket Casts yet, I highly recommend it. Best podcast app I've ever used, hands down.
- rogerbinns 12y ago
  Do however be wary if you use it in a car. I've found it quite flaky. That includes randomly stopping for no apparent reason (on content that was fully downloaded), random crashes, forgetting things (like it was playing a list of episodes not just one), starting to play 2 hours after I pressed play, forgetting position and the list goes on. They were responsive the first time I contacted them (before buying) but ignored my emails after I had bought and found issues like the above. If you aren't in a car then you can resolve most of those issues by pressing the right buttons in the app. However while driving you can't, hence it mattering a lot more.
  - bronson 12y ago
    Agree 100%. Also, it has serious streaming problems. Don't bother starting a podcast unless it's 100% downloaded.
  - supercoder 12y ago
    Yeah doesn't work in the car for me either, cuts out a couple minutes in usually.
- reconbot 12y ago
  If we're sharing podcast apps, DoggCatcher the podcast player is probably the best one on android.
  - bane 12y ago
    I'll add Podcast Addict to the list, constantly updated and Chromecast support is awesome.
webwielder 12y ago
At the end of the day, Apple has always delivered far superior tools, frameworks, and ecosystem (development-wise). That to me says a lot more than how friendly the staff is.
- deminature 12y ago
  Anecdotally, this is also my experience with using some of the lesser known frameworks in the Android ecosystem - nothing is documented properly or the documentation is years out of date and/or uses long deprecated methods, significant bugs remain open for years without attention, requiring time-consuming workarounds, and everyone just puts up with it, because that's the way things have always been. An example of problematic documentation is Volley, which is a brilliant and totally needed framework and documentation that exists for it is a 45 minute presentation and a handful of StackOverflow posts.
  - archivator 12y ago
    While I'm not arguing against your overall point, your example is not a good one. Volley was unnecessary. It only got attention because Google did it but the community was already on top of the issue. From shipping their own, newer Apache Client libs, through koush's ion and picasso, to Square's okhttp, networking on Android is full of good libraries to use. Volley didn't anything dramatic to this and, judging by the amount of attention it has received, it was someone's side project.
    - deminature 12y ago
      I take your point, and that's exactly why I'm not using it in production, but it doesn't seem like Google should have drawn as much attention as they did to it, running a session on it within Google I/O, if it was just intended to be a side-project and not for widespread consumption. I guess I'm just coming at this with a WWDC mentality, where a presentation would be run only on a completely production-ready and documented framework, and perhaps I/O does things differently.
- bredren 12y ago
alttab 12y ago
Late one night I began watching the room sessions, and after I kinda wrote off the Keynote I began to see the same level of organization the writer spoke about. Unification across all applications, platforms, screen sizes, and use cases was a huge priority and that is a rather radical shift from what I've seen. They have focus.
deleted 12y ago
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skizm 12y ago
You have to remember, Apple is selling all Apple stuff. Google is selling the web.
- ttflee 12y ago
  Google is actually selling the Ads, IMHO.
megablast 12y ago
Great piece, very interesting. > Overall they just seem more balanced, you can tell that what Apple is doing doesn’t keep them up at night. Eh, I have found the opposite, whereas Android developers will be very hardcore, almost akin to .Net developers who only use bing. They will only use Android, and Google, and Open Source, and never pay for anything ever. Even apps. And beware if you have an iPhone. Not all, and maybe I am sheltered from the Apple critics because I leave my Android phone and table at home. And it really depends who you meet. I certainly see Apple as a very closed company compared to Google, but it looks like that is changing with the WWDC 3,000 API's announcement, really opening up the OS to developers. iOS devs can start to do cool things that Android devs have been doing for a while. As for the Google anouncements, is TV any different than the last few years? And they still don't seem to have wearables right yet.
- hyperion2010 12y ago
  I read the sentence you quote as referring directly to the engineers who work at google, not android developers.
bjchrist 12y ago
Are google glass completely dead now?
amaks 12y ago
"Having met a lot of Apple employees, I can’t say the same is true on the other side. They seem overly obsessed with Google, and are insanely sensitive should you bring the topic up, or deity of choice forbid, you actually develop on a Google platform." It used to be exactly like that in Microsoft around 2010. Microsofties were extremely sensitive about non-WP devices other employees used. Hopefully things have changed there since then.
- fortuitous 12y ago
  I was trying to enjoy the company of a friend and his friend turned out to be an Apple executive and had a lot of passive things to say about the fact that I had an android phone. the gist was it was too big, not many apps, and other nitpicking stuff. I couldn't help but think... well gee just try another smaller android phone, but I wanted to just eat dinner and ignored his snide comments. They're definitely obsessed from the top down. IMO, they need to stop whining and give users what they want, a cheaper phone. That could have stopped android years ago, instead they just sued and became indignant. As if that helps. You want to talk about a bubble. I fear the day when apple's revenue drops. I sort of want them to stop bitching and do something, because that day won't be pretty.
_pmf_ 12y ago
Could we please not appropriate the generic term I/O for the gimmicky marketing travesty that is Google I/O? Some people expect an insightful article about system programming.
joeblau 12y ago
> None of them care what phone you use, what laptop you choose or which platforms you develop for. Benedict Evans has a very interesting take on why Google has this sentiment. Basically, it comes down to Apple being about hardware and considering the cloud dumb storage and Google being about cloud services and the hardware being dumb glass (not Google Glass, but hardware interfaces). It seems like Google as a company is in sync, all they want to do is get their cloud services on as many devices as possible because the real value of Google is in the cloud. I agree with Benedict's hypothesis and I can't wait to see how these two companies unfold over the next decade. They currently seem to have two different trajectories.
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323 points by ismavis 12y ago

> ever since we’ve had success on the Android platform [Our Apple developer rep has] made it very clear that his services are no longer available to us. Wow. That is shocking to me - is that typical of Apple? I know they're very much about having people their ecosystem, but I didn't realize that there was this kind of animosity towards people who stepped out of bounds.

jbigelow76 12y ago
Maybe the Apple rank and file took Jobs's "thermonuclear war" vow to heart[1] [1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-20/jobs-regretted-not-getting-cancer-surgery-sooner-biographer-isaacson-says.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-20/jobs-regretted-not-...
- fpgeek 12y ago
  That makes me wonder if they'd have gotten the same reaction for a successful Windows Phone app (though, for practical reasons, I don't expect many developers to end up testing that).
  - aceperry 12y ago
    That's pretty funny, because Microsoft has been actively courting Apple devs. They've had special events featuring Apple devs and companies associated with Apple, making the case for developing on the Windows 8 platform. Including Windows phone, which I suspect Apple and their fanbois aren't too concerned with at the moment.
- jjoonathan 12y ago
  Or they get performance pay based on converting/retaining their assigned customers.
fpgeek 12y ago
Well, taking 2+ years (and at least one lawsuit) to fix the "iMessage switcher" bug seems to fit the same pattern.
- aviraldg 12y ago
  Why is the truth being downvoted?
  - MBCook 12y ago
    Because it's not directly developer related?
  - cheald 12y ago
    I can actually understand them dragging their heels on that - it only manifests when you leave iOS, at which point they've already lost the customer, and it causes a worse experience on their new non-Apple device, which could drive the user back into Apple's arms. It's slimy, but switching ecosystems is a high-friction event, and Apple may have just determined that the cost of supporting former customers is greater than the winback they'd get from doing so. Alienating developers, on the other hand, seems like a losing play. Publishing on Android doesn't mean you stop publishing on iOS, but giving them the cold shoulder might drive them to do so.
    - xxchan 12y ago
      They're actually hurting their current customers, those that can't get a text message through to their lost Apple brethren. Shame on them for having traitors in their flock, I guess.
      - cheald 12y ago
        Certainly, but the common factor is that the friends they're having problems with are dirty Android users. I have no doubt they've been content to let people believe that the problem is that Android can't handle text messages.
    - 12y ago
chimeracoder 12y ago
Anecdotally, I've heard horror stories from friends who develop apps for multiple platforms of being "punished" by Apple for releasing features to their Android application first, or similar things. Those friends don't talk about it publicly for fear of further retaliation, but given their experiences, what OP wrote doesn't surprise me in the least.
- fpgeek 12y ago
  > Those friends don't talk about it publicly for fear of further retaliation, but given their experiences, what OP wrote doesn't surprise me in the least. But what is surprising, especially given the prevalence of these anecdotes, is that OP wrote about it. I have the feeling he made the calculation that there isn't much left that Apple can do to them (other than kick them out of their app store, which would probably backfire spectacularly, of course).
robryan 12y ago
Seems like a weird attitude. Almost everyone with the resources to do so is going to want their app distributed as widely as possible across multiple platforms. Personally if I was at Apple I would be accepting that and trying my best to make iOS the platform you have the best dev experience on so that you are encouraged to put as much time as possible into the iOS app and update it more or at least as regularly as elsewhere.
- zak_mc_kracken 12y ago
  Very logical and absolutely not the way Apple operates. Steve Jobs' ghost is going to be haunting these walls for a very long time (well, at least until the new campus comes).
zak_mc_kracken 12y ago
> Wow. That is shocking to me - is that typical of Apple? Yes it is. We have a pretty successful app in the iTunes store and as a consequence, we have privileged access to the entire team, including engineers and executives who advise us how to word the description of our app and telling us all kinds of tricks to increase downloads. A few months ago, we released an Android app and since then, we have fallen into a complete Apple black hole. The Apple people we used to exchange daily emails with are not even responding to us any more. Apple is very, very serious about exclusivity. And probably feeling very, very threatened too.
- cheald 12y ago
  That's...well, bizarre seems too kind. As an outsider who hasn't ever dealt with Apple in that kind of capacity, it seems downright childish. I'm not sure that I was in danger of developing iOS apps any time soon, but these kinds of tales make me want to run screaming.
  - threeseed 12y ago
    How is it childish ? It's business. Apple has finite resources and there are thousands of amazing, exclusive apps that don't get any direct assistance. Why would they invest their time if it doesn't benefit their ecosystem. Also as someone who has worked on some of the most popular apps there is always the problem of feature equality. Companies don't want to annoy their customers by only offering features on one platform. So they don't. In which case you end up with a lowest common denominator of features.
    - hahainternet 12y ago
      > How is it childish ? It's business The two are not mutually exclusive.
    - vacri 12y ago
      It's uncommon for businesses to see a client flirting with another vendor, and in response cease all communications. Usually it's just the opposite - wow the client with attention, and woo them back. Apple certainly has the resources to shed clients at will, but it's still childish behaviour. Why make it harder for a client with a good history to develop on your platform?
izacus 12y ago
Yes, we were told directly by Apple that we will not be featured on AppStore or get any dev contacts if we release Android app together with the iOS version.
- morsch 12y ago
  That certainly explains why there are so many iOS exclusives. Here I was blaming the Android platform or foolish developers, when in fact Apple's aggressive business practices were -- at least partially -- to blame. Also serves as a reminder what we, both as devs and users, gave up when we put ourselves at the mercy of approximately 2.5 app store operators. There's no need to remind me what we gained, I'm aware. The question is rather if we can get a system that combines the best of both worlds.
kreeger 12y ago
When I worked for Universal Uclick, we released the GoComics app all at the same time for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone. I worked on the iOS release until its launch, and we had the ear of its developer support team up until and well after its release. We even were able to get the app 'featured' in the App Store shortly after its release. We didn't experience a cold shoulder at all from Apple after putting out the app for other platforms. But then again, that was just us.

eitally 12y ago

I agree with everything you wrote -- thanks for taking the time to put it to paper! Two other things: I've been to five I/Os and this year's keynote was absolutely the worst in terms of quality of presentation. It honestly seems like they didn't plan to announce L until it was leaked a couple weeks ago. I'm glad they did and I think, given the lack of prep, it went pretty darn well. Secondly, before they started charging $900/ticket, I'm absolutely sure a lot of locals applied just for swag. I don't think that happens anymore, and you can tell from what they handed out this year that there will be no more free phones and tablets. If there is hardware swag, it will be new tech, not the stuff everyone already has. Additionally, I was truly surprised at the heavy focus on Android at the expense of nearly everything else. I think with Sundar in charge we're seeing a sea change at Google in terms of platform focus, and this is -- while a little confusing sometimes -- a good thing. It also means I/O is turning into truly a hardcore developer conference with a unified theme (or several big themes), rather than a sort of dog & pony show ("Hey, look at this shiny, useless crap we've been working on!") like in the past (Nexus Q anyone? Android @Home? Google TV?). There was no mention this year of anything besides Android platform products & services, except the expected general purpose dev platform stuff (Compute Engine, App Engine, etc). I was surprised at the lack of mention of anything enterprisey, nothing about Google+ or identity management, anything about ChromeOS (just a small plug in the keynote about schools adopting Chromebooks), or any of their X projects. I at least thought they'd have some robots there to ogle. If the keynote was subpar this year, the 'box talks were a highlight. The speakers were almost universally awesome, the open fora allowed high quality engagement, and if one topic didn't interest, it was easy to stroll to the next whiteboard/screen and see if that one did. Jake Archibald's talk on browser quirks was my favorite. http://www.html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/speed/script-loading/ http://www.html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/speed/script-loading/ http://vimeo.com/77497239 http://vimeo.com/77497239 Btw, I was fully expecting Android Wear to be a novelty I had no use for, but I very quickly came around and already find myself talking to my watch, James Bond style. I completely agree with this Ars post: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-smartwatches-make-google-glass-obsolete/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/06/android-wear-smartwat.... My wife & I have a "no phones at the dinner table" policy but even my kids have been telling me to "ask Google" for answers to questions. Having the knowledge graph so handy is awesome.

alecco 12y ago

How sad it is we are so easily seduced to take sides on a false dichotomy. How easily we forget our work becomes just a cog on someone else's platform. Relations centralized, us with the big player, very one-sided.

suprgeek 12y ago

"...is that it highlighted just how insular and superior a lot of Apple developers act and feel. If you don’t believe me, just join a group of them at WWDC and whip out your Android phone. Within moments, you’ll wish you had whipped out something less offensive, like your genitalia instead." Can relate to this a little bit...A coworker who is completely in the Apple camp argued fiercely how consistent the iOS keyboard was when I mentioned to him that the Android one changes case to match the Caps lock setting.

jonah 12y ago
> Android one changes case to match the Caps lock setting. My primary mobile device runs Android and it's always a shock to me that the iOS keyboard doesn't do this. Are they taking their skeuomorphism too literally?
MBCook 12y ago
As a die-hard iOS user... that was a stupid argument to be in. There is a reason Apple does what it does (supposedly to match a real keyboard) but it's not strong and doesn't matter. And the iOS 7 shift key symbol stupidity should automatically lose him the argument.
- bollockitis 12y ago
  > There is a reason Apple does what it does (supposedly to match a real keyboard) but it's not strong and doesn't matter. Wow. Really? That a silly reason for an otherwise indefensible UI decision. I really wish the iOS keyboard changed case. Ever since iOS 7, I can't tell whether shift is on or off. Maybe I'm just an idiot, but sometimes I fumble with it a half dozen times before getting it right. It's worse than trying to plug in a USB cable.
  - MBCook 12y ago
    I see nothing wrong with only showing uppercase letters on the keyboard as they seem easier to read. The major flailing is the shift key. Right now it's white with a black arrow. That means the sentence started with an initial cap. At any other theme, say mid sentence, it's different again. Mid sentence it's a white arrow on darker gray. So, in short: about to type cap? Black on White. Mid sentence? white on dark grey. Want to do all caps? Double tap it and get a new version. I'm not sure how these semantics are different enough from iOS 6 to cause confusion but it does ALL THE TIME.

jgh 12y ago

meh...I've been in the "Apple Camp" since they released the SDK in 2008 and I've yet to work with anyone who would find it offensive that someone has different tastes than them when it comes to their device choices. it really doesnt matter that much. That said I'll probably be looking to do more non-iOS work as well in the near future, I need to expand my horizons again.

timothya 12y ago

One of the things that I've always seen as an interesting difference between how Google and Apple run their developer relations teams is the title that they give their employees. Apple has Technology Evangelists, suggesting that they promote the use of certain technologies (typically Apple's own technology or Apple-supported web technology). Google, on the other hand, has Developer Advocates - these are people who actually represent non-Googler developers internally at Google. While they may just be titles, my experience has been consistent with their titles. Apple representatives you see once a year at WWDC, while Google representatives you see at Google I/O and also at a number of Google-hosted events year-round, including the regular videos they put out (and the "office-hours" type Hangouts they have so that you can actually talk to them and get your problems resolved) - just look at all of the events they have scheduled on the Google Developer Events page[0] or all of the videos they have on their YouTube channel[1]. I've also seen a lot of them give talks at tech conferences, while Apple employees are rarely seen at conferences. And you can see that Google's Developer Advocates really do talk directly to the actual teams directly and file bugs against them when necessary on behalf of developers everywhere. It's a system that has worked pretty well in my experience. I will also agree that Google's Developer Advocates don't care too much about what platform you're using and just want to help you. I've been to a number of Google-run technical workshops and codelabs, and the people there are willing to help you with whatever problems you run into, no matter what it is. [0]: https://developers.google.com/events/ https://developers.google.com/events/ [1]: https://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleDevelopers https://www.youtube.com/user/GoogleDevelopers

murtza 12y ago
The difference between a developer advocate and a developer evangelist is inbound vs outbound. Developer advocates are focused on helping address developers' problems. Developer evangelists are focused on increasing product use and adoption. That said, the responsibility of these positions mostly overlap. In my personal experience as a developer evangelist at Marketo, my day-to-day work has encompassed the function of both titles. My goal is to create a great developer experience [0] in order to drive platform adoption [1]. Anecdotally, I have noticed a shift towards the developer advocate title. At Facebook, Dropbox, and Twitter, the role is called this. [0] http://murtza.org/creating-a-great-developer-experience/ http://murtza.org/creating-a-great-developer-experience/ [1] http://murtza.org/driving-the-api-adoption-funnel/ http://murtza.org/driving-the-api-adoption-funnel/

zmmmmm 12y ago

> Android is now clearly their platform of choice, it runs on TVs, cars, phones, tablets, watches and in your home. The same OS, different screens was their message. This was one of the big surprising take aways for me. The minute Pichai took over I had the feeling that Android's future was limited - they would keep investing in it for sure but it would be on a long term road map for convergence and eventual transition to ChromeOS. I expected to first see Chrome apps running as first class citizens on Android, then a new SDK for Android that was all about ChromeOS and then finally a deprecating of the Java SDK. It always felt to me like internally Google preferred ChromeOS and the web as a platform and Android was a sort of accidental success that they were just running with until they could somehow meld it into their pure vision of computing, as represented by ChromeOS. So now I'm having to significantly revisit all that thinking, as if anything Google seems to be pushing Android everywhere and little was said about ChromeOS.

fidotron 12y ago
I got the distinct impression Sundar has changed his tune now he's not threatened by Android, but instead runs it. Anyone that had thrown their lot in with Chrome Apps or similar probably felt this year how Android devs did last year.
- SquareWheel 12y ago
  Though if you're invested in Chrome apps, at the end of the day it's still web technologies. It'll run anywhere, even if Google is backing off. In some ways it's a safer bet for developers.
- general_failure 12y ago
  This is not some single person dictatorship where Sundar can just call all the shots. They are so many people vested in Android at Google. I don't think Sundar has a choice. I really dislike how everyone thinks the too management can sweepingly do anything they want. It does not work like that.
DCKing 12y ago
There is a bit of convergence going on. Chrome is now a first-class citizen of Android; its tabs will now appear seperately in the multitasking menu. Android apps are coming to Chrome OS in windows. If this is to be interpreted as a first step, I imagine that Chrome OS will eventually become yet another variation of Android. A variation focused on windows, and instead of bundled installed apps a greater focus on Chrome. But still with it all being Android underneath.

dewitt 12y ago

Not directly related to his post, but if you haven't tried Pocket Casts yet, I highly recommend it. Best podcast app I've ever used, hands down.

rogerbinns 12y ago
Do however be wary if you use it in a car. I've found it quite flaky. That includes randomly stopping for no apparent reason (on content that was fully downloaded), random crashes, forgetting things (like it was playing a list of episodes not just one), starting to play 2 hours after I pressed play, forgetting position and the list goes on. They were responsive the first time I contacted them (before buying) but ignored my emails after I had bought and found issues like the above. If you aren't in a car then you can resolve most of those issues by pressing the right buttons in the app. However while driving you can't, hence it mattering a lot more.
- bronson 12y ago
  Agree 100%. Also, it has serious streaming problems. Don't bother starting a podcast unless it's 100% downloaded.
- supercoder 12y ago
  Yeah doesn't work in the car for me either, cuts out a couple minutes in usually.
reconbot 12y ago
If we're sharing podcast apps, DoggCatcher the podcast player is probably the best one on android.
- bane 12y ago
  I'll add Podcast Addict to the list, constantly updated and Chromecast support is awesome.

webwielder 12y ago

At the end of the day, Apple has always delivered far superior tools, frameworks, and ecosystem (development-wise). That to me says a lot more than how friendly the staff is.

deminature 12y ago
Anecdotally, this is also my experience with using some of the lesser known frameworks in the Android ecosystem - nothing is documented properly or the documentation is years out of date and/or uses long deprecated methods, significant bugs remain open for years without attention, requiring time-consuming workarounds, and everyone just puts up with it, because that's the way things have always been. An example of problematic documentation is Volley, which is a brilliant and totally needed framework and documentation that exists for it is a 45 minute presentation and a handful of StackOverflow posts.
- archivator 12y ago
  While I'm not arguing against your overall point, your example is not a good one. Volley was unnecessary. It only got attention because Google did it but the community was already on top of the issue. From shipping their own, newer Apache Client libs, through koush's ion and picasso, to Square's okhttp, networking on Android is full of good libraries to use. Volley didn't anything dramatic to this and, judging by the amount of attention it has received, it was someone's side project.
  - deminature 12y ago
    I take your point, and that's exactly why I'm not using it in production, but it doesn't seem like Google should have drawn as much attention as they did to it, running a session on it within Google I/O, if it was just intended to be a side-project and not for widespread consumption. I guess I'm just coming at this with a WWDC mentality, where a presentation would be run only on a completely production-ready and documented framework, and perhaps I/O does things differently.
bredren 12y ago

alttab 12y ago

Late one night I began watching the room sessions, and after I kinda wrote off the Keynote I began to see the same level of organization the writer spoke about. Unification across all applications, platforms, screen sizes, and use cases was a huge priority and that is a rather radical shift from what I've seen. They have focus.

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skizm 12y ago

You have to remember, Apple is selling all Apple stuff. Google is selling the web.

ttflee 12y ago
Google is actually selling the Ads, IMHO.

megablast 12y ago

Great piece, very interesting. > Overall they just seem more balanced, you can tell that what Apple is doing doesn’t keep them up at night. Eh, I have found the opposite, whereas Android developers will be very hardcore, almost akin to .Net developers who only use bing. They will only use Android, and Google, and Open Source, and never pay for anything ever. Even apps. And beware if you have an iPhone. Not all, and maybe I am sheltered from the Apple critics because I leave my Android phone and table at home. And it really depends who you meet. I certainly see Apple as a very closed company compared to Google, but it looks like that is changing with the WWDC 3,000 API's announcement, really opening up the OS to developers. iOS devs can start to do cool things that Android devs have been doing for a while. As for the Google anouncements, is TV any different than the last few years? And they still don't seem to have wearables right yet.

hyperion2010 12y ago
I read the sentence you quote as referring directly to the engineers who work at google, not android developers.

bjchrist 12y ago

Are google glass completely dead now?

amaks 12y ago

"Having met a lot of Apple employees, I can’t say the same is true on the other side. They seem overly obsessed with Google, and are insanely sensitive should you bring the topic up, or deity of choice forbid, you actually develop on a Google platform." It used to be exactly like that in Microsoft around 2010. Microsofties were extremely sensitive about non-WP devices other employees used. Hopefully things have changed there since then.

fortuitous 12y ago
I was trying to enjoy the company of a friend and his friend turned out to be an Apple executive and had a lot of passive things to say about the fact that I had an android phone. the gist was it was too big, not many apps, and other nitpicking stuff. I couldn't help but think... well gee just try another smaller android phone, but I wanted to just eat dinner and ignored his snide comments. They're definitely obsessed from the top down. IMO, they need to stop whining and give users what they want, a cheaper phone. That could have stopped android years ago, instead they just sued and became indignant. As if that helps. You want to talk about a bubble. I fear the day when apple's revenue drops. I sort of want them to stop bitching and do something, because that day won't be pretty.

_pmf_ 12y ago

Could we please not appropriate the generic term I/O for the gimmicky marketing travesty that is Google I/O? Some people expect an insightful article about system programming.

joeblau 12y ago

> None of them care what phone you use, what laptop you choose or which platforms you develop for. Benedict Evans has a very interesting take on why Google has this sentiment. Basically, it comes down to Apple being about hardware and considering the cloud dumb storage and Google being about cloud services and the hardware being dumb glass (not Google Glass, but hardware interfaces). It seems like Google as a company is in sync, all they want to do is get their cloud services on as many devices as possible because the real value of Google is in the cloud. I agree with Benedict's hypothesis and I can't wait to see how these two companies unfold over the next decade. They currently seem to have two different trajectories.

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