Do you want an iphone app? I think this is the only way to go

cedivad

Active member

I've a crazy idea:
xF pays some external developer to deploy an (example) iphone app. App must be brand-able from the final admin and he must receive the source code too.
Let's see you pay the app 2000€, that is a month of work of a great coder.
You than resell the app to us (50€ each?), we brand it and we use it with our users.

Crazy?
 
I don't care what it looks like. All I care about is if a product can actually make my life more productive. We will see, I have been eying the iPhone and Droid for a few years now before I make my final decision. :cool:

Honestly, I've found the Droid the most productive... Cept for that pesky PSX emulator that just manages to have all my favorite games easily portable (Legal rips of my own disks).
 
I personally think that a good mobile skin for XenForo would have significantly more value than an iPhone app at this point.
Please keep going along that line of thought.
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How about we just have a nice mobile skin like IPB does. I personally prefer that, specially since I don't use an iPhone and iPhone apps are overrated. :) Android all the way!
 
The attraction to a custom iPhone or Android app, is that forum users can have a icon on their phone leading right to your forum. You can never reach that advertisement and ease of use with a skin. To use the skin, users have to browse to your site first. With an app it only takes the click of an icon. Its a world of difference.
 
Tapatalk exists. If they are willing to add it to the list of supported forums, I see no reason for Kier & Kompany to waste time and efforts redeveloping the wheel. Time and effort better spent in the core areas of development that cannot be accomplished through alternate means.
 
Tapatalk exists. If they are willing to add it to the list of supported forums, I see no reason for Kier & Kompany to waste time and efforts redeveloping the wheel. Time and effort better spent in the core areas of development that cannot be accomplished through alternate means.

Tapatalk has to equally support many different platforms. If an app -was- released, I'd prefer one to come straight from XF, as it would supported by XF itself, and would be as feature rich as the forums itself.

The attraction to a custom iPhone or Android app, is that forum users can have a icon on their phone leading right to your forum. You can never reach that advertisement and ease of use with a skin. To use the skin, users have to browse to your site first. With an app it only takes the click of an icon. Its a world of difference.

I'm pretty sure with Android there is/was an app that allowed for sites to be made into a widget for instant loading.

I don't use my iPhone, so I don't know of a solution available for that.
 
The attraction to a custom iPhone or Android app, is that forum users can have a icon on their phone leading right to your forum. You can never reach that advertisement and ease of use with a skin. To use the skin, users have to browse to your site first. With an app it only takes the click of an icon. Its a world of difference.


Don't know if you mean this, but on an iPhone it is actually possible to create a shortcut to a webpage on your homescreen. You just have to manually browse to your site once and press a button to add it to your homescreen (it automatically generates an icon for you): dead easy. After that, it's all accessible through your newly created icon. This is how it looks:

XenForo icon on iPhone.webp

I just love my iPhone! :cool:
 
You have some messages you should probably read ;)

I knew somebody was going to say something about that! :p (it's just mails from my hotmail account... which I never use and private mails from a dutch social network site (which I also do not use anymore since I am on Facebook... heck... I even do not use Facebook that much... I much prefer to hang around here!).
 
I knew somebody was going to say something about that! :p (it's just mails from my hotmail account... which I never use and private mails from a dutch social network site (which I also do not use anymore since I am on Facebook... heck... I even do not use Facebook that much... I much prefer to hang around here!).

if you have no intention of reading them, why have your phone check for them?
 
As an iPhone/iPad app developer I could tell you now that its a bad idea. Why?

Think about it. On average, an update has to be released at least once every 6 months. That means every 6 months, XF are going to be paying a developer to perform updates to get it compatible with the next OS release.

That update then has to be re-downloaded by all forum owners, who you are assuming all have Macs, and a developer account to get hold of XCode. They then have to customise it, send it off to apple (again, needing a developer account) and get it approved.

See the problem here?

Stick with a mobile skin.
 
As an iPhone/iPad app developer I could tell you now that its a bad idea. Why?

Think about it. On average, an update has to be released at least once every 6 months. That means every 6 months, XF are going to be paying a developer to perform updates to get it compatible with the next OS release.

That update then has to be re-downloaded by all forum owners, who you are assuming all have Macs, and a developer account to get hold of XCode. They then have to customise it, send it off to apple (again, needing a developer account) and get it approved.

See the problem here?

Stick with a mobile skin.


Currently in the process of developing an iPhone app for my users (since it has been requested -- some users will always prefer apps to mobile skins, for whatever reason), myself. Based on previous experiences of developing apps for the iPhone/iPad, I pretty much share your sentiments. I have never found developing for the iPhone platform to be enjoyable in the least bit. Now, androids on the other hand, much more enjoyable.

Anyway I agree with those saying a great mobile skin would be much more beneficial.
 
Tapatalk has to equally support many different platforms. If an app -was- released, I'd prefer one to come straight from XF, as it would supported by XF itself, and would be as feature rich as the forums itself.
And if this was a perfect world... :) I'm just looking around and seeing that there are probably many higher priorities here. Since there is a limit of time, money and developers, it would seem - to me at least - that developing a home made iPhone app would be unnecessary for now. If someone wants to create a mobile skin, great, but the same sentiment applies. That's more considerable effort when someone else might already have a solution that can keep us happy for a while.
 
And if this was a perfect world... :) I'm just looking around and seeing that there are probably many higher priorities here. Since there is a limit of time, money and developers, it would seem - to me at least - that developing a home made iPhone app would be unnecessary for now. If someone wants to create a mobile skin, great, but the same sentiment applies. That's more considerable effort when someone else might already have a solution that can keep us happy for a while.

Kier has already stated a mobile skin is probably coming, just not with the first release.

I personally think that a good mobile skin for XenForo would have significantly more value than an iPhone app at this point.

Not that XenForo renders badly on mobile devices, on the contrary it renders very well (see here) but many of the UI elements are not designed for touch interaction, and therefore may be expecting hover operations or may be too small to effectively click without zooming in.

I have plans and designs for a mobile skin, though I can't say when it will debut at this point.
 
Kier, do not see the white iPhone app as something important for our users. Most likely, your mobile style may be even better!

It is a way for us admins to generate income by having users pay a small fee for this app.

At this point, I'd not even think about it. But you may (!!!) have a presale of this app, bundle it etc. to have some money earlier.
 
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