I have a very strait forward question (and yes I've looked though apple documentation to see if this has an answer but no luck... I may have accidentally missed it though)
Here's my plan:
The problem I've been trying to find a workaround for is that if the admin would ever want to add a product, he would have to log into iTunes connect to add it and also add it in a custom control panel. We, obviously, don't want to make him suffer that so I've been looking for a solution but I need you guys to tell me if it's allowed by apple. Basically I will take over most of the product handling on our servers and will only go to apple with the transactions. This means that apple will not have an in-app purchase set up for ALL the products... only one for each length of subscription (1 month, 3 month... etc) and a few consumable in-app purchases for the various prices of the issues/singles
Side note: I will be selling monthly issues that contain multiple singles for each day of the month. The user will be able to download a full month or a single day at a time if they like.
DEFINITION OF CONSUMABLE PURCHASE - products must be purchased each time the user needs that item. For example, one-time services are commonly implemented as consumable products.
So I will store all the information in our server about the products and if someone chooses to buy a single month's issue that was set to 4.99 (on our server, not apples) then the app will run the in-app purchase with apple that is listed for the 4.99 tier. Whenever a person opens the app for the first time, their app will send some information to our server and they will have a row set aside for them where all the information about their purchases will be recorded so that they can restore them if they switch over to another device.
If you guys think i'm safe in doing this, please let me know so that I can proceed. Also, if this method helps anyone, feel free to use it!
Thanks,
Matt
I think your restore process might be flawed. You talk about the app sending some information up to your server, but what is that information? There is no reliable way to uniquely identify a user across different devices.
If you want to continue on this path you'll want to make sure that your recovery and failover process is very solid. Try out every imaginable scenario. From an app store submission point of view, you'll want to consider a token/coin-based approach. Of course, Apple's guidelines are fairly loose and subject to change so it's always possible you'll get rejected, but tokens are certainly more solid than simply using the same generic in-app purchase.
In a token system, you would set up in-app purchases for different numbers of tokens that the user can purchase as a sort-of virtual currency only valid within your application. Then users can spend these tokens on any items that you dynamically create.
Server-side this means you'll need some way to store how many tokens a user currently has and a way to uniquely identify a user across devices, which is a fairly uncertain proposition. Instead of storing the number of tokens each user has, you could implement some sort of hashing algorithm that generates a hash from an in-app purchase receipt and then sends it up to your server. If the app crashes or the network dies after purchase but before sending your hashes up, next time they open the app you can recalculate all of the hashes, send 'em up, and if the server doesn't recognize a hash it just adds it to the database. Then if a user wants to restore their purchases you simply recalculate the hashes on the device using the in-app purchase receipts you'll receive and then send them up to your server and ask the server to figure out for each of those hashes, how many tokens the user has left. You could think of it like a gift card system, where each hash is one gift card.
Again, app store rules change and if apple thinks you're trying to game the system and not provide a useful experience they have the right to reject you. It could be worthwhile to open a Developer Technical Support request and see if an apple engineer can provide you with a better solution or tell you if the reviewers are likely to accept your application.
Related
OK I'm working on a app where the user purchases the app from the App Store, gets access to the app for a year, and then after the year has passed they are sent to an In-App Purchase screen where they can purchase a subscription for continued access.
(this is not the subscription model I'd implement if it were up to me, but the client insists that it follow this model)
In order for it to work, though, I need a reliable way to check when the app was purchased, in order to calculate when the first year of access ends. Following the suggestions in one of the answers in...
iOS App Purchase Date
...I've gotten the app receipt and I can find all the data fields that the documentation says there are, but there are also a few others including "original_purchase_date" (not the one in the IAP receipt array; the one for the app receipt itself). This would appear to be what I want. However this field is undocumented.
As far as I can tell, Apple security operates via a form of "Security Through Obscurity/Diversity", so it's been difficult to find further information about these undocumented data fields. My concern is that I might use the data from this field, and then discover that it was only there in sandbox mode and actual receipts don't have it. Worse, what if I reference that field and then Apple releases a new iOS update that completely discards that field from its implementation? Undocumented features are even less reliable than deprecated features, after all.
My question is this: is there a reliable source of information somewhere where I can find out what Apples intends regarding this field? Or better yet, is there another, safer way of achieving the system my client wants?
You have to implement it as a free app that requires a subscription IAP. Paying for an app cannot be its subscription cost.
Check rule 11.12 here: https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#purchasing-currencies
Apps offering subscriptions must do so using IAP, Apple will share the
same 70/30 revenue split with developers for these purchases, as set
forth in the Program License Agreement
Implementing it the way your client wants will result in rejection.
I want to offer my app free for a period and then charge to continue using it. I understand that the way to do this is to force the user to buy an In-App product after the free period. However, if I simply record the date that the user starts using the app in the standardUserDefaults and use this to calculate when the user must buy the upgrade the user could simply delete the app when the time arrives (I assume the sandbox is also deleted) and download the app again for another free period.
First question. Is my reasoning so far correct?
Second question. Is there any way of accessing the date that an app is first downloaded?
Assuming the answers to these questions are Yes and No I have come up with the following solution.
Upon downloading the app the user is first forced to "buy" free an In-App product which then will have the date it was added to the transaction queue. This In-App product would then be downloaded for any subsequent download and I could use the date of this product as my reference date.
As I can find no reference to this problem or solutions I really wanted confirmation that this was a sound way to proceed or if there was another more standard way of dealing with the problem.
Thank you
Silas
You are not allowed to limit you app for free for a limited period:
11.9 Apps containing content or services that expire after a limited time will be rejected, except for specific approved content (e.g.
films, television programs, music, books)
If you want to risk it, you could save the date (encrypted) in keychain to make it more persistent. Just so you know, user are able to access their keychain data if they iCloud keychain sharing and are on a Mac. So if they delete the correct key or rest there device your app will fall back to the free/trial mode.
This does not seem entirely consistent with:
Communicate the value of your products to your users. Users want to
know exactly what they’re going to buy. Combine information from the
App Store, such as product prices and descriptions, with additional
data from your server or the app bundle, such as images or demos of
your products. Let users interact with a product in a limited way
before buying it. For example, a game that gives the user the option
to buy new race cars can allow users to run a test lap with the new
car. Likewise, a drawing app that lets the user buy additional brushes
can give users the chance to draw with the new brush on a small
scratch pad and see the difference between brushes. This kind of
design provides users an opportunity to experience the product and be
convinced they want to purchase it.
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/StoreKitGuide/Chapters/ShowUI.html
One way of letting the user interact with a product feature in a limited way is to let them use it a few times before requiring that they pay to use the feature.
I have a client that needs to have its volunteers purchase an IAP (A data package that is downloaded), then somehow reimburse them. The problem is that there is no easy way to do this that I think Apple will approve of. Especially for over 1500 people. I've come up with several ways of doing this with their pros and cons, which one would be best to implement and does anyone have any other suggestions on how to do this?
1) Have the client send out iTunes gift cards via email. The IAP is $7, and you can't send a gift card less than $10. Also, they would have to send them one at a time, there is no way to send bulk. Not going to work
2) Create gift codes like iTunes gift cards. My client can purchase codes in bulk via IAP (so Apple still gets their money), and store them on my web server securely. I can then implement a system to send all the codes to a single email, or individually to multiple emails. Then the volunteers can use the codes to unlock that single IAP. This would be more work on my part, but easier for my client. Something tells me Apple probably would not approve of this method.
3) Create "Credits" that the client can purchase in bulk via IAP (so Apple still gets their money), then gift either the credits or send the IAP info itself to the volunteers via a p2p bluetooth connection created with game kit. This would be harder for the client, as they would have to send each "Credit" individually. But I think Apple would be more likely to approve this.
4) Have the client send me a list of UUIDs for each of the volunteers devices. I add the UUIDs to a secure list on my server. During the purchase the a check is preformed to see if the devices UUID matches one on my server. If it is, they are marked as "all ready paid" and given the IAP data. I don't know about this one, as the only way I can see the money transfer happening is myself getting paid directly, and Apple being left out (So they probably wouldn't approve of this. I have no problem giving Apple their 30% if I could find a way to get that to work with this.
I'd go with Option 5, and create my own IAP system. Much like Option 3, but bypassing Apple all together. Add a Custom URL Scheme to you application, give it to your client to distribute. When your app is launched by its Custom URL Scheme have it open to a promo code entry page.
Your client would be able to purchase/create codes as necessary via a website that you set up for them. You would then store the codes (or create an algorithm to check generated codes against), and validate the codes as the users enter them.
Then your clients users would enter their unique code and have everything unlocked/downloaded as needed.
I have done a similar set up with promo codes to unlock the full version of my applications so I could create my own promotions, without making the upgrades free for everyone by removing/altering the IAP.
I'm about to take my first foray into In-App purchases, and I'm not quite sure how to handle my situation. At top is my situation, with some actual questions in bold at the bottom. Any advice would be appreciated.
I'm designing an app that will have a LOT of in-app purchase content. Every day, around 20 or 30 new items will be generated for sale. 3 or 4 days worth of items will be for sale at any given time, and after that they go away.
So we're talking a lot of items. Way too many to add to submit to Apple for a unique ProductID each day.
Of all these hundred items, there are actually only 4 or 5 different types of item. So I'm thinking I'll need to make 1 SKProduct for each type. Under the hood (and invisible to the user) the will actually be buying a credit good for 1 item of type X. After the transaction goes through, I send the receipt AND the requested item to our server. Our server stores that and sends the file back. If they want a 2nd file, they need to buy a 2nd credit and repeat the process. Of course to the user it will be presented like they're buying Item 1, Item 2, and Item 3 directly.
To make this even more complicated, we also want to offer a 3 month subscription (at a significantly higher tier) for those who don't want to buy their items ala carte.
1. Does this sound like a good approach?
Will Apple be okay with this? If not, what possible alternatives do I have?
2. Optimally we'd like to allow people to re-download items they've already paid for.
Would a good approach be to make each credit non-consumable, and since I've already stored the receipt info on the server I can match it to whatever item they should get? If this is too complicated or against Apple's rules, we may just make the item consumable since the item is only good for a few days anyway...
3. Is there anything else I'm overlooking here?
Thanks for any insight you guys can provide.
Take a look about what the iOS Development Program License Agreement says about treating In App Purchases like credits:
2.1 You may not use the In App Purchase API to enable an end-user to set up a pre-paid account to be used for subsequent purchases of
content, functionality, or services, or otherwise create balances or
credits that end-users can redeem or use to make purchases at a later
time.
2.2 You may not enable end-users to purchase Currency of any kind through the In App
Purchase API, including but not limited to any Currency for exchange,
gifting, redemption, transfer, trading or use in purchasing or
obtaining anything within or outside of Your Application. “Currency”
means any form of currency, points, credits, resources, content or
other items or units recognized by a group of individuals or entities
as representing a particular value and that can be transferred or
circulated as a medium of exchange.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but if your approach does not unlock/add functionality or change the behavior of the app by buying an In App Purchase, my guess is that this could be problematic when trying to get Apple's approval.
Hope this helps,
From the StoreKit guide:
If the user attempts to purchase a nonconsumable product or a renewable subscription they have already purchased, your application receives a regular transaction for that item, not a restore transaction. However, the user is not charged again for that product. Your application should treat these transactions identically to those of the original transaction.
This presents a huge problem in an app I am working on. We have licensed a large body of content from a publisher for sale through in-app purchase. They require that every time we sell a piece of this content (i.e. user pays us), our server calls an API on their servers to report the transaction. This is for accounting purposes and ultimately used to determine how much we pay them at the end of the month, per our agreement with them.
I have read several suggestions on SO and elsewhere about calling restoreCompletedTransactions rather frequently and maintaining a local understanding, on the device, of what the user has already purchased so they cannot be allowed to purchase it again. This to me seems like something that should be able to be implemented on the server side. However, the receipts that we are getting back from the Apple servers are exactly the same for a buy and a re-buy, as promised by the StoreKit guide.
If payment callbacks from StoreKit cannot be trusted as a valid accounting mechanism in this kind of situation ("you got paid" vs. "you didn't get paid"), what other real-time insights into transaction traffic are available? I don't think the publisher we are working with is going to be happy if we tell them we have to wait 45 days after the end of the month to get the REAL paid dollar amount out of iTunes Connect.
I have recently looked into the same problem. In my case, I wanted to implement accurate revenue tracking using Mobile App Tracking to track revenue generated from different customer acquisition campaigns.
Fortunately enough, there is a way to do it. It should be noted that SKPaymentTransactionStatePurchased vs. SKPaymentTransactionStateRestored solely depends on the initating action, e.g. whether you initiated a restore or a (re-)purchase, so that doesn't work.
What does work instead is checking for SKPaymentTransaction.originalTransaction which will be != nil for restores and re-purchases. The latter is unfortunately undefined behavior (docs). I'd consider a null check fair enough though.
Another option is to validate the transaction-receipt of transactions with SKPaymentTransactionStatePurchased and check that the original_transaction_id property in the returned, validated receipt matches the transaction_id.
The bad news is: In the current iOS version (4.3.x) there's no way to distinguish between a buy and a re-buy of non-consumable products.
To ease the situation I would recommend two things:
First
After a successful purchase, store the product identifier of the purchased product in the NSUserDefaults on the device. You can then hide the already purchased products from the user and thus handle a re-buy situation.
The NSUserDefaults are backed up by iTunes when the user synchronizes his device. So your stored purchase information is not lost when the user gets a new device.
Second
Store the receipt data together with the device ID on your server. Analyze the receipt's product identifier and the device ID.
If you receive another receipt with the same product identifier and device ID combination, then assume a re-buy. At least this would allow you to cover most of the re-buy cases.
Assuming that an ordinary iPhone user switches his device every 1-2 years, you will at least cover most of the re-buy cases and maybe apple will fix this in the future.
I have one solution,
Configure the product as consumable.
this will solve the problem - (They require that every time we sell a piece of this content (i.e. user pays us)).
Next you need to implement a logic in product buy option. It is in a way that once the user purchase a product the buy option need to remove otherwise the user may happendly go purchase and lost is cash once again for same product in same device.
you can use NSUserdefaults for this purpose.
thanks,