Apple App Store Rigors Defended

While the Apple iTunes App Store approval process may be long and hard on many would be developers, the hair-pulling and tears is worth it, according to one iPhone developer.

Bottle Rocket's Calvin Carter told Macworld the process is important and necessary and not simply Apple needlessly nitpicking.

"The review process has changed dramatically over the last year. We have a good track record of approvals, but that's only because we learned the hard way what will get your app rejected," Carter told Macworld.

"Apple really focuses on user experience. Make something difficult to understand, mislead the user or don't take care of the zillions of use-cases dealing with internet connectivity and you're sure to get rejected. And, frankly you should get rejected."

Carter believes Apple is keen to ensure iPhone applications are fit for purpose and do not reflect badly on Apple if they are revealed to be buggy or overly complex.

"The app review process is long and hard on all developers. And it's certainly not perfect. But it's important and very necessary. Most issues are black and white. You'll get a pleasant email from Apple kindly informing you of a bug. You'll say to yourself "no way, that's not possible!". So, you open the zipped screen shot and, DOH!"

"There it is... Your bug in lights. You stop denying, fix that one line of code and resubmit. But the second review takes as long as the first. No cutting in line... The real pain felt by developers is the time lost when having to resubmit. We have felt that pain. It hurts... "

Bottle Rocket has produced a range of well-received applications including games Wings, Wings Galaxy, Santa Wings, Voxie voice recorder, GasBuddy, ProxyPal and Overnight utilities, Spin Decision and the recently released NPR News.

You can read the full in-depth Bottle Rocket interview here.

You can read Macworld's review of NPR News here.