Steve Jobs Offers Explanation About iPhone SDK Changes Restricting Adobe and Other Cross Compilers

[Stella]

I can understand why Apple did this, but it will make cross platform apps harder to develop, which is a shame. Basically, Apple want an exclusive lock in for developers..

If this decision ends up biting Apple up the arse, the decision can be reversed at any time.

 

[JustSomeDude]

Exactly. This wouldnt be a big deal if on a desktop platform. But on a mobile one you really gotta make those apps as clean as possible. For functionality, for efficiency, for the overall look/appeal & for the limited resources you're working with.

Anybody who says different is only concerned with getting their apps on the most platforms so they can sell more & not with quality.

This isn't always true. If it were, Apple would have no need for these restrictions. If this reasoning were true the apps built in another language or with another platform/middleware would be so inferior they would fail because of apps written in Apple approved manner would be clearly superior.

In reality, sometimes another language or middleware will allow for a superior solution. I don't believe this will usually be the case, but in some cases, yes. The developer is in the best position to know what the correct tools are. Consumers will decide if the developer was right.

 

[anthonylambert]

I've think they have got it very wrong...

I think if their development tools were the best then they would have a better story. Objective C was a market leading language when the competition was MFC. It's not now its C# and other modern languages... which took the best of what they and other tools had to offer and improved upon them. Objective C is 10 years out of date with the state of the art.

Your new agreement effectively bans the use of any third party library and tools which contain code. Unless it is delivered in source and written in C, C++ or Obj C....

With flash and silverlight(moonlight) we are in the process of web apps providing true desktop app like functionality. These toolkits need sdks in both the client and server - Apple are killing off both these toolkits and have no offering themselves, clever huh!

Winning strategies.... There are two general strategies...

1. The force everyone to adopt your "pure" way of doing things... it is the right way... the only way... the best way... and you have no choice.

2. You have your way of doing things, you actively take the best from everyone elses ways of doing things and make it your own.

If you look at these strategies the second is the successful one! Look at the English and French Languages! In English new words are added all the time, new word comes from any other country that has a good one. This is very similar to the American culture... think The Borg!

In France they ban foreign words. If they need a new word they have part of the government make a new one! In French Computer is ordinator, Byte is Octet!

If you take the 1st Strategy you are saying you've lost and are retreating to your castle and waiting for the the whole world to come up with something better that you won't take advantage of.... it's only a matter of time before you loose...

Remember the App store Steve..... You never wanted to support all those 3rd party developers did you?

You did after pressure...

It's what's really made the great iPhone brilliant... It's let Apple move faster than they could ever do alone. It's let developers develop how they see fit and use the greatest and latests tools, libraries and technologies to do that.

If you ban all that technology you are effectively giving your competition that advantage.

 

[JustSomeDude]

Very smart move on Apple's part.

"Consider a world where some other company’s cross-platform toolkit proved wildly popular. Then Apple releases major new features to iPhone OS, and that other company’s toolkit is slow to adopt them. At that point, it’s the other company that controls when third-party apps can make use of these features."

The famed Internet Explorer effect.

The situation isn't analogous. Apple controls the market place for iPhone apps, while no one controls the marketplace of the web. If Apple finds that apps being developed using a certain language or middleware are deficient in some manner, they can simply ban the apps individually based on the fact they are deficient. The offending language or middleware would quickly change (or the developers would find their own work-around) or be dropped by developers.

 

[Stella]

The situation isn't analogous. Apple controls the market place for iPhone apps, while no one controls the marketplace of the web. If Apple finds that apps being developed using a certain language or middleware are deficient in some manner, they can simply ban the apps individually based on the fact they are deficient. The offending language or middleware would quickly change (or the developers would find their own work-around) or be dropped by developers.

If an Application is being developed for several platforms, including iPhone, it is the iPhone that could be very well dropped:

Sales of platformA + platformB > sales of iPhone == drop iPhone

iPhone platform may be considered too costly to develop on.

 

[JustSomeDude]

If an Application is being developed for several platforms, including iPhone, it is the iPhone that could be very well dropped:

Sales of platformA + platformB > sales of iPhone == drop iPhone

iPhone platform may be considered too costly to develop on.

Allowing use of other languages and middleware would decrease development costs for iPhone and thus would lead to more software being developed for the iPhone.

 

[E.Lizardo]

Makes sense to a non-tech person like me.Maybe developers could,oh,I don't know,quit trying to be lazy and make quality apps from the ground up.

 

[Kesuke]

With a plethora of Android devices about to go to market and Windows Phone 7 on the horizon Apples market position is going to be challenged on both the quality and cost fronts.

Its going to be interesting to see how this plays out, because for developers there is a naturally selective enviornment. Its good to be first through the door on a new OS, because you can be the first to release the high-volume/popular apps on this new platform. Nobody wants to be stuck making the umteen-millionth incarnation of what is essentially tetris.

For example right now theres a killing to be made in iPad apps, simply because there are very few good ones and plenty of 'essential-must-have' apps still waiting to be made.

Anyway, my point is that there are going to be pressures driving developers away from Apple OS anyway when the Android/WinMo rush sets off later this year. In that situation enforcing restrictive platform policies will only hurt apples product.

 

[E.Lizardo]

Well, it's easy to explain. If you have to develop the game from scratch using C/C++ (remember no so called "undocumented API" i.e. no game engines is allowed) it'll take you a few years to do so. Apparently that's what Apple wants. Your best chance for getting good games on a phone is to switch to Android.

How many "good games"are currently on each platform?More importantly how many really top grade games are on Android and NOT iPhone?

 

[anthonylambert]

If it wasn't for Cross platform software Apple would be bust!

I really don't thing cross platform software is any issue at all. Apple's argument carries no weight what so ever...

Good well written software wins. Crap software is crap the market decides!

Some of the most popular packages on Mac are very Mac like BUT are also cross platform applications written using most of the latest Mac features.

These Applications saved the Mac and Apple.

They are of course PhotoShop, PageMaker, Quark and not forgetting Microsoft Office.

Steve where would Apple be if you banned these applications because they used cross platform layers!!

Why don't you just put all the "toy" Flash apps in the same section of the AppStore and before you know it they will get the reputation they deserve and people won't buy them... and flash will = bad.

let the people decide!

 

[WilliamLondon]

If an Application is being developed for several platforms, including iPhone, it is the iPhone that could be very well dropped:

Sales of platformA + platformB > sales of iPhone == drop iPhone

iPhone platform may be considered too costly to develop on.

That's their choice to lost out on one of the biggest markets in mobile platforms. Given that for non jail broken phones the App store is the only place to buy apps, people buys apps from the App store, and they would be walking away from that.

I don't see many developers walking away from a gold mine.

As a consumer, having a unique app built for the platform I have in my hand is better for me, than having some app built to the lowest common denominator for multiple platforms. It may have cost the developer more, but I don't care, I have a great app written for the device I own.

 

[Stella]

Allowing use of other languages and middleware would decrease development costs for iPhone and thus would lead to more software being developed for the iPhone.

Yes, agreed.. but if you can't use middleware for iPhone then costs will increase.

I don't see many developers walking away from a gold mine.

But the iPhone is not a gold mine. Only the top sellers actually make money. Due to the amount of Apps, the average joe's app , even if great will be invisible amongst the rest of the applications of lesser quality out there.

 

[E.Lizardo]

With a plethora of Android devices about to go to market and Windows Phone 7 on the horizon Apples market position is going to be challenged on both the quality and cost fronts.

Its going to be interesting to see how this plays out, because for developers there is a naturally selective enviornment. Its good to be first through the door on a new OS, because you can be the first to release the high-volume/popular apps on this new platform. Nobody wants to be stuck making the umteen-millionth incarnation of what is essentially tetris.

For example right now theres a killing to be made in iPad apps, simply because there are very few good ones and plenty of 'essential-must-have' apps still waiting to be made.

Anyway, my point is that there are going to be pressures driving developers away from Apple OS anyway when the Android/WinMo rush sets off later this year. In that situation enforcing restrictive platform policies will only hurt apples product.

I thought there was supposed to be a flood of Androids Last year?Are we in for another?Anyway,keep in mind,85+MILLION iPhone OS devices,all with the same interface and very similar capabilities.If I'm a developer,that looks really attractive.

 

[Kesuke]

How many "good games"are currently on each platform?More importantly how many really top grade games are on Android and NOT iPhone?

I think what he meant was that Androids market share has the potential (if not the inevitability) of taking over from iPhone OS simply because Anroid will be on hundreds of devices at all price points whilst iPhone OS is limited to just a few devices with a very high price point.

As a consequence new game development may shift towards android simply because its a way of selling more apps and making more money. Cross-compilers would have meant 1 developer makes 1 app which is then just compiled for multiple operating systems.

 

[JustSomeDude]

If an Application is being developed for several platforms, including iPhone, it is the iPhone that could be very well dropped:

Sales of platformA + platformB > sales of iPhone == drop iPhone

iPhone platform may be considered too costly to develop on.

Is this referring to how I said Apple could just ban deficient apps to force languages/middleware to update appropriately? This shouldn't be an issue, as long as Apple consistenly applies their guidelines for accepting apps. For example, if some popular middleware is deficient, it should be deficient in either a minor manner which can be quickly rectified. If Apple has been consistent with their approval of apps, no middleware should get it's apps accepted if the middleware has major issues. The only time a popular middleware should have major deficiencies would be if Apple makes a major change in the API, but then all apps would be affected and so everyone would need some time to conform to the changes.

 

[rams]

i'm monotouch developer, so this hits me hard. very hard.

i paid for the monotoch license, i paid for the developer account and i paid for the two iphone models.

now i can throw my apps to the garbage or port them to objective c.

i am not allowed to comment on the agreement, but i can say what i paid for and that i'm losing weeks of hard work.

make your own picture

 

[TMay]

Hmm...WAY beyond genius? I dunno...I'm a decently smart guy and I've never heard him do or say anything I found remarkably insightful. He is obviously very smart, and a visionary in his own way, but he is also a control freak and that combined with his position of power is what gets him where it does. That and his charisma. Sure, he knows how to manipulate people, and groups to do his bidding. Don't think it requires anyone way beyond genius as you say. Maybe he is, but I don't see any actual evidence of that.

Way beyond genius? That's Woz. Remember, without Woz, Jobs is basically a great car salesman who annoys the heck out of his coworkers because of his massive ego. Surely we've all worked with people like that. Jobs is just not an engineer, or a programmer, or anything beyond a guy that has power and a desire to see this or that. That's it. He hires people who can implement what he wants.

Anyway, sure, he's smart, but just not sure about your statement, curious what your reasoning is...

There are all kinds of genius. Steve happens to have been a cofounder of Apple, founder of Next, caretaker of Pixar, savior of Apple the second time around, and the pathfinder to convergence of media and mobility. You could make an argument that anyone of those would be a fluke, but that's a pretty good track record. Steve has the talent of taking existing technology, extrapolating it, and distilling it into its essentials while blending it with the culture of the human race.

Woz was a brilliant designer, and that single accomplishment of the Apple 1 hardware design remains a pinnacle of his career, but his era is long gone. I don't think that you give enough credit for Steve in launching Apple as the company. Without Steve, Woz would have been an unknown engineer outside of some large corporation that he would have ended up working for.

 

[joshh2o]

Adobe just needs to suck it up and adapt. If they don't, Apple might as well acquire them later on.

I agree

 

[Kesuke]

I thought there was supposed to be a flood of Androids Last year?Are we in for another?Anyway,keep in mind,85+MILLION iPhone OS devices,all with the same interface and very similar capabilities.If I'm a developer,that looks really attractive.

There was a trickle really. The Droid, the Nexus one (in the US only) etc. Android are shipping 60,000 handsets per day going up at an exponential rate on just those sets. Even projecting at that rate, they'll have about 30 million devices by the end of the year, but likely much higher.

Only 45 million people in the US have smartphones - that means theres a huge market for expansion, and the reality is that most people can't afford the iPhone. So unless apple splits the iPhone line (like they did with the iPod/Nano/Touch etc.) into several price points its likely that most of the remaining expansion will be Android, Windows Phone 7 and Symbian^3.

Also bear in mind that the massive ~450-500 million sized European market has tailed behind for smartphones. Until this month the iPhone was the only true smartphone available in Europe and the clear winner on performance. I dont have a figure to hand but overall market penetration of smartphones is still very small in Europe. If android uptake in Europe alone was particularly strong that could overtake total iPhone OS numbers.

 

[Stella]

Is this referring to how I said Apple could just ban deficient apps to force languages/middleware to update appropriately? This shouldn't be an issue, as long as Apple consistenly applies their guidelines for accepting apps. For example, if some popular middleware is deficient, it should be deficient in either a minor manner which can be quickly rectified. If Apple has been consistent with their approval of apps, no middleware should get it's apps accepted if the middleware has major issues. The only time a popular middleware should have major deficiencies would be if Apple makes a major change in the API, but then all apps would be affected and so everyone would need some time to conform to the changes.

How much $$ would it be to change the middleware to make it Apple-Happy?

For whatever reason, the costs may be too high or impractical due to architectural reasons.

 

[WilliamLondon]

But the iPhone is not a gold mine. Only the top sellers actually make money.

Think they're going to go running to another platform and leave the iPhone behind? If this weeds out some developers, so be it - most likely their apps weren't big sellers (otherwise they wouldn't go) and also then the apps weren't the most innovative, so again, not really sad to see them go.

The ones who will remain are the ones who (hopefully) make money, and are devoted to the platform and producing apps that people will enjoy using.

 

[JaguarGod]

.....I'm suprised so few people have mentioned the apple exclusion of 3rd party cross compilers means developers are still locked into owning apple macs in order to develop products for the iphone. The flash compiler would finally have enabled PC based production of apps....

All the more reason to exclude them if you are looking to sell your computers. If a developer is serious about creating something on the iPhone platform (knowing what the monetary gains could be if it is a good app), I do not think buying a Mac would keep them from developing it. It is probably a good thing that every PC owner isn't developing for the iPhone. At some point it has to be about quality products and not just quantity. It's already cluttered with sub-par apps and games. Though Apple sure likes to throw those App numbers around!

 

[RaZaK]

Jobs reportedly points to John Gruber's analysis of why Apple might have implemented this. Gruber argues that Apple wants control over native iPhone OS development and cross platform solutions would dilute iPhone-exclusive and iPhone native apps. Gruber also believes that these cross platform compilers rarely produce high quality native apps. Steve Jobs reiterated this point in a followup email:

Yeah Gruber, because that whole Java experiment never made it off the ground. Imagine trying to make developers' lives a little easier. The nerve of Adobe.

Yes, would-be flamers, i do understand the difference between having a virtual machine and having the code converted. it's the same basic principle, though.

Whatev's, bring on the new MBP's! Apple lovers are still going to buy CS5. Really, is the removal of this feature going to keep people from buying the next version of Photoshop??? Umm, noooooo!!!!!!!! lol

 

[EagerDragon]

That is a matter of opinion, an IDE is an IDE and can be changed si its a moot point.

I personally hate Eclipse and prefer XCode over it. I like netbeans most of all.

Just wanted to clarify.... Adoby is not providing an IDE like in your comparison. They are providing a layer that is common to all phones. Developers use this layer to write the code so it can run on iPhone, Android and anything else.

In my opinion there are several issues here:
1) Programmer not commited to the iPhone platform
2) Programmer wants one program to run everywhere just like the promise of Java (run anywhere) which did not work well, tends to cater to the lowest denominator.
4) Because of 1 and 2 above, the programmer is not interested in learning the iPhone APIs and the Apple provided tools.
5) Apple is interested in iPhone developers also being Mac deveopers which is another reason they want the developers to learn the tools.
6) The layers added by the Adobe environment are not likely to keep up with changes made in the iPhone APIs so they will rarely be taking advantage of better APIs and new capabilities.
7) The way the code is produce may interfere with the Apple way of doing multitasking and may in turn drag all the other applications down and drain the battery.
8) Additional layers makes applications bigger, also may introduce additional security risks.
9) When issues arrise, it is difficult to tell if the problem is with the iPhone, Apple's APIs, the programmer code, or Adobe code. This results is longer time to repair the issue and Adobe may take months to correct an issue. This can easily cause the developers all sorts of headaches and lose customers, but today they don't seem to have taken that into consideration.

I think the key here is: Is the developer a dedicated iPhone developer or do Is the developer going to write for all other phone also?
Is the developer willing to learn the tools and produce optimal code?
Is the developer going to keep up with the API and correct bugs as quickly as possible?

 

[McLarenTopTeam]

You guys do know that this not only affects Adobe but pretty much all the major game and app developers?

If Adobe someone allows the rest to continue using non standard tools under the same T&C but blocks tools from Adobe, Adobe has every right to go to court.

That's anti-competitive practice.