Xcode Application Loader stuck at "Signing in to App Store Connect"

Question

Note: this is NOT the same as being stuck at "Authenticating with the iTunes store" while uploading an app, which is well-documented on SO and elsewhere.

When I first launch Application Loader, I'm prompted for a username and password. I enter my credentials and click Sign In. A message pops up saying "Signing in to App Store Connect" with a little spinner to the left. Then a few seconds later, the spinner goes away, and I'm never brought to the page where I can upload an .ipa. And I'm left questioning my life choices.

I have a coworker who experienced the exact same issue. We each have email addresses associated to 2 Apple Developer accounts, we'll call them nodice.com and allgood.com. We can both sign in to our allgood.com accounts fine. But both of us experience this issue when signing in to our nodice.com accounts.

However, we can both sign in to both accounts at https://developer.apple.com/ and https://appstoreconnect.apple.com/.

The curious difference between the two, is that both of our nodice.com email addresses also belong to other organizations. The allgood.com accounts have only been invited to one organization. In other words, on the websites above, while logged in to the nodice.com account, I can switch between these organizations. On the allgood.com account, I have only one organization to choose from.

Even curiouser is this, which I found by accident: if I close the stuck login screen, I see the "Template Chooser" screen! But the selected team is the one I don't want, and when I click the button, the menu is borked.

Recently Apple made a change -- we all got the email -- that "Teams and roles have been unified" between the Apple Developer website and App Store Connect. This could be related.

We are using Xcode Version 10.1 (10B61) and Application Loader Version 3.7.2 (1138), which as far as I know are the most recent versions.

I have tried modifying the net.properties file as documented here.

I have also tried updating the iTMSTransporter using the instructions found here.

I may just have to file a bug report with Apple, but I'm curious if anyone else has had this issue and has maybe found a workaround.

Answer 1

I experienced this issue recently.. and I seem to have found a work-around. Inside of the Application Loader.app package there's a tool called iTMSTransporter. You can invoke it from the command line to upload your package!

$ /Applications/Xcode10.1.app/Contents/Applications/Application\ Loader.app/Contents/itms/bin/iTMSTransporter -m upload  -assetFile /path/to/YourApp.ipa  -u <[email protected]> -p <password>

This is it in use in it's simplest form: for more options you can run iTMSTransporter --help upload