“Beta testing apps has long been a pain point for iOS developers. So it’s no surprise that the announcement of TestFlight as part of iOS 8 was met with much fanfare at WWDC 2014,” Nick Arnott reports for iMore. “Since Apple’s acquisition of Burstly (makers of TestFlight), there has been a lot of speculation and hope that Apple could finally release a more friendly solution for handling the distribution of beta apps. TestFlight marks a significant advancement for Apple in that area, and a welcome change for developers.”
“The first significant change is TestFlight will not require developers or testers to deal with UDIDs or provisioning profiles,” Arnott reports. “Currently, in order to add a new device, the flow goes like this: 1. Developer asks tester for UDID (and has to provide instructions on how to retrieve it if the tester doesn’t know how) 2. Tester uses an application to retrieve the UDID 3. Tester sends UDID to developer 4. Developer logs into Apple’s Developer Portal 5. Developer adds the tester’s device to the account 6. Developer adds the new device to the appropriate provisioning profile 7. Developer updates app with new profile 8. Developer distributes app to tester.”
Arnott reports, “The exact flow may differ depending on what tools a developer is using, but that’s more or less how it works. TestFlight’s flow looks like it’s going to be more like this: 1. Tester tells developer their Apple ID 2. Developer logs in to iTunes Connect 3. Developer sends email invitation to tester 4. Tester accepts invitation 5. Tester installs app via TestFlight app.”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: Our developer Empirical Development used TestFlight for the current (v.3.1) version our MacDailyNews app prior to Apple’s acquisition and it was a joy for us to test each beta as our app progressed vs. dealing with the previous UDIDs/provisioning mess.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related article:
Apple acquires Burstly app testing and advertising company – February 21, 2014
Well, I like the MDN app very much, so good job with the TestFlight development.
Are you saying that you’re using the MDN app via TestFlight?
Of course, he/she is not, not a beta tester.
“Tester tells developer their Apple ID”
What could possibly go wrong?
Did I miss the part where you have to tell the developer your password too?