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Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

kentnguyen.com

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Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#61

Post by tomjen3 »

tewks wrote: post #38
cryptoz wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is 2012 not 1992 On the other hand, think of what you could accomplish with a weekend of work in 1992 and compare that to 2012. Our abilities as developers/designers/etc are vastly improved due to improved infrastructure, tools, communications, resources, etc. You could build a distributed photo hosting and viewing application back in 1992. But you'd probably be writing it in C++ and it might take you a long tim…

Time to prototype has definitely gotten cheaper. C is still necessary for a lot of people at scale.

I doubt that -- there aren't that many programmers writing lowlevel OS or database code and most everybody else use something more productive.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#62

Post by natesm »

Jabbles wrote: post #48

I have no experience designing iOS apps. Could someone explain briefly why they are so inflexible? Tightly integrated code: With websites, you can simply add one more page, then create a link to that page when you needed. However, you can’t do that with iOS app, everything has to be set in the beginning, any changes might result in significant other changes that you might not be able to understand why. The way iOS co…

This:

> The way iOS codes are structured is like a breadboard, everything is hard-wired, you still can change a few things here and there, but if you change the wrong wire, the whole board might stop working

Seems very wrong. It sounds like something that someone that doesn't really understand Objective-C would write. It's a very dynamic language, using features like first-class classes should help prevent that C++-esque nightmare.

A Facebook like button is not a fair comparison at all. In a web app, you can just paste it in. If you had to implement the button yourself it would take just as long as implementing it from scratch on iOS.

Instead, consider a data type. If we're writing a Facebook clone, let's say we only have status messages and now we want to add photos. On the web, you'll need to write the template to generate HTML for that in the news feed. On iOS, you need to write a cell class. It's true that the iOS one will probably take longer, but that doesn't make it less flexible. It's just the nature of declaring your interface in code instead of in markup.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#63

Post by enjo »

waterside81 wrote: post #27
reidmain wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So $15k was the cost the iOS developer charged you? What was the cost of having the art assets and server side functionality done in house? Adding that to the $15k seems to be the actual cost of the app. Also how much time was spent designing the app before art assets were made or server side programming started?

Right, that's the point I was making - if you had to pay for those services to an external party, the cost goes up, quickly. I did the server side work, my co-founder did the artwork, both at a > 0 opportunity cost I'm sure. We designed the app ourselves, again, at some non-zero opportunity cost.

How many hours did the developer put into it?

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#65

Post by ovi256 »

matwood wrote: post #42

While trying to describe a rather large system change an SVP in a large company once told me: it's just an 'if' statement

I found the best answer is to respectfully state the logic the change needs, the inputs to the logic and where they come from, and any trouble spots in implementing that. If the reason for their view was ignorance, this will solve that.

If it was malevolence, they'll refuse to budge and you'll know to run. Fast.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#66

Post by mechanical_fish »

Tossrock wrote: post #60
mechanical_fish wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that once we make 80% of the process vastly more efficient, all it does is throw a spotlight on the remaining 20%. (This is the unheralded dark side of the Pareto principle. ;) Not everything about building an app gets more efficient with time. You can now throw together a photo-hosting and viewing application in a couple of days. But that doesn't necessarily yield a site that runs itself. Teaching the…

> The problem is that once we make 80% of the process vastly more efficient, all it does is throw a spotlight on the remaining 20%. (This is the unheralded dark side of the Pareto principle. I think this might be better referred to as the well-known outcome of Amdahl's Law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amdahls_law

Agreed, but if I'm going to jokingly but inaccurately name-check a principle involving the number "80%" I might as well pick on poor Pareto. He's used to it by now. ;)

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#67

Post by kls »

rickmb wrote: post #39
kls wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are 2 points we also have to consider when specifically talking about the custom development market, one is that advertising development houses are not helping the issue by putting out teaser ads like Get your iPhone app idea built for $5000 . It sets pricetags in peoples minds that are unrealistic. When you get down to the fine print, if the app requires communicating to REST service or design work that number…

The latter is exactly what we regularly do. It's still a pain though, talking a client down from their original ideas (sometimes piles of paper with all kinds of ambitious features) to something that matches their needs within their budget. Plus, these often turn out to be not particularly desirable clients that take up a lot of time, and there isn't sufficient margin on simple WordPress jobs to give such clients the…

For us, we have a guy that manages all of these type of contracts. It's kind of like an entrepreneur in the making kind of arrangement, for him. I agree on the hacking issue, which is why we personally don't host Wordpress sites and the person that handles Wordpress size clients makes it very clear that Wordpress provides the platform, security and all, that we provide the design, customization of template, SEO, analytical, etc.

While there are a lot of pain-in-the-rear small clients it is not unique to them nor are all of them pains. We have had a lot of small clients turn into large clients as well, we have had a lot of small clients refer us to large clients. How we personally made it worth while was to find a person that wanted to grow a company, but offered them the advantage of doing it from within a current company. This person is now, managing Wordpress (Drupal and a few others) for several shops like ours. He also receives a commission when one of his clients outgrows him and is ready to move into custom development. It has worked well for us, but it is by no means the bread and butter, but it does save a lot of time by not spending cycles with people that just flat out can't or won't spend the money to pay for custom software.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#68

Post by zedwill »

mirkules wrote: post #49

I agree with the overall sentiment of the page. A few questions to seasoned iOS devs: "With websites, you can simply add one more page, then create a link to that page when you needed. However, you can’t do that with iOS app, everything has to be set in the beginning, any changes might result in significant other changes that you might not be able to understand why." Isn't this what the Navigation Controller is for?…

I believe he might be talking about modifying a view, as he presents the example of adding an email button or a facebook one.

It still doesn't make sense as you can use tools such as Interface Builder. The only thing that applies, you could still be building the view programmatically or need custom animations. That needs coding. And of course a facebook button needs to handle things such as authentication than an emailing one does not.

About the UITabBar, you can always use the black one. Or use this little trick for greater effect which is less demanding on custom images: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/571028/changing-tint-back...

I also do apps for a living and it is true that business has unreasonable expectations on time and cost. Not to speak of the myriad of people that want a whatsapp clone for 500$

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#69

Post by kls »

zavulon wrote: post #43

This is a message on NY Tech meetup mailing list, from about a half hour ago. All I could do is shake my head. _____________ I am seeking a telephony app. builder that can deliver a PhoneGap lie ( non-native) inexpensive app. for a telephony project. pay is: $350 + 1% equity stake in a newly formed Delaware Corp. and 2.5% on all residuals. possible board seat (future paid projects) if you can deliver an additional in…

Even at 7hr which I believe is the minimum wage that is 50 hours worth of funding. A light week for most developers, a person should be offended to even post something like that. The app will take longer than a week and 1% is a insignificant sum. At that kind of compensation I would be looking for more than 50%, because well, I can work on my own idea and forgo the worse than minimum wage compensation and keep 100% of my idea.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#70

Post by kls »

wtvanhest wrote: post #21

As a "business person" I need to know three things to hire someone: 1) how much did it cost other people to build similar apps (comparative analysis) 2) that you are able to build the product successfully (reducing technical risk) 3) that the price is low enough that the estimated Rev will produce a return (ROI) - If you can present those points clearly you will be in a much better position to make more money with le…

I don't disagree with you but I think ROI is a business owners case to make. You know your projections and it is up to you to take what I say it cost to fairly compensate me and see if it matches with your expected ROI, if it does not, we can negotiate, if the numbers are not there, then they are not there. But I don't think it is on me to prove out your ROI. Chances are you already know this number, before you even start soliciting bids. Now if I come to you with the idea, sure I would expect to have to prove the case as to how it will benefit your company.
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