What you wrote is the obvious part of what I do - test with beta users. I agree that this is a must.
The problem is, sometimes it's impossible to debug what you find. When the issue is not a simple crash stack trace - but rather some behavior, or display issue, you can't just keep ping-ponging versions with a user without wasting whole days on that... You need the device in your hand. And as an indie developer, it's practically impossible to get a hold of many different devices. On Sunday, July 28, 2013 12:47:30 PM UTC+3, Piren wrote: > > Wrote a lengthy response but my browser decided not to post it, so here's > the short version: > > - That's a known problem with android development, it was obvious about a > couple of months after it came out. when the premise of the system is to be > open and as varied as possible, this kind of issues are a given. > - Under your limitations, the best approach is to release the app only to > a small subset of devices it was tested on and expand that subset as time > goes on. Use an open beta group for devices you do not have access to. Even > Netflix was released on only 5 devices. > - iOS development might not have this issue (it has fragmentation, but it > isn't the same as android's), but over all i believe android has a more > developer friendly ecosystem... instead of being frustrated with this, > you'll find more than enough other iOS specific issues that will frustrate > you.. especially since you're used to how Android is. > > > > On Friday, July 26, 2013 1:39:14 AM UTC+3, Omer Gilad wrote: >> >> .I am wondering how developers here are dealing with the fact that there >> are 1000's of devices out there, some of them running your applications in >> very broken ways >> .I keep running into these kind of issues again and again for the past 3 >> years, and to be honest, I'm fed up with it >> .I've decided to move to iOS development, and the only way to convince me >> otherwise is to give me a decent, reliable way of dealing with fragmentation >> >> So what do you do when you develop a game, for example, and try to create >> a high-quality user experience on Google Play? >> Do you do your QA on 50 different devices? 100? 1000? >> Or do you just shoot blindly and hope that it works, or wait for users to >> send you bug reports? >> >> To make it clear, I'm not talking about "official" fragmentation. >> I don't talk about different screen sizes, densities, features, OS >> versions and so on. >> I talk about the "unofficial" fragmentation. The fact that most devices, >> even the popular ones from the big companies like Samsung, HTC, Motorola, >> LG and so on, contain tons of implementation bugs that prevent apps from >> working correctly. >> I'm talking about the fact that you can call a certain simple API, test >> it on a stock Android ROM (like on Nexus 4), and then have your application >> crash on some Samsung, that decided to break the implementation because of >> some customization. >> >> How can people stand that? >> How is it possible to write code, when the machine that executes it is >> completely broken in unexpected ways? >> >> I'm really fed up with it. >> About 50% of my Android development time is wasted on babysitting broken >> devices. >> I'm waiting for an official Google response about this, and what have you >> been doing in all those years to fix that. >> I've heard about things like "conformance tests" for devices and so on, >> but the reality is far from acceptable in this area. >> >> ,Looking forward for helpful responses >> Omer >> > -- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
