Tag: mobile app development

9 Tips to Become a Better Mobile App Developer

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Mobile App Development Companies are always on the search for better developers. They prefer to make the most out of the salaries that they pay. So, as a developer, you might need to hone your skills in order to become successful doing mobile app development.

Here are some tips that would help you to become a better mobile app developer.

1. Read other Developer’s Code

No matter how good a developer you are, you always have one thing or the other to learn from your co-workers. You should actively take effort in reading other people’s code and learn from them. That way you could be exposed to a new logic or a new angle of solving a problem, thereby growing yourself into a better developer.

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2. Get Someone to Read your Code Too

Getting someone to read your code is as important as reading other people’s code. Mobile App Developers  are often too timid or too egoistic to consider this approach.

For most people it is so hard to find one’s own mistake. We are all so pleased with our hard work, ain’t we? You comb for errors and you feel more confident about your code. So, it is worth remembering that a good code is something that everybody could understand and not yourself alone.

3. Fix Bugs Prior to Writing New Code

Can you guess what is the most harmful thing that Mobile App Developers thinks when he finds out a bug?

It’s thinking that you will fix it later. If you can break out of this habit, you will get one step closer to better mobile app development.

4. Learn New Technologies

Those who have started developing for Apple recently might have seen how Swift is being widely adopted and replacing Objective C. It is very important that a developer constantly be aware of the changing technologies and train themselves to stay in demand.

5. Write a Blog Post

You know that you understand a topic well when you are able to teach it to others. There is no better way of sharing your unique experiences, knowledge, and love for programming than writing blog posts.

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6. Contribute to Open Source

People could easily think that this is so purposeless. In a world where conversion is everything, why should one give one’s service for free? Why should one make waste of their valuable family time?

Contributing to open source has got it’s own advantages. You can keep informed of the trends in the field and collaborate with other developers outside of your organization. This will help you in networking as well.

7. Fix it, Don’t Hack It

When you have a messy code to deal with and a tight schedule at hand, it will always be tempting to hack it instead of fixing it. A priceless advice is to take your time and find the bug, no matter what. Otherwise, you will end up getting more frustrated and irritated than you were, when the vanished error keeps coming back later to kick you in the ass.

8. Do Test Driven Development (TDD)

Unit testing can be exhausting for Mobile App Developers, especially when a shoddy code is bequeathed to you from a second developer. For a superior codebase, it is always better to break the untested code into blocks and add the tests one by one.

9. Take Ten Odd Minutes Away from the Desk

Last but not the least, leave your desk and have a stretch. As a programmer, sitting glued to the desk all day would be nothing unfamiliar to you. But if you don’t want to spend all the money you make on medical bills, take enough breaks and take it wisely. It will also help you to stay focused under the pressure and avoid things that might set you off.

Apps Overtake Desktop in Online Banking (BBA)

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

The everyday usage of banking apps have risen as never before. At the same time, usage of banking websites have gone down. This has been reported by the British Bankers Association (BBA).

In 2015, 4.3m website logins happened per day, as against 4.4m in 2014 while 11m users logged in using apps in 2015 as against 7m in 2014.

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BBA chief executive Anthony Browne said that the customers are loving the new tech as it allows them to bank round the clock.

Does the same remain true for online payments?

When it come to payments, users are still more inclined to use a desktop. 347m payments happened through mobiles in 2015 while 417m payments happened through desktops. But there was a significant change from last year. Payments through app increased by 54% while it was just 2% for website transactions.

There are numerous new app-based banks around the world which are making it easier for customers to pay on the go.

Planet of the Apps – Apple’s New Reality Show Makes Open Casting Call

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

In March this year, technology giant Apple had announced it’s first TV reality show. The show, which will be unscripted, is about app developers. It has now been christened as “Planet of the Apps”.

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This week, a casting call has been made by Apple, asking for “100 of the world’s most talented app creators,”. Interested app developers should send details about the app under development, while also providing their (developer & team) 1 minute video profile. Applications can be sent in till August 26.

Filming of the first season would start from late 2016 to early 2017, and would be filmed at Los Angeles. Tech-lover and pop star Will.i.am is producing the show along with Howard Owens and Ben Silverman.

425,000 Apps Vanished from the App Store in Thailand!

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Earlier this month, during a routine app monitoring, Sensor Tower, a mobile analytics firm noticed that a huge number of apps were missing from the App Store in Thailand.

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The company first estimated the number to be around 19,000. But it was later found that the number of missing apps were a much higher number, titaling to around 425,290.

Responding to the news, Apple confirmed that a number of apps were accidentally removed from the App Store when they were repricing the apps in local currency. They also revealed that the bug was fixed within 48 hours. But Sensor Tower Data Scientists claimed that they were unavailable for around 6 days.

Save Yourselves from Human Trafficking with This Smart App

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Human Trafficking is a very serious worldwide issue. Tens of thousands of people get trafficked each year. It is done mainly for prostitution or some form of labor and more recently, human organ trade.

Developed by an organization (Exchange Initiative) that is waging a war against sex trafficking, the TrafficCam app seems to be a very useful app.

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With this app, anyone with a smartphone can fight human trafficking. Just upload the photos of hotel rooms where the trafficked person is being held. As traffickers, especially in the sex trade, post photos in online advertisements, it is easy for investigators to track the victims and find out the perpetrators.

A database of hotel room images are created which makes it easy for investigators to zero down on the posted location

As per UNICEF, every year, 1.2 million children are trafficked worldwide. A large percent of these are children between 12-14 years of age.

Smart App ideas such as the TrafficCam mobile app are superb examples of technology helping out to tackle social issues.

App Store has Generated $50 billion in Revenue for Developers: Tim Cook

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Apple CEO Tim Cook has claimed that they have paid $50 million in revenue to developers. This is a 20% increase from the $40 million in January. Last year, the number was $30 million. He was talking at the Wordwide Developers Conference yesterday.

Also the number of apps in the App Store has seen a significant increase to 2 million apps from 1.5 million apps same time last year. The total downloads has reached 130 billion.

Apple also overhauled the App Store revenue sharing model last week, now offering a developer friendly 85-15 split that are at least a year old and have subscriptions. This model replaced an 8 year old 70-30 revenue split model.

Another major development announced was that Apple would allow app creators to advertise search-related apps in the app store, thus giving users a chance to re-engage with apps.

Top 6 Mistakes to Avoid in Businesses Mobile App Development

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Modern day businesses are swiftly adopting enterprise mobility to improve productivity, enhance customer engagement and for risk mitigation in their respective corporate workplaces. But good quality enterprise apps are scanty since the field is relatively new for mobile app development companies.

Here are the top mistakes found commonly in enterprise apps that could be fatal to efficient and effective app development success.

1. User interface issues

The enterprise app’s user interface has a direct impact on user engagement. Therefore, the user interface should be so designed that it would be easy for end users to operate them.

A. Complicating the UI: Don’t treat the UI like a junkyard, which could be littered with descriptions and controls. It will give rise to an overcomplicated user interface which will negatively impact the user experience. You should be careful while choosing the features and should think in advance about the ways of implementing them without creating visual complexity.

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B. Prioritizing: You should definitely be careful not to include all contents/controls on the main screen of your app. Instead, learn to prioritize. More important and relevant content/controls should be displayed on the main page and connected content/controls can be provided in the sub-pages/sub-menus.

C. Make it effortless: Maintaining the ease of use is something that is very important for a good end user experience. For e.g., an app that makes you click/tap multiple number of times for getting even the simplest task done like saving a work or sharing a file could test the user’s patience. It would also waste considerable amount of time in completing a single task.

D. Poor graphics and text: The graphics and text used in the app should have good clarity. Inconsistent text formats, using text and background colours that are too bright or too dull, text that runs off screen, images & text that overlaps etc. could ruin the user experience.

E. Localization mistakes: Localization mistakes are the result of insufficient proof reading. Culturization is also an important part of this step. So, local translators should be hired for this purpose.

2. Absence of a purpose

All apps should have a well defined purpose and should do well defined tasks, but it is particularly important for enterprise mobile apps. Business owners often get satisfied with apps that are mere copies of third party business apps. These apps won’t be efficacious for your particular business needs.

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Every business requires unique business apps based on its environment, processes, work culture, and other such factors. So it is better to hire your own mobile app development team for your specific business app.

3. Lack of metrics

How are you going to understand the performance of your app or a business process if you do not have a proper mechanism to evaluate the success or failure of the same? Inorder to recognize the usefulness of your app or determine the value of processes, there should be regular analysis and reporting in place.

4. Security threats

Business apps must possess an intact privacy and security policy. The app should be free from all the major security and cyber threat vulnerabilities. Apart from that, the app should not allow unauthorized access or leakage of private data to third parties.

5. Crashing

App crashing is a very common issue, but it cannot be neglected because this will affect the overall productivity of a business. Efforts should be made to figure out the real reason behind sustained app crashes during the testing phase of mobile app development. They can be primarily due to issues that are too apparent like bandwidth problems, bugs in the app, memory unavailability, device incompatibility etc. These problems could be avoided if adequate measures are taken.

6. Help Menu

A well written, easy to understand, error free, comprehensive, step-by-step help menu is inevitable for every business app.

5 Things to Know Before You Start Mobile App Development

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Just imagine the pain that goes behind developing a mobile app. Sadly, in spite of best efforts, a lot of mobile app development endeavours end up as big failures. In most of these cases, there were the lack of a proper development plan. It is essential that you decide upon the importance of various facets of your project before proceeding with its implementation. Here are some of the major things that you need to keep an eye on before doing anything else.

1. Well formulated purpose  

A project without a purpose or without some value could never do well in the market, and it will soon get buried into the depths of the digital app stores. So, it is highly recommended that you ask yourself the question, “why you are building your app” a few times before you start planning further.

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The app you make should solve an existing problem. You don’t need to strictly avoid imitation of an idea. People will admire your app if it provides a solution that is more interesting or easy.

2. Learn to plan from within a budget

The line between possibility and impossibility should be clearly drawn at the beginning of mobile app development itself. Blindly imitating all the features and functionalities of successful apps that you find in the app stores without questioning its practicality could cost you heavily later, when you try to implement the design.

You should understand the importance of working from within the budget you have in hand. Otherwise, if you spend too much for design extravaganzas or app features, you will find yourself in need of money to do activities that gains importance towards the end phases; especially marketing.

3. A good market research

People believe that the only thing that a market research helps in knowing is whether a demand gap exists or not for a particular product. Well, this is not necessarily so. A market research will help you to devise a good marketing strategy based on your study and observations of specific markets. You could also get feedback from public about the qualities and enhancements that are expected from the kind of apps that they already use. This way you can create apps that are unique or different.

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As most of the existing and successful apps have several drawbacks, you can offer your brand that solves those issues. For e.g., you can develop apps that give good performance and new features. They are likely to get much attention as people would probably have settled down with some app, because they had no other choices. Once they can get their hands on improved and more useful apps, what could deter them from giving it a try?

4. Early marketing

Marketing should not be left out for the last phase of mobile app development. Do everything you could, to get your app noticed during the first week of your app’s launch itself. This would mean getting the word out early. The general trend is that if you can not get a good buzz around your app during the initial months of its release, you won’t be able to hope a recovery by updates, even after the best marketing efforts.

5. Pricing your app

You might be very much excited about getting huge returns from your app right after its launch in the app store. But how could you expect to get a good return from an app that is priced too high for the particular market that you are targeting?

App pricing could vary by and large based on the particular platform, industry and country targeted, purpose fulfilled, demand for the app for doing the particular task etc. Saying that, it is advised that you should not price your app too low also. You can give your app free for trial, but pricing it too low will make doubts in the customer’s mind about the quality of the app.

A Smartphone for Rs 99 Namotel Acche Din claims to be the ‘World’s Cheapest’

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

After the news-making Freedom 251, another smartphone has now claims to be the world’s cheapest smartphone at just Rs 99/-. This phone is named ‘Acche Din’ and is launched by Namotel.

The company is obviously something we have not heard of before. Is this another fake news? We cannot be sure. But it’d be clever not to spend your money on this.

The phone claims the following specs

  • 4-inch Display
  • 1GB RAM
  • Android 5.1 Lollipop
  • 1.3GHz quadcore processor
  • 1325 mAh battery
  • Camera – 2MP REAR + .3MP FRONT
  • Dual SIM Card

The company has promised the phone to be available for booking from May 17th to 25th May 2016. According to company promoter Madhava Reddy, this could be the cheapest phone ever, and would revolutionise the mobile phone market. Mr.Reddy has previously been working in the Home Loans department for Axis Bank, as a Relationship Manager. It evidently points his inexperience with the smartphone industry.

Looking at the news, its hardly believable. The news raises a lot of suspicion. Lets hope people do not fall for such campaigns.

The 14 Crucial Steps of Mobile App Development [Infographics]

Posted on by Super Admin Testreveal

Mobile app development has been sought by the majority of businesses these days. Fortunately, many business owners have realized that it is hard to survive the battle in the market without abiding by the business tactics and measures that are prevalent today. Even though this is a very thoughtful decision, a lot of failures are still visible.

Analysis shows that one of the main reasons contributing to app failure is the ignorance of the app development process on client side. They jump straight away into project proposal and app development, once they find a suitable mobile app development company, without examining if their expectations are actually practicable. Most are not interested in acquiring any knowledge of the details of development or procedures involved. They basically just want to an app, like they any commodity from a retail store.

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Each of the app development process is something that has a highly individualised nature and the outcome has a huge dependency factor in several of the decisions taken during the inception phase. This infographics will give you an awareness of the most important steps followed under the mobile app development process.