this post was submitted on 06 Mar 2024
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Dev accounts are free. It’s only when you want to post stuff to the store that you start paying.
You mean when you want to make it available to download in the only way Apple makes possible? It's not like you can just send the apk to someone to run on their iPhone, if you want to share the app with others on an iPhone, you have to use the Apple App Store, you have to pay them $100 + the cost of an Apple computer. Just to share your FOSS app with your friends.
on iOS its called ipa
If dev accounts are free your friends can get their own accounts and load the app.
It just works™️
Sideloading on android is also more complex than the play store
You're not even good at whataboutism, lol. Changing one setting is not even comparable to Apple's perfection. The message that you need to allow it first even takes you straight to the setting.
So... More complex than the play store?
Not really: You don't need to log in. That is more effort than enabling sources ;)
Don't forget that registration also requires an email account! And a phone number! All of that is not necessary for sideloading in Android.
You log in once when you buy the phone, for email, maps, calendar, play store, browser, messaging, drive, home automation, YouTube...
And before that you need to register and validate your contact data. Even the act of that one login is more work than changing one setting to allow sideloading. Your point is just completely wrong.
I did that in 2008, once. For sideloading you need to find the apk every single install and update. Several minutes, several times a week.
Right, and since 2008 not a single thing has changed in this world.
Who cares? I did it once and haven't had to do it again. Zero tinkering. No looking for apks every day.
Did this change? It was about a decade ago. I could develop and test on an emulated device, but testing on hardware was 100% locked behind a $100 paywall.
I could be reading this wrong, but it looks like TestFlight allows you to distribute internally without going through the App Store.
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/distributing-your-app-for-beta-testing-and-releases
It mentions the apple developer program which is what I assume the 100 dollar subscription is. I keep seeing people say dev accounts are free but any tools beyond the dev environment are paywalled.
I wasn't even talking about app stores; I never published anything to Google play, just loaded through usb from android studio. The apple program didn't allow even that.
Before TestFlight was a thing, you could self-sign your own apps (.ipa) and install them to local devices through iTunes over a USB cable connected to the device. The developer signing certificate for this was/is free, included when you sign up for the free version of Apple Developer account.
Nowadays it looks like you can still do this directly from Xcode. See section: “Connect real devices to your Mac”
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/running-your-app-in-simulator-or-on-a-device
*The mention of Apple Developer Program in the bullet points of this section is an “if” and is optional. It’s not required for testing apps on local devices.