Select Page
Blog - Apple’s Surprise iOS Release Caused Developer Headaches

Apple’s Surprise iOS Release Caused Developer Headaches

If you’re one of the many iOS developers out there, then September 15, 2020, is a date you won’t soon forget. It started off pretty exciting: Apple announced its next major iOS update, iOS 14. But excitement quickly turned to panic when Apple announced that iOS 14 would be released the next day.

App developers were left to question: What would this mean for our apps nearing production? How could we possibly test our apps on time to ensure compatibility with the new iOS? Was there any hope to release by the next day?

Needless to say, this surprise release date caused chaos and disruption for many app developers, who are often the ones to bear the brunt of the blame if an app fails. Developers who chose to delay their app release to support iOS 14 were hit especially hard.

How It Usually Works

Normally, there’s a notification of a new public iOS release about a week in advance. A “golden master” (GM) copy of the new iOS and XCode developer tool is released so that developers can make sure the apps they’ve built for the beta release of the new iOS actually work on the final version.

Sometimes, changes from the beta to the final version cause critical bugs to appear in the app. You can only discover and fix these issues during this point in the process.

Once the developers iron out all the issues, the app’s release date can coincide with the launch of the new iOS. This gives the app a chance to appear on review sites, blog posts and tech news articles reporting the newest iOS features and the apps that take advantage of them.

The Consequences

Many developers would agree that the tight deadline imposed by the unexpected release date was impossible to meet.

For an app to work in iOS 14, it must be built with Apple’s XCode 12 GM build, which had just then been released. This meant developers were forced to download XCode 12 right away and rebuild their app using it, hoping everything would work the same as it did in the XCode beta versions.

Many developers would agree that the tight deadline imposed by the unexpected release date was impossible to meet.

If all went well there, the app still needed to make it through the submission process. App Review can take anywhere from a few hours to a day — or longer.

That leaves little margin for error. As a developer, you could do everything right and the app still might not release on time. Alternatively, if the app has unexpected bugs due to changes in the final iOS 14 release, it likely will receive negative reviews. In either scenario, your app won’t make it to any “Best of…” lists that publish around a new iOS release.

In addition, some developers were at a disadvantage time-wise as they scrambled to submit their apps, especially those in Europe and on the East Coast of the United States. The announcement happened around 2 p.m. ET/11:00 a.m. PST on Sept. 15. Developers on the West Coast of the United States had roughly half a working day to accomplish everything before iOS 14 went live, whereas developers on the East Coast had a couple hours, and developers anywhere east of the United States had no chance at all.

What’s Next?

It would be nice to think the iOS 14 release was an anomaly. But what if it’s not? It may very well be Apple’s template for future iOS announcements. While it isn’t great news, we’re not powerless. We can prepare for it by flexing up our testing processes, including for regression testing.

It would be nice to think the iOS 14 release was an anomaly. But what if it’s not?

One way to do this is to increase the flexibility and around-the-clock nature of your testing. Applause offers real-world testing with 24/7 availability to enable a company to get overnight testing results using testers sourced from a global community.

With Applause, your build is assigned to a dedicated team of vetted testers on an as-needed basis in real time. The testers on your team will be based on attributes such as devices owned, location, demographics and so on. Using the Applause interface, you can see bug reports in real time and take action right away.

So if Apple were to announce on a Tuesday in next September that iOS 15 is going to be released a day later, your Applause team could test your app as soon as you’re ready to test, and give you an opportunity to confidently release your app close to the launch of the new iOS. You might not be happy with the quick turnaround, but it’d be a less stressful night at least.

Whitepapers

The Essential Guide To Mobile App Testing

To effectively test mobile apps, now and into the future, enterprises must ensure a strong user experience from the beginning. Here’s how to implement an effective mobile testing strategy.

Read 'The Essential Guide To Mobile App Testing' Now

Apps targeting young people

Naturally, banks and online brokers are also increasingly offering mobile solutions for stock trading. However, this new group of fintech startups has a different structure than traditional providers. As international apps with social media appeal, they are aimed at a particularly young target group of 25- to 35-year-olds who want not only access to stock trading but also a new kind of user experience. It has become clear that accessibility and user-friendliness are key selling points for these new investment apps. For example, according to Bitkom’s Digital Finance Report 2020, 40% of respondents expressed the expectation that “smartphone apps’ ease of use for stock and securities transactions will enable more people to benefit from companies’ performances.”

In a nutshell, the easy access via smartphones makes these “neobrokers” so appealing. Clear design, community integration, and ease of entry has turned UI/UX into an actual product.

Special opportunities – special risks?

Many apps have little to no limit on how small a trade can be, making it possible to buy fractional shares. As mentioned, they charge very low fees — or none at all — and are available outside of regular trading hours. The apps clearly aim to lower the entry threshold for stock trading, and sometimes lure new users with free shares. On the flip side, the apps offer no or minimal investing advice, unlike traditional brokers. Consequently, purchasers must do their own research outside of the app, using articles, forums and social media. This aspect has raised suspicions in the German market. In the survey undertaken for the Bitkom Digital Finance Report referenced above, 69% of respondents stated that “an advisor’s input is absolutely key to making good investment decisions.” As a result, the separation of professional advisory services and the gamification of trading stocks carries certain risks, especially for inexperienced users.

Too much power?

The potential dynamics unleashed by direct market access were demonstrated in an interesting case study in January. Small investors coordinated a purchase of GameStop stock via Reddit to prevent a decline in the company’s value, on which hedge funds had speculated. In fact, the Reddit community’s actions were so successful that U.S. authorities are now investigating the possibility of market manipulation. Outrage erupted, however, when Robinhood simply suspended trading in GameStop shares at the height of the buying frenzy.

Ultimately, the neobroker did have a good reason for halting trading. The security it had deposited with clearinghouse DTCC was insufficient to match increased trading volume. However, this episode illustrates that some luster has fallen from the new market power of small investors: Even trading apps do not eliminate the intermediary function; they only replace it, sometimes with even more opaque conditions than before.

The outlook is promising

And yet, neobrokers are attracting young investors by reinventing the process of investing and stock trading. With pleasing designs and customer experiences geared toward millennials, these apps will be able to gain many users in the next few years. At that point, they will have to show that they can keep up with the momentum that they created. Users expect apps, acting as financial service providers and managers of highly sensitive data, to be error-free at all times and in all places – and rightly so. User trust and compliance with financial rules will play a crucial role in determining whether neobrokers will remain competitive as market penetration continues.

However, the new investment apps’ penetration of the DACH market is still at an early stage. Established providers, especially banking apps, may leverage the trend by incorporating a more attractive UX and simplified investment features into their existing apps. For example, a whitepaper from the Sparkassen Innovation Hub on the topic of changing values recommends “opening up products to small investment amounts” as well as “using a clear, appealing interface (UI), playful elements for data entry and maintenance, [and] the use of status and progress indicators to guide users through processes” to attract a new group of potential investors.

One thing is certain: The phenomenal growth of investment and trading apps, especially in Germany, could be a precursor to interesting developments in the coming years.

View all blogs ⟶
Dan Cagen
Dan Cagen
Former Product Marketing Manager
Published On: November 5, 2020
Reading Time: 5 min
Customer Journey

Avoiding The Hidden Cost of Payment Failures

Learn how you can improve your payment experience and protect revenue across markets, methods, and moments.
AI Training & Testing

Claude Code Crash Course: How to Master Claude Code for QA Engineering

Discover how you can use Claude Code to safely implement AI tools and skills to accelerate your testing lifecycle.
AI Training & Testing

Why Test Plans Fail in the Real World

Your current test strategy might be the reason products fail. Find out why test plans must be adaptable.
AI Training & Testing

How to Conduct AI Evals: Best Practices for Building AI Confidence

Discover why AI evals are crucial for releasing with confidence and get best practices for improving AI system performance.
Integrated Functional

Crowdtesting vs. System Integrators

Compare system integrator testing with managed crowdtesting services to find the right QA approach for real-world digital quality.
AI Training & Testing

EU AI Act: A Practical Guide for QA Leaders

See how the EU AI Act affects QA and product leaders — and how to adapt testing workflows ahead of compliance deadlines.
No results found.
This site is registered on wpml.org as a development site. Switch to a production site key to remove this banner.