I have an application I've been handed to test, and I'm — shall we say — less than impressed?
I believe the company that built the application for my client didn't build it as an iOS native application; my gut feel is they leveraged one of the multi-target platforms because that's what they're comfortable with. The application's usability is particularly poor, and it just doesn't behave the way an iOS application should.
How can I tell whether this application is native or built on some OS-agnostic platform? Any big give-aways that can tell me?
FWIW, the iPad is the only target platform for this device. It won't need to run anywhere else.
Are you saying that it doesn't have the look and feel of a regular iOS app? It's possible that it has been developed in AIR, HTML5, etc. I don't know if there is much way of doing this without jailbreaking the device.
You could, of course, ask around or post a screenshot and see what others think.
Get the binary out of the device, using softs like DiskAid (free for that part - no jailbreak required), and study it. You may get important infos through a disassembler, such as Hopper, which has support for ARM.
If you can't read assembly, study the application's resources. It may also give you some hints. Again, a software like DiskAid will allow that.
While "some OS-agnostic platform" is a bit broad, there is an easy way to tell if an app was made with PhoneGap, arguably one of the most popular OS-agnostic platforms.
Copy the .ipa file you've been sent (or find it on your filesystem
and copy it).
Rename the copy WhatEverTheAppNameIs.zip.
Extract the zipped folder and open it.
Open the folder named "Payload" (If it isn't already).
Right-click on BlahBlah.app and select "Show Package Contents".
Inspect the bundle.
Check for the presence of a www folder. If it's contents are sizable (compared with the packages contents in general) there's a good chance the whole app was made with PhoneGap.
It's also illuminating to click on the index.html file in the www folder just to see how much of the app runs in desktop Safari.
You may also discover other evidence of OS-agnostic platforms by examining the bundle further.
Related
There is any way to submit to the App Store an Qt Quick Controls application
under LGPLv3 license without violating App Store rules?
What i want to do is to deploy my app on iOS store using a dynamically linked version of the Qt libraries.
I tried to find an answer in every forum but seems very difficult.
Any suggestion is very appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
App Store does not care which license you use. It is the users of your application and the Library authors who care. The main point of the LGPLv3 license is that the end users must have the possibility to replace the library with their own modified version. This is very important to understand, dynamic / static / everything else is just distracting.
Let's move to Qt. It is available with LGPLv3 license on major Desktop (Windows, OSX, Linux) and mobile (iOS, Android) operating systems. Suppose you develop an application and want to keep your source code closed. On the Desktop you can link dynamically to Qt libraries. When the end users install your application, they can replace Qt libraries in the following way:
Compile their own version of Qt libraries
Navigate the the location where the application is installed
Replace original Qt libraies that were shipped with your applicatoin with their own modified versions
Looks easy, right? The main goal of LGPLv3 is achieved. The user can replace libraries.
Moving to the mobile platforms, starting with Android. Even though you link dynamically to the Qt libraries, we now have a small problem. The user can not navigate to C:/Program Files/YourApp and replace Qt libraries, because it's Android. Rooting is not an option, since it doesn't work on every device (and might not be legal). Remember, the main goal of LGPLv3 is to give the users ability to replace the library and run the modified version of your application on their device.
Solution? Provide .apk file to every user who installed your application with detailed instructions on how to:
Unpack your .apk file
Replace Qt libraries
Zipalign / pack / signtool to a new .apk
Install .apk with modified Qt libraries
Let's talk about iOS. Many say it is not possible to use LGPLv3 with iOS because of static linking. Wrong. Again, you just need to give the end user the possibility to replace Qt libraries. How? Provide your object files for the end user to relink. Or even better, put all your application code and resources in a separate Qt Quick plugin which will compile in a static library archive (technically just all object files concatenated together) for iOS. Then for every user who installed your application you have to provide instructions on how to replace Qt libraries:
Download project files and object files from your website
Download XCode and developer tools from Apple website
Replace Qt libraries
Deploy application to your device
Before this was not possible because in order to deploy on the device the user had to enroll Apple Developer Program. But this is not the case any more. You can launch your app on a device using a free Apple ID account
The end user rights are protected. They can replace Qt libraries. Just make sure you do required steps:
Mention in your application that you use Qt libraries and also mention you use them under LGPLv3 license. Provide a link to LGPLv3 lincese.
Make sure your setup of replacing Qt libraries work. Set up a clean virtual machine and do everything step by step. Document it for the end users.
When the users who downloaded your application want to replace Qt libraries, provide them everything so they can do it.
Actually I don't think anyone would care. But you have to be ready just in case. Do not scream you use Qt LGPLv3 on Qt forums, but make sure you have it visible somewhere down in your application's "About" screen. Qt company does not have resources to scan every application from the App Store if it uses Qt or not. Neither they will touch you if you are a small-near-zero-profit. They have more important things to do.
It is very dissapointing however to see absolutely no help from people who work in Qt on the LGPL subject. Most likely all developers were instructed to answer "IANAL, please contact our legal department". The legal department will tell you - buy our commercial license, it's the only option. On the Qt website you can find Obligations of the LGPL. I am not surprised, there is no word about static linking and providing object files for re-link on this page. Qt company simply prefers not to tell anyone it is possible.
From my point of view LGPL was a huge step which enabled a lot of application to use Qt without disclosing their source code bringing huge popularity to Qt. Not to mention Nokia was the one who sponsored Qt on Mobile first (Symbian and then MeeGo).
Also thinking about MeeGo and Blackberry, there was no problem with developing closed source mobile apps that use Qt and publishing them in respective app stores. No commercial license needed.
Update:
This has been done before. LGPL is possible with static linking and App Store. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4302517
In case the question gets closed as off-topic, I copied the answer here
https://opensource.stackexchange.com/questions/6463/in-2018-if-i-use-c-qt-5-10-0-to-build-a-closed-source-application-requires-ope/6495#6495
Yes, it's possible.
You can use this Qt app template:
https://marketplace.qt.io/products/qt-lgpl-app-template
On IOS it's impossible to relink the App, so it's LGPL V3.0 incompatible (user can't replace Qt libraries)
But this template generates a redistributable .zip Qt project on every rebuild.
Their entire private project is distributed in a compiled .a library, so a user can open project in Qt Creator, rebuild their application and load it on their ipad / iphone, and your source code stays protected
Note: If you are using the qtquick compiler, you must relink it to the same version of Qt.
This .zip file can be uploaded to your own URL or you can add it to your software resources.
You can use the same template in an Android app, a static Windows app, etc.
It's the same as #psyched says, but 100% automatically.
This is the error messsage I get.
I know it's kind of an eye roller, that it's difficult nigh impossible to tell what I may need without the source, but it seems like a deployment problem as people that installed the Qt SDK can run it. Plus, I figured I'd have better luck asking here than with a chinese developer that speaks google-english.
So here's what I've done:
I installed the MSVC2012.
I used a program called cffexplorer to see what the exe was looking for. I have the 7 or so .dlls that are at the top of the tree.
I found a recent (jun 2013) qwindows.dll from elsewhere on my system and put it in ./plugins (I've tried this file in ./, ./plugins, and ./plugins/platforms
I created a qt.conf with the following data (I determined the format from an existing Qt based app that works)
[Paths]
Plugins = plugins
Yet, I continue to get this message. Any suggestions on what I might look for to clear this up?
Ask the developer what compiler was used to build the application. Then you will need the right dll (that was built with the same compiler as the application). Also notice that (by default) the documentation says that qwindows.dll should be in the platforms folder in the same path as your executable, read more here. Depending on whether the developer used a Qt built with angle, you may also need: libEGL.dll and libGLESv2.dll. Dependency walker might help you find dependencies that are not there.
We outsourced the development of Blackberry 5, 6, and 7 apps. Please bare in mind that I have absolutely no knowledge of Blackberry development at all.
Development is complete, and they have sent us the source code - a collection of .cod, .csl, .cso, .debug, .jad and .rapc files.
I would at least like to review the code in terms of it's consistency and standards - somewhat a measure of the quality. Clean code is not something specific to any one platform.
I have tried to open each of these files in notepad, but with no source code found.
Please advise me on what I need before I go pay them a visit.
The files you have been given are the files that are created as part of the build of your project and the resultant executable files. There is no source included here.
In a BB OS Build, regardless of the development environment used, the Java source files will all have the suffix .java, and the assets (images etc.) will have a suffix appropriate to the asset (like .png). If you don't see these file suffixes, then you have not been given the actual source. You should be able to view the java files using Notepad, the other files will open in an appropriate application (like paint).
To get the complete source, you should just ask the full 'project' files for your development. This will be a directory with a number of sub directories. The actual names used and the structure will depend on the development tool. If your developer is using Eclipse, then the two important directories are called src for source and res (resources) for the assets. If they are using another development environment, then the directories might have different names. So you should ask them what development environment they are using too.
Two other points:
1) If you are paying for this development and wish to review the code, but are not familiar with Java, then I would recommend that you pay someone to review the code who has knowledge of BB Java. There are two reasons for this:
(a) you will not be able to form a judgement on the appropriateness of the code without some understanding of Java, and
(b) you will not understand if the correct BB Java approaches have been used.
You need to be cautious about this, because programmers will always find fault in other developer's code. The question is how significant the faults are.
2) Some developers might be wary of giving source to their client while some payment is outstanding.
I need to access the sandbox directory for an application installed on an iOS device, using the command line (non-gui) from a Mac or Linux. This is to help with development and testing automation. Dropping a json file into the sandbox lets me set parameters like extra debug messages and smaller refresh intervals.
A tool like iFunBox works perfectly but is graphical only, requiring numerous clicks to do this. Emails to the developers were unanswered. It also does not support AppleScript. I did find another app that provided a Fuse module, but it turned out buggy especially if the app was uninstalled and then reinstalled (in order to reset back to first time user experience). I reported the problems to the developer but there is no fix on the horizon.
The things I need to do are:
Test if an app with a specific bundle id is installed
Create Library/Caches/MYLIBNAME directory if it doesn't exist
Copy a ~100 byte json file from the Mac to that directory
Get a copy of that file
A solution that only works from Linux is acceptable too
Devices are not jailbroken and I would prefer not to need that as a requirement
In some cases I do not have the source code to the app since it is a third party using my library, so compiling different versions of the app isn't practical.
Answer is below in many comments thanks to lxt. Summary is:
Various libraries and programs associated with libimobiledevice can solve the problems
Use patched iFuse to mount an application sandbox
Use idevicesyslog to see the console log
Use ideviceinstaller to install/uninstall apps
The various libraries and programs associated with libimobiledevice are incredibly difficult if not impossible to compile as is on Linux or Mac, and there is no unified distribution of the source or binaries
For Ubuntu try libimobiledevice (may have 3 suffix), ideviceinstaller and libimobiledevice-utils packages
For Mac a search for libimobiledevice-macosx may get you some of the way there
This is going to be a little tricky, because as I think you've found out the application name is randomly generated on every install. I don't think there is a way past that, certainly that I know of. This explains the problems you're running into when simulating a new install (...the app directory name changes to a new, random hash, and then you're stuck).
Although my preference would be to access this config file in some other way (perhaps over a network, and have some code that only executes on debug/test builds check for it), if you did want to do this then I'd suggest trying something like writing a script that when you want to simulate a new install chooses the app directory that's most recently modified. But this is very hacky.
If you're not able to insert conditional code that only executes on debug/ test builds then I think the random app naming schema that iOS uses at a file system level is going to be problematic for you whatever approach you take.
Update: Regarding iFuse and libimobiledevice - out of the box it limits you to the documents directory. This is because the authors of iFuse don't entry-level users to be confused, and also because the structure is a little different depending on iOS version. You can comment out the lines in the iFuse source - fuse_opt_add_arg(&args, "-osubdir=Documents"); - to get access to the library directory through the mount. You will obviously need to re-compile iFuse yourself if doing this.
You can make use of MobileDevice Library
I know this is an old question and I doubt anyone is looking here anymore, but I thought I'd mention that you can use 'brew install libimobiledevice' to compile on the mac. There are a lot of dependencies and Homebrew really helps make it an easy process by installing them for you.
The Apple dev site makes it look as tho it has all the tools you want for developing iPad apps. Should I consider any other tools outside the Apple development tools for iPad development?
Thanks so much in advance for your help!
MonoTouch is another option, if you're a .NET developer looking to do iPhone/iPad development. (Currently MonoTouch has experimental, alpha-level support for iPad, but full support shouldn't be far away.) It's not free, but it's a great tool if you're coming from that background.
Plus it compiles to native code for the iPhone, so can be used for App Store builds and everything.
Adobe has some tools where you can author in Flash/Flex/Air and it will compile down into a valid iPhone/iPad application, that can be accepted and sold in the appstore.
There's also a company called Unity3D http://unity3d.com/unity/features/iphone-publishing.html that has some alternative iPhone/iPad development tools (where you program in C#!)
It depends on what kind of tools you're talking about... If you mean applications, you can use any editor you want for example, like TextMate or Vim or anything else (personally, I hate Xcode's built-in editor, it can't even open files in tabs...). You'll still need to use Xcode for building the app and IB for preparing the interfaces though (unless you want to create entire UI in code, which is madness). I'm not aware of any unofficial tools that can build an iPhone app or create NIB interface files.
If you mean frameworks that allow you to code in something else than ObjC (like Adobe's Flash tools or MonoTouch), then these were recently banned by Apple, so you need to stick to the standard ObjC/Cocoa APIs.