Phew. Luckily, we’re stocked up well to support all this; we took a serious delivery this morning. Check out the testing pool.

You’re reading the tapadoo blog. Did you know that as well as publishing our own applications, we offer iPhone development services and consultancy? If you have an idea, project or something you think we can help you with, please get in touch through our contact page.

• Proven track record in releasing iOS applications
• Have at least gained certification at beginner of special ops in modern warfare 2
• Keen eye for detail
• Have never used the phrase “Its good enough, lets ship it as is”
• Be in a possession of a full clean, collection of Apple stuff

Or…if you’re the best iOS developer you know, we want to hear from you.

Get in touch with Dermot. If you don’t know how, you’ve stumbled at the first hurdle.

There are 250,000 iPhones in Ireland

At least, that’s according to the article on silicon republic.

That’s only a starter statistic though. Take a look at actual app sales figures. Who are selling apps? Well, you could look at this article which gives Gartner’s take on it.

Or…I’ll save you the bother and give you the management overview from the bottom of the article:

Wow.

You’re reading the tapadoo blog. Did you know that as well as publishing our own applications, we offer iPhone development services and consultancy? If you have an idea, project or something you think we can help you with, please get in touch through our contact page.

I’ve done a few speaking events on iPhone this year; two Dev Days, Epicenter, one for Enterprise Ireland and the Young Entrepreneur event, and feel I’m getting the hang of it, but this event was particularly interesting.

At the Epicenter event last year, I attended a “round table” event for all speakers to have a broad discussion on the software industry in Ireland. I was bemoaning the fact that university prepared me for a job, perhaps even for a career, but it didn’t suggest starting a business as an option. As I left this talk, Chris Horn came to me and said “take a look at what Jerry Kenelly is doing in the institute of Tralee”. He suggested that Jerry has put Entrepreneurship on the programme, and that it is paying dividends.

Back in January, out of the blue I was contacted by Jerry Kenelly asking would I speak at the event. Naturally I jumped at it, I’m really glad I did.

Why? Well it gave me a chance to see first hand what they are doing to promote Entrepreneurship as an option for students. Their mission is to promote “the fact that becoming an entrepreneur is a viable career option”. They do this by running an annual Young Entrepreneur of the year competition. The event is kicked off in October and is open to all 2nd level and 3rd level students in the area. This year was also open to students in Limerick.

The event last week was the mid-programme event. It is called “Business Boot Camp”. Its attended by all 600 entrants, and has talk from business leaders along with some practical work. What most impressed me was the respect shown to the audience. The dialog was not dumbed down or simplified for students. This was real practical advice. Speakers included former Entrepreneur of the Year (from the Ernst & Young competition, the “Senior’s” if you will), Colum O’Sullivan of Cully & Sully Foods (who crunched the numbers with a student), and the most revered man in Kerry, Kerry Bainisteoir Jack O’Connor.

During the event, the students were given a chance to pitch their ideas. One girl in particular did a pitch worthy of Dragon’s Den, and when Sully attempted to dissect them, she was quick to show how her market research stacked up. Very impressive stuff.

So there – Setting up a company is a real option. I really wish it crossed my mind 15 years ago. That’s nobody’s fault, but with I can’t help but think that what’s going on in Kerry will plant the seed for some, and could be where the next great business leader will come from.

The event will have its proof in the coming years, when a guest speaker will be able to say “I was sitting in this audience like you just 3 years ago….”

The future’s bright.

Apple will share with you download and sales figures, but you will have no real way of contacting those users – Apple don’t give you, for example, the email addresses of your users; Which is perfectly understandable; they may have downloaded your app, and immediately deleted it. They aren’t your users, they’re Apple’s users. Apple, understandably wouldn’t like iTunes users getting spammed by people who wrote the apps.

This does lead to a disconnect though; How do you engage with your users? The people who use your apps regularly are the same people who can give you the best feedback. I’ve done one or two of these, and need to do more (”A lot done, more to do” as the phrase goes). But here’s my thoughts

1. Read your reviews. Some people will give useful feedback here. Read them all. Go over them, regularly
2. Provide a number of channels to take feedback. My page about “Irelands Phone Book” and “Irelands Phone Book Pro” has a UserVoice feedback tab at the side of the web page. It allows users to submit feedback directly; I take comments on my blog, and reply to them all, and I also publish my e-mail address on the site.
3. Allow for feedback within your app I fell down on this one. But the 3.0 SDK now allows for embedding emails, so allow the user mail you direct with feedback. All my future apps will do this.
4. Get yourself a bug/issue tracking system. Any useful feature requests, put them in there for your next version. Also to record where you got the request

People will have gripes or dislikes about your app. Its how you choose to deal with them that is important. By taking it on board, you can turn an estranged user into one of your biggest supporters.

Also, if you do act upon user suggestions, its a good idea to let the user know that you’ve implemented their feature request.

And with that, I’d like to thank the following. All of you had influence on deciding what to put into Irelands Phone Book, Pro Edition:

• User Nabidana on iTunes: You asked for SMS directly through EirText Pro. You got it. I also added support for EirText (free) and JellySMS.
• User Wez77 on iTunes: You asked for mapping. That’s there now too.
• Twitter User : @mejooley: When you heard I was adding maps, you said “Will I be able to get directions?” – Well, that would be complicated..let me see..OK; You can tap on an entry in the map and it will open it the iPhone Maps application. Now you can get directions.
• Dan Laffan: You said you didn’t like when you use the previous and next page buttons, that the table remains at the bottom of the results – Like, If I hit next page, surely I want to see the top of the next page. Yup. Agreed. Done.
• Twitter user @conorwinders. You asked for better integration with contacts.app. I’ve done some of it (more to come), but now you can either create a new contact, or save the contact to an existing one.
• Tom Fennelly: You suggested being able to override the default search location. You even suggested the concept of “name@town”. That’s a great idea. Good for users, and really easy to add. So I did it. Its in there.

On the off-chance you’ve not read the main page about the pro version, here’s an App Store link (Opens in iTunes).

Have you thoughts on engaging your users? Are you one of my users with an idea, or some feedback? Do get in touch. Just use the comments section below.

Watch out kids. This could happen to you. It begins with a simple iPod nano, you never know were its going to end. As I write this, I don’t know what the future holds. An iMac? A cinema display? Who knows.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I’m Dermot Daly, and I’m a Macaholic

Getting ready to head to Moscone

The press gallery at the keynote

The Sessions
The sessions where by and large excellent. Every speaker was polished, and the delivery was first rate. And..its like drinking from the firehose. The information comes thick and fast, is detailed and useful. Each session leaves aside about 10 minutes for Q&A and sticking around for these is worthwhile. Its also good to see the Apple folk having to answer technical questions on the fly.
One part of the Q&A became a little tedious. Apple do not answer any question if it is posed in the future tense. I’m a relative newbie to this world, but I noticed this very early. It surprised me that people continued to do it. Any question beginning with “Are you planning on…”, “Will there be..”, etc. etc. gets stonewalled, brushed aside, or given a stock answer like

“That’s great feedback. Doooley noted. I’d encourage you to file a radar on that”

(I didn’t notice anyone noting anything by the way).
I would go as far as to say I felt that some of the evangelists (this is what the public facing guys who give out their e-mails, etc. are known as) seemed to take some pleasure in trumping out these mantras. Often, the “that’s great feedback” line was delivered through a smug grin.
The point is this. Apple don’t talk about the future. Don’t ask. There’s no point.

Lunchtime sessions
The lunchtime sessions put on by Apple were superb. The ones I attended were worthy of a TED talk, with the most entertaining one being Denis Wingos “Adventures in Technoarcheology, Restoring Lunar Images for a New Generation of Exploration”. It was technical, interesting, entertaining and even emotional in parts. During the Q&A, a guy who worked on the original NASA project complimented the speaker, and got emotional. It was touching. Software development is much older in the US than here in Ireland, so there were plenty of more mature people at the conference.

Extra events
There’s lots of things going on during the week of WWDC. You could quite easily eat and drink free for the week should you want to. We attended events put on by Symbian (Free lunch, nokia 5800 out of that!), Palm (free tapas and drink!), The iphone launch party (Rubbing shoulders with Steve Wozniak!, free champagne!), Parallells (free food and drink!), Cocoaheads (free entertaining talk by Wil Shipley), etc. All of these were a great place to meet people, network, and have some fun too.
This brings me on to another point.

Geeks are people, too. Interesting people, even
Like all first timers, I had preconceived notions of the “kind” of people who attend events like this. I took some flak about my week away going to a “nerdfest” and other such terms, but the experience has totally changed that.
As software engineers/programmers/scientists people make assumptions about our inability to communicate beyond speaking about technology. What I met were lots of people who were interesting, engaging and fun to be around. Some of these people use the term ‘nerd’ or ‘geek’ with pride. None of them were like the stereotypes we’ve come to know from movies, etc. Some spoke about technology, some spoke about the books they’ve written, but plenty were happy to speak about sports, or where they are from, or their family, whatever.
At WWDC, I was with people I enjoy spending time with. We had overlaps in our interests, sure, but by and large I met people that self confessed ‘non-nerds’ could enjoy being with. I think its time that those stereotypes were busted.

When uploading to itunesconnect, set your release date far in the future. When it comes ready for sale, set it back to when you really want to release it.

Here’s why….

So, I finally go through the contracts processed and released my application. You can read all about it here.

I made a simple mistake when I submitted it, and luckily this did not affect downloads, however I still feel this is an important point to make. Pay attention, new iPhone developers because I saw this tip on numerous sites and chose to ignore it.

What I am talking about is setting your sale date. When uploading to itunestconnect, you are asked for my sale date. I mistakenly took this as something the reviewers would used to help decide how quickly they should review. No chance.

I suspect that the review team work more or less from a first in, first out basis (ok, there could be some exceptions, but basically). The sale date is for you only.

I set mine to be a week away in the silly hope that they would review it quicker.

Here’s what actually happened:

1. I submitted it for review 19 March, with a on sale date of 26 March
2. I received my first submission feedback 14 days later, on April 2, where they had found a crash
3. I fixed and resubmitted that evening
4. 7 days later, on April 10, I received notice that the app was “ready for sale”
5. However, my contracts were pending (that’s another story) so when they got fixed on May 13, I set the App to go on sale the next day, May 14

Ok. Still with me?
So, when my app is on sale, I look for it in iTunes by ordering by release date. No sign of it. I search backwards. Can’t find it.

Eventually, when I can find my app, its got a release date of April 10, i.e. the date it was approved (as my original “on sale” date was earlier).

This means my app missed its “day in the sun”. Being top of the list by release date is one way your app can get noticed after it is released. So don’t make the same mistake I did.

To reiterate:

When uploading to itunesconnect, set your release date far in the future. When it comes ready for sale, set it back to when you really want to release it.

The post script to this is my app has exceeded my expectations in terms of popularity, despite not being noticed as a “newly released” app. I’ll blog further thought on what to expect post release in a day or two.

Any other comments? Feel free to add to the discussion

Here’s some things I may be writing about, in no particular order: software, Objective-C, Java, the software industry in Ireland, iPhone application development, living your life “in the cloud”, photography, C, Apple, Linux, being a nerd, trying not to be a nerd, and cool new companies that are sprouting up.