Soooo, i have created an app that uses the main ionic templates with two tabs at the bottom and ionic buttons throughout to switch between views.
I have waited 6 days for apple to start reviewing it and today was the day they did so and rejected it with the following vague statement.
“Your app did not include iOS features. App Store apps should use native iOS buttons and include iOS features other than just web views, Push Notifications, or sharing.”
Any ideas on how to make a basic ionic app that reads data from an API and display it use native iOS features? It sounds like they want me to make it more complex just for approval.
Hmm, this is the first I’ve heard of apple doing something like this.
What exactly is your app doing?
It’s kind of hard to believe that apple would reject an app while there are thousands of hybrid apps out there.
That is a canned message from Apple. If the app just is a data display with no functionality, that is the type of message you will get from them. Using hybrid is not the issue, but taking a static web site and wrapping it in a hybrid container is something that will trigger a rejection.
My app currently does just pull data and display it nicely. My longer term view was to enable push notifications and sharing functionality (have this information in your pocket as opposed to having to go to websites constantly) but even with the comment Apple left those two features would still not be classified as useful enough for approval.
Am i expected to over complicate my app just for approval? Isn’t “usefulness” a very subjective term as i would find this highly useful to have it on my phone.
We build apps for clients and have run into this issue before, we encourage clients to integrate some native feature in the app even if it is cosmetic to avoid this issue.
Also if that is all it does why not just make a website?
What sort of features are easiest to implement for native?
I don’t want a website because that is what i am trying to replace for ease of use. The idea is to have all the info needed in your pocket, not have to go and scour through 5 websites.
Twitter/Facebook also just display information from the website… they do have input and use the camera etc but in my instance i am not sure what else “native” i should put in.
Would local storage be considered native? would pulling down images/video content and displaying them in the media app be native?
I did in the end yes, even tho the decline response stated that basic features wouldn’t get it accepted (like social sharing etc) that is all i really added (social sharing functionality using a ionic plugin). The other way i also “think” i got it through was that i pushed it through to a beta channel first and invited some friends to test it out, then once it was approved there and tested for a few weeks i submitted it to the production channel and it was approved.