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This is actually just one of the many ridiculous decisions taken by the App Store review team. The truth is that developers keep getting forced to remove functi

by milen 12y ago

This is actually just one of the many ridiculous decisions taken by the App Store review team. The truth is that developers keep getting forced to remove functionality, sometimes the decisions are reversed but not always (and it might only work if you've got a large enough following). I've had enough of this stuff and I've voted with my feet - I no longer develop for iOS and I'm back to the Mac, outside the MAS. My absence won't make any difference to Apple but it makes a huge difference to my wellbeing and health by not having to deal with this stuff. It pains me so much to see fellow developers' efforts just thrown down the garbage bin. It's extremely demotivating to have your work crippled when you're striving to create the best software. The reason why this keeps happening and will continue is simple - there are hundreds of thousands of people developing for iOS, it's Apple's playground and their rules - if you don't like it, you can leave. If you're an indie, you have zero leverage, that's the reality. I honestly hope things improve in the future but until that happens, I'm done with it. A few recent examples where the (Mac) App Store cripples apps: - Drafts get asked to remove widget while other widgets to do the exact same http://www.macrumors.com/2014/12/02/apple-drafts-widget-removal/ http://www.macrumors.com/2014/12/02/apple-drafts-widget-remo... - Rejected for slide to start, which is a gesture not even used anymore: http://mjtsai.com/blog/2014/11/25/racesplitter-rejected-for-slide-to-start/ http://mjtsai.com/blog/2014/11/25/racesplitter-rejected-for-... - Sandbox forces feature removal http://mjtsai.com/blog/2014/12/02/garagepays-encryption-removed/ http://mjtsai.com/blog/2014/12/02/garagepays-encryption-remo... - Notification Center rejection http://www.macrumors.com/2014/11/18/apple-cracks-down-on-neato/ http://www.macrumors.com/2014/11/18/apple-cracks-down-on-nea... - PCalc got asked to remove calculator but then decision reversed http://www.macstories.net/ios/apple-asks-pcalc-developer-to-remove-ios-8-widget/ http://www.macstories.net/ios/apple-asks-pcalc-developer-to-...

0x0 12y ago
Everyone should head over to https://www.apple.com/feedback/ https://www.apple.com/feedback/ and drop off a quick note about this. It seemed to help in getting the pcalc decision reversed.
eridius 12y ago
> Notification center rejection Wait, that app had a fake keyboard inside a notification center widget? That's truly awful and roundly deserved to get rejected. > Sandbox forces feature removal I don't see how this is relevant to your comment. This wasn't a decision by app store review, or anything like that at all. This appears to simply be that the app was using functionality that is not possible to do inside the sandbox. If he was shipping on the MAS before, he must have been using a temporary exemption and would have known that it would have to get removed once those temporary exemptions stopped being allowed. This is a purely technical limitation and has nothing to do with the sort of management issues you're complaining about. > Slide to start That seems like a legit rejection to me as well. Looking at the actual screenshots, they tried to make their control look and feel pretty damn close to the official Apple control. This is a control that Apple spent years training people meant "unlock" (or more specifically, "unlock device"). So even though Apple isn't using it right now, they're still well within their rights to claim that it is too similar to Apple's own UI widget (especially for something that does completely different functionality). I bet that if the slider didn't look so intentionally similar to Apple's own widget, he wouldn't have had an issue. But he deliberately aped Apple's UI, and should have expected this to eventually happen. I'm also a bit irked that he's trying to play this up as a big "I got a bogus rejection!" thing and completely ignored the fact that Apple told him to remove or revise it. The issue is not that the act of sliding a finger across a screen to start the race is verboten. It's that his widget is too similar to Apple's UI. Note the actual quotes: > 8.3: Apps that appear confusingly similar to an existing Apple product, interface, or advertising theme will be rejected [emphasis mine] > The “slide to start the stopwatch” is similar to the “slide to unlock in iOS device”. > Thank you for your message. In order for the app to be reconsidered for the App Store, please remove or revise the Slide To Start feature. Have a good day. [emphasis mine] > Specifically, the Slide to Start Race UI element is not appropriate and not in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines as it is too similar to the iOS Slide to Unlock UI. [emphasis mine] Instead of trying to stoke public outrage, he should just accept that his UI widget, which was very obviously based directly on the slide-to-unlock widget, should be altered to not look so similar. -- Yes, there are bogus decisions. PCalc is a good example. But there are also plenty of valid rejections too (many orders of magnitude more). And it's a mistake to think that every publicized rejection is invalid.
deleted 12y ago
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dmead 12y ago
why are you qualifying it as "the apple store review team"? it's just apple. maybe people have trouble associating this kind of bad behavior because the branding is so strong? are you mind controlled?

by milen 12y ago

0x0 12y ago

Everyone should head over to https://www.apple.com/feedback/ https://www.apple.com/feedback/ and drop off a quick note about this. It seemed to help in getting the pcalc decision reversed.

eridius 12y ago

> Notification center rejection Wait, that app had a fake keyboard inside a notification center widget? That's truly awful and roundly deserved to get rejected. > Sandbox forces feature removal I don't see how this is relevant to your comment. This wasn't a decision by app store review, or anything like that at all. This appears to simply be that the app was using functionality that is not possible to do inside the sandbox. If he was shipping on the MAS before, he must have been using a temporary exemption and would have known that it would have to get removed once those temporary exemptions stopped being allowed. This is a purely technical limitation and has nothing to do with the sort of management issues you're complaining about. > Slide to start That seems like a legit rejection to me as well. Looking at the actual screenshots, they tried to make their control look and feel pretty damn close to the official Apple control. This is a control that Apple spent years training people meant "unlock" (or more specifically, "unlock device"). So even though Apple isn't using it right now, they're still well within their rights to claim that it is too similar to Apple's own UI widget (especially for something that does completely different functionality). I bet that if the slider didn't look so intentionally similar to Apple's own widget, he wouldn't have had an issue. But he deliberately aped Apple's UI, and should have expected this to eventually happen. I'm also a bit irked that he's trying to play this up as a big "I got a bogus rejection!" thing and completely ignored the fact that Apple told him to remove or revise it. The issue is not that the act of sliding a finger across a screen to start the race is verboten. It's that his widget is too similar to Apple's UI. Note the actual quotes: > 8.3: Apps that appear confusingly similar to an existing Apple product, interface, or advertising theme will be rejected [emphasis mine] > The “slide to start the stopwatch” is similar to the “slide to unlock in iOS device”. > Thank you for your message. In order for the app to be reconsidered for the App Store, please remove or revise the Slide To Start feature. Have a good day. [emphasis mine] > Specifically, the Slide to Start Race UI element is not appropriate and not in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines as it is too similar to the iOS Slide to Unlock UI. [emphasis mine] Instead of trying to stoke public outrage, he should just accept that his UI widget, which was very obviously based directly on the slide-to-unlock widget, should be altered to not look so similar. -- Yes, there are bogus decisions. PCalc is a good example. But there are also plenty of valid rejections too (many orders of magnitude more). And it's a mistake to think that every publicized rejection is invalid.

deleted 12y ago

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dmead 12y ago

why are you qualifying it as "the apple store review team"? it's just apple. maybe people have trouble associating this kind of bad behavior because the branding is so strong? are you mind controlled?