Apple rejected iPad app for using pinch to expand gesture
appleinsider.com
appleinsider.com
Apple may be doing this to demonstrate that it owns multi-touch and that it will not tolerate 3rd party multi-touch implementations.
This would be in their defense in the suit against HTC.
I hope that the case is actually what was stated above, and that apple releases this in their next API version, its a sensible approach.
then again, since there is only one way to load in apps, they can dictate whatever disabling of technology they want, with poorly explained reasons, and it stinks.
http://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/documentation/UIKi...
http://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/documentation/Gene...
We don't know the whole story here, but those saying that this rejection happened because Apple only wants its own apps to use the pinch gesture clearly have no clue what they're talking about.
I don't think the pinch gesture specifically was the issue, but instead the "pinch to expand" meaning spreading out a stack of items with a pinch. We asked the reviewer to clarify what exactly constituted a "pinch to expand" but they just replied with the exact same wording, kinda frustrating.
Speaking with somebody directly about this, and basically, their stance is: coverflow is an experience owned by Apple. If you imitate it poorly or inaccurately, users will have a bad / confusing experience (Apple's call what 'poorly or inaccurately' means, of course).
If software patents are evil, then at least predictable evil is easier to deal with than unknown lurking evil...
Apple should rightly be roasted for this kind of bullying. There's nothing about pinch-to-expand that would threaten Apple's control over the user experience in any way.
But you have to wonder why you would want in at all, if your apps are going to be competitionally crippled against Apple's apps.
Illegal to use native look and feel is pretty ludicrous. But it's their game.
Apple 's attitude of power is therefore ridiculous, they seem to think that their tablet PC is something only they can develop and master, however it's not. Soon there will be millions of free and of equivalent quality Tablet PC's around and Apple 's iPad will only constitute a minority of them.
If nothing else, some non-US company is going to come up with their own tablet tailored to the local language and use the dual advantages of openness and cultural expertise to trounce them in those markets. In face several companies could do this at the same time. It's very easy to see how Apple could lose market leadership on the international stage this way.
N.B. Moblin merged with Maemo to become MeeGo -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MeeGo
With few (no) details on why.
It is not clear if this Apple response is even relevant to this submitter's application.
These folks could have gotten punted for some other expected reason.
Or this could be advertising their stuff by submitting something they knew would get rejected, and then resubmitting without it.
We do not know what's really going on here. On most any aspect of this.
We asked the reviewer to clarify and they just replied with the same unclear language but specific to our app. They did specifically ask us to remove the "tap and pinch to expand gesture." When we replaced it with just the tap they let it through.
One thing I have to say is after trying the gesture on the device and not just the simulator it's was a little slow but still usable. We've since fixed it so we'll see if it gets through in the future.
Why?
Here's my theory. Let's say you have a fantastic application such as Web Albums HD (I'm assuming it's fantastic for the purpose of my argument). Then presumably once there are competitive tablets on other platforms, the developers would port their application to other platforms. The user would say, "Gee, I can get this application on any platform. So what's the big deal with the Apple tablet".
But if you end up primarily using Apple applications because they are the only version available due to app store restrictions (web browser, email, voicemail) or they have a superior experience due to app store restrictions (photos, ebook readers), you'll be less likely to switch to another platform.
Although, by using these techniques, the end result is a worse user experience, which seems very anti the Apple I knew. (I say this as a former employee)
I can understand Apple refusing apps where the experience sucks, but forcing developers to modify their app to make the UX worse than Apple's bundled app seems a little ridiculous and anti-consumer.