Mobile App Testing

You know how they say a picture is worth a thousand words? Well in the case of Android fragmentation – a subject discussed at great length here and on the uTest blog – a picture is worth a few thousand devices.

The image you’re seeing is a data chart of thousands of separate device models encountered by the dev team at OpenSignalMaps over the course of a six month period. It may not be a flashy infographic, but it’s one of the best visuals I’ve seen to convey the challenge of Android hardware fragmentation. Here with more details on the chart (and on Android fragmentation in general) is arstechnica:

Read more…

A few days back we highlighted uTest’s launch of AppGrader for Android. How would the tech world react? Judging from a recently TechCrunch article, we’d say rather favorably. Here are a few excerpts from Sarah Perez’s latest piece, which included some interesting facts and figures about the Android ecosystem:

uTest, a company known for providing a variety of testing solutions for desktop, web and mobile, is launching a new solution designed to grade mobile apps’ performance under real-world conditions, and then compare the app’s rating with that of its competition. The solution, for obvious reasons (i.e., desperate need) is arriving first on Android, with an iOS version to follow soon. The app testing process takes just a few minutes, the company claims, and will then return a report grading the app on a scale of 1 to 100.

In addition to the score, the report also details any issues discovered during the app download, installation and basic usage. To provide more context, the AppGrader report, as it’s called, also compares the app’s grade to those of the most popular applications in the Android Market Google Play store that are found in the same app store category.

Although all mobile developers could benefit from more testing tools, there’s more of need to address the Android developer base first. On Android, developers don’t just have to deal with an incredible number of device types in the wild, they’re also constantly challenged by OS fragmentation, too. According to Google’s own statistics, only 4.9% of users are running the latest version of Android (Ice Cream Sandwich), 3.3% are stuck on the version just prior (Honeycomb) while 64.4% are on Gingerbread, which was first released back in December 2010. The remaining 27.4% are running versions that are even older, if you can believe it.

Read the rest >>>

There’s only a few things that can happen when a user downloads your mobile app. Unfortunately, most of them are bad. Here are a few common outcomes:

• The app crashes
• The app hangs
• The app stalls
• The app works exactly as expected

The point is this: Without proper testing, you’ll never really know how users are experiencing your mobile app. This is particularly true of the Android operating system, with its seemingly countless permutations of devices.

So to help make the mobile app testing process a little less complex, uTest is pleased to launch a new tool that we hope will help you catch some of these problems before your users do. We call it AppGrader, and today we’re launching it as a way to quickly test your Android apps.

What is AppGrader?
AppGrader is a free online tool that can be used to quickly test your mobile application on a variety of common devices. With AppGrader, you can load your application on several devices and get basic reporting about bugs associated with installing, loading and running your application.

Why Does It Matter?
As a proponent of in-the-wild testing, we believe that an application is only properly tested once it has been evaluated by real users, with real devices, in a wide number of locations. AppGrader is a way to provide a taste of in-the-wild testing, by accessing the real devices component (albiet in an automated fashion).

Those who are interested in what AppGrader has to offer will likely appreciate uTest’s full suite of testing services.

What Do You Get?
With AppGrader, you can get a custom score for your application. You’ll also receive a comparison of how well your app works compared to dozens of other popular apps on the same devices. If your app should crash on the device, you can quickly download a crash log to get a deeper look at the problem.

What Devices Does it Cover?
At this point in time, AppGrader is just for Android devices (and yes, we do have plans to launch this service for other mobile operating systems). Devices tested include:

• Samsung Galaxy Nexus
• Samsung Galaxy Nexus S
• LG Nitro HD
• Samsung Galaxy Tab
• HTC Thunderbolt
• Sony Ericson Xperia

AppGrader will also evaluate your application on devices across several popular carriers, including AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint.

What Does It Cost?
Only your soul. Just kidding. It’s free.

How Do I Get Started?
To get started, simply fill out a brief form and upload your Android APK. Once your results are ready, you’ll be notified by email within minutes.

So what are you waiting for?

Try AppGrader Today >>>

There are lists upon lists of “best apps” floating around the internet, and every once and awhile I like to put a few up on this site to see what you guys think. So today we’re going to take a look at the apps featured in CIO’s “Top Mobile Apps Showcased at DEMO 2012,” and PCWorld’s “12 Best Free Mobile Apps for Commuters, 2012 Edition” and “4 Best Free Health and Fitness Apps of 2012.” I chose these lists in particular because everyone likes new things, I commute to work and bathing suit season is coming up.

From Top Mobile Apps Showcased at DEMO 2012

TourWrist
The TourWrist iOS app is basically a Google Street View equivalent for any location the user decides to document; the app captures 360-degree panoramic images and shares them online. …

Perhaps the most interesting part of the demonstration came when the presenter stepped forward while viewing the Grand Canyon panorama and the app automatically zoomed in. … Another benefit is the ability to share these interactive images on social media sites for use by potential customers who do not have the app.

Fribi
Fribi takes one of the most common uses of Craigslist — finding and soliciting personal items that would have otherwise been discarded — and takes it one step further. …

The design one-ups Craigslist by displaying each available item by its photo, rather than a one-line description that the user will have to click for more information. Older items that have since been given away remain on each user’s profile so others can get a sense of the type of business they can expect in the future.

Arqball
Arqball is a combination iOS app and small rotating stage that combine to make interactive 3D images of individual objects. … By placing an item on the stage and capturing a rotation with the camera on an iOS device, the app creates an image that can later be viewed from every angle.

Read more…

The debate has been raging for awhile: Which will win out? Mobile websites or native apps?

There have been solid arguments for both and even hybrid compromises (like native app icons that take you to a mobile site). But another melding of the two forms has just appeared in the form on CNET’s new mobile site.

In an article published yesterday CNET details how the design aesthetics of a native app influenced the redesign of their mobile site. The thought they put into their site is thorough and interesting and might just give mobile site designers a few ideas to think about and build on. Here’s what CNET did:

We know that there’s nothing as frustrating as a hard-to-navigate mobile Web site. There’s so little space on a phone screen that every pixel has to earn its keep. So when we redesigned our m.cnet.com site from the ground up, we took cues from something everyone knows and loves: mobile apps.

First, we simplified the layout of our mobile site and made its navigation familiar to anyone who uses Facebook, Path, or any other common mobile app. …

Just because m.cnet.com looks like an app doesn’t mean that is an app, though. Anytime you click a link that takes you to a CNET page on your phone’s browser, you’ll get this experience whether you’ve installed a CNET app or not. We’ve made our article pages clean and easy to read, with standard sharing navigation at the upper right.

Get more details at CNET >>>

Has anyone used the new CNET mobile site? What do you think of it? Is it intuitive and easy to navigate or did CNET miss their mark? Is the concept of “native app design for mobile web” something you think will or should catch on?

The readers of the SD Times (Software Development Times) are probably a fairly good subset of the population to poll when you’re interested in how many companies are buying into the mobile app phenomenon. Well BZ Research (another arm of SD Times’ owner BZ Media) did just that and found that 70% of its respondents planned on having a mobile app within the next 18 months. No word on how many people took part in the survey.

Here’s a few numbers for you:

• Of those already building apps tablet specific apps are betting out phone-targeted apps 88.1% to 82.3%
• Apps for e-readers are grabbing the attention of 9.8% of companies
• Android apps barely beat out iOS at a rate of 63.9% versus 63.6%
• 1 in 5 companies are developing for Blackberry

Read more…

We write a lot about the scope of mobile fragmentation (particularly within Android) and the vastness of the testing matrix related to that fragmentation. Usually it’s viewed as a pain in the side of developers because it makes it difficult to know how their apps will preform across different devices/OS/etc. It’s also a pain for testers and end users who are upset when a glaring bug appears or an app isn’t offered for their device.

But the folks over at Sourcebits (a development company) used some space in VentureBeat to counter that assertion. In fact, they present five reason mobile fragmentation is actually good for developers! Here’s a summary of their five reasons:

Big fish, small pond

Look at Amazon’s Android-based, highly customized Kindle Fire. Small platform, some might say — perhaps even a niche within a niche. But that’s actually a positive. “We’re seeing impressive uptake on Kindle Fire and Amazon’s marketplace,” said Nat Trienens, co-founder and Director of Mobile Services for Fuzz Productions in New York. “There aren’t as many apps in that market, so there’s a bigger opportunity to get better market position.”

Mobile is really, really, really big

There are currently almost 6 billion people on the globe who have a mobile phone, according to the International Telecommunications Union. 6. Billion. People. That’s a lot. And many of them have or will soon have smartphones: IDC tells us that 491 million smartphones were shipped in 2011.

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Interested in developing apps for the upcoming Windows 8 but don’t want to shell out the money right now for a lowly Windows 7 tablet? Fear not, Splashtop has your back!

The remote desktop maker has created a new iOS app called Win8 Metro Testbed that will allow developers to test their Windows 8 apps on an iPad (before Windows 8 is even available). Here’s their thinking (from Gigaom):

Why an iPad? Cliff Miller, Splashtop’s president of its Asia/Pacific region and chief marketing officer, said this of the potential Windows 8 developers the company is targeting:

“If they want to test their app with touch gestures there’s only one way to do that and that is to buy a Windows tablet, and that can cost $500 to $1,000 or more. … And 99 percent of Win8 tablet developers — they have iPads.”

Now, there are no Windows 8 tablets on the market yet. Microsoft has unveiled a public preview of the software, but the finished version of the desktop/tablet OS is supposed to roll out to the public some time in October. Developers can test their apps on Windows 7 tablets in the meantime, but to Miller’s point, it’s a hefty expense for some individual developers and smaller shops.

Read the full article at Gigaom >>>

So if you are interested in developing or testing an app for the up-and-coming Windows platform, break out the iPad and get cracking! Then when October rolls around and you feel comfortable buying the newest Windows tablet, you’ll already have an awesome app available in the Win8 store!

This seems like yet another instance of insufficient testing. The newest Batman game, “Arkham City Lockdown,” was recently released and while it’s averaging a good star rating, it’s contending with some fairly serious crash issues for some would-be users. Here’s what one of those potential users is experiencing (from TechNewsWorld):

As much as I wanted to play “Batman Arkham City Lockdown,” I couldn’t. Ten times out of 10, the app would crash before I could start playing. I was using a first-gen iPad, which should be a supported device, according to iTunes. Is this a case of inadequate testing? …

I gave it 10 chances, and it crashed 10 times.

I’d get to the point at which I could select a memory slot in which to create a new game, then suddenly my iPad’s wallpaper would be staring back at me again. Maybe if I stuck it out once more I’d succeed on the eleventh try, but if this game always takes nearly a dozen warm-up sessions to actually get in the mood, I can’t imagine myself playing it more than once. …

Am I the only one experiencing this problem? No again. Sorting the reviews on iTunes by “Most Critical,” I see much use of the word “crash.”

Paul, who wrote the TechNewsWorld article, downloaded the app onto his first gen iPad. At first he thought that might be the issue, but if it is, Warner Brothers (who released the app) have some explaining to do. Back to Paul:

Read more…

By now, nearly everyone has heard THE BIG NEWS about Instagram getting sold to Facebook for a cool $1 billion. You’ve probably also seen the news about Instagram being launched on the Android marketplace, having previously been exclusive to the iPhone. What you may not have noticed is that it’s Android launch has not gone as smoothly as some might have hoped for – and not because some iOS users are jumping ship. The real reason: fragmentation.

Readers of this blog are quite familiar with the fragmentation of the Android ecosystem (i.e. numerous combinations of devices, operating systems and carriers), which makes bugs incredibly hard to diagnose and fix.

CNET Asia posted a brief summary of a few issues in particular. Take a look:

If you haven’t heard, Instagram, the popular social networking app for sharing pictures, is now available for Android. We tried loading it on HTC’s latest wonder phone, the One X, in order to put its fantastic camera to the test. Unfortunately, as you can see above, the app just doesn’t quite work. In fact, we’re not the only ones who have noticed this.

According to Gotta Be Mobile, Temple Run also suffered from the same issue of not working properly on certain devices. Google’s continued insistence that Android is not fragmented just looks silly at this point, especially when you consider the fact that only 2.9 percent of handsets are running Ice Cream Sandwich. The OS was released late last year.

Comparatively, 80 percent of iOS users are running on iOS 5 or later, according to statistics obtained by Indie developer David Smith.

Other sites, such as geek.com, have made note of forced close on the Glaxy Nexus and the Nexus X. I’m sure there are many other similar instances as well.

In any event, as Instgram expands its footprint (to Windows Phone perhaps?) it will be interesting to see what approach it takes to testing. Stay tuned.