Lesson Learnt from iPhone Development

Last week was quite tough for me dealing with the project I was working on. The project was quite simple actually. It was released on App Store and the client decided to make minor changes to the application. I made the requested changes and the application was resubmitted to the App Store. Then we got Apple's email saying that the app was rejected. The email said:

"We found that your app does not follow the iOS Data Storage Guidelines https://developer.apple.com/icloud/documentation/data-storage/, which is not in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines https://developer.apple.com/appstore/resources/approval/guidelines.html#functionality.

In particular, we found that the app is storing too much data, which can be recreated, in the incorrect location."

I have to admit that I don't visit Apple Developer Portal regularly to check if there are any update on their Developer Guidelines. So the thing is our data was stored in document folder and I need to move application's data to library/cache folder for prior iOS 5.0.1 and setting "do not back up" attribute for iOS 5.0.1 above. Thanks to iCloud, iSun, iMoon and whatever it is on the sky above.

There was another thing screwed me, the core data. Core data needs versioning if you happen to change the data structure like adding columns, changing relationships, renaming tables, etc. Apple has documentation about it but don't expect everything goes smoothly as there are many things undocumented. If you find any errors, stackoverflow.com is your help.

Last thing is, I think it is always a good idea to introduce a User Default value that holds your application version early when you start developing your app. It is useful if you need to trace what application version installed on a device. Usually you need this when there are any update for your app.