Pre-release checklist before building final version for App Store

Question

Curious what practices people have learned before making their final build and submitting to the App Store? Aside from switching from Debug to Release & commenting out calls to NSLog what other basic and/or not so basic things should we be watching out for?

Answer 1

This is a good question and I'd like to restate some of the answers and add a few of my own. I've made this answer Community Wiki, feel free to add to it.

1. Delete the app from your device, turn off WiFi, off cellular data, now install and test app. Does it work properly (as much as it can without Internet)? Does it at least tell the user that a network connection is required (if it is) or does it crash?

2. If you use CLLocationManager: Delete the app, fresh install and run, but do not allow app to have Location Data. Does the app behave well or does it crash? Does it at least tell the user that it can't run without location data (if that is a requirement)? Does it work on an iPod Touch that does all geo location using WiFi only?

3. Run the app in the simulator and for each view controller do the following steps: (a) From the iPhone Simulator menu select "Hardware" --> "Simulate Memory Warning", (b) now navigate around your app to other view controllers and see if everything is working, (c) repeat test for another view controller.

4. If you support older firmware (ie: iOS 3.1.3), install your app on a device running 3.1.3 and test it there (if you don't have one, use the 3.2 simulator).

5. Start your app while on a phone call or when Personal Hotspot is active. Are all the screen layouts correct (the status bar is 40px high instead of 20)? Did the bottom 20px of the view get pushed off the screen or did it resize correctly?

6. Accept a phone call while in your app, does it resign active and resume properly? Do sounds from your app stop playing while in the phone call?

7. Start your app while playing music, does the music continue to play? Do your sounds mix properly or fade the music appropriately?

8. Test performance on a slower devices with limited RAM such as: iPhone 3G (128MB RAM, 412Mhz CPU) or iPod Touch (1st or 2nd gen).

9. Run the Clang static analyzer and fix (or at least understand) every warning.

10. Make sure NSZombiesEnabled is NO in the environment variables (caution: not sure if this is still a problem)

Answer 2

A few things:

I actually recommend not creating a build configuration called "Distribution" as Apple specifies, because I often am creating ad hoc builds for beta testers. I create two build configurations, one called Ad Hoc and one called AppStore, so I'm not confused. The only difference between the two is the presence of the Entitlements.plist file for the Ad Hoc build. This way I can test as closely as possible what I will be submitting to Apple.

Most developers are optimists. That's why we are working weekends to create an app that we just know is going to make us a millionaire. Before submitting though, be a pessimist. Imagine everything that can possibly go wrong, and double check it.

Don't assume anything. Don't assume that that tiny little change you made to the app won't affect anything else. Murphy's Law says that that tiny change will cause your app to crash on all iPod Touches or something. Test, test, test thoroughly between the final code edit and Appstore submission. If you have to make a tiny change, then repeat until it's perfect.

Remember that if the app doesn't crash for 99.9% of your users, then 1 out of every 1,000 downloads will result in a 1-star scathing review.

I use Clang static analyzer, Leaks and Object Allocations during development, but I do an extra run of these tools before submission just in case.

If you don't have an older device, get one, because the 3GS performance is significantly better and you may miss some important performance issues.

Test your app with the following configurations when network or location are applicable:

• iPod Touch
• iPhone 3G
• iPhone 3GS
• iPhone in Airplane mode
• iPhone with Wi-Fi
• iPhone with EDGE
• Call the phone while using your app

Answer 3

Instead of switching to Release, I switch to "Distribution". It's a copy of Release, but that's is how I got taught by some Apple doc and iPhoneDeveloperTips.

Important points:

After the final build, but before you rush off to zip up your app, open the bundle using the Finder's Show Package Contents. Due to some bug in the MacOS, which bit me in versions prior to Snow Leopard (and it might still be there), if you zip up too fast (using the Finder's Compress or Archive menu item), some of the resources have yet to be flushed out into the file. When you do a Show Package Contents, the contents get updated. The way you would notice this problem is that the size of your compressed app would be between a fifth to a tenth or less of the expected size. You might think to yourself, "hey, that zip utility really does a great job of compressing", but that's not the case. This problem would occur at this point instead of during testing mainly because you are doing a "clean all" build and all the resources and contents of the app bundle are starting out empty and then being filled by Xcode. And for some reason, even after Xcode is done creating the file, the contents are still not actually there, if you compress, but would be there if you looked at them (sort of a reverse Heisenberg). Beware.

Another area I spend a lot of time on is to make a nice backup of the sources, after I have committed all the latest changes to SVN, made a new branch, and tagged the file. I also like to have my version number match my SVN build/commit number so I always know which SVN version matches my release. I have those two version numbers in my info.plist and can be pulled up by the app user when they hit i for info. For example, a current info.pist includes:

<key>CFBundleShortVersionString</key>
<string>2.0a1</string>
<key>CFBundleVersion</key>
<string>346</string>

There are different thoughts on how to use the CFBundleVersion. This is my way. Also useful is the command line utility, agvtool.

Once the app is built, after compressing so you're not actually making any changes to the compressed version, go check the app file and make sure it is signed with the right distribution cert and not your adhoc one. Learning to use the command line utility, codesign, is helpful for this kind of checking and debugging. By making the compressed copy first, you ensure that you're not in any way going to change the final copy that Xcode has handed you and that you will upload to itunesconnect, if all looks well.

Other things to remember are the app icon, the various other icons and graphics you need for the iTunes store, the info.plist, and the fact that when the uploading of the app fails with a cryptic error message, it usually has to do with one of these pieces being missing from the compressed file you are building (those pieces that belong in the app bundle).