Easing the Path for App Releases

Managed Development of React Native with Expo

- Bob Japenga

This is the fifth in an article series about mobile app development from the perspective of an embedded systems designer using React Native. The series covers Bob's experiences creating apps for both iOS and Android devices. This month he wraps up his observations on mobile app development with the React Native framework, by looking at available tools for releasing and testing an app.

One of the major obstacles for my team in developing a mobile app to support our embedded products was our fear of trying to release it for Apple products. We knew that the release had to be submitted for review by Apple. How could we keep to our schedules, when we would be tied to the availability of Apple reviewers and jumping through all their hoops? A typical development cycle would deploy just a few mobile apps several months before production of the embedded product.

But what if there were a critical bug that needed to be fixed immediately? So for years, with every proposal we made that included a mobile app interface, we restricted the proposed app to Android. We knew that we could put an Android app on a phone without going through Google for a limited release.

But an Apple release was frightening.

As you might know, Android phones are deployed from the Play Store by Google, and Apple phones are deployed from its App Store.

For the purposes of this article, I will be using "app store" for both when it applies to both, and Play Store or App Store otherwise.

Whether those fears were justified back then, I don't know, but I can assure you that review by Apple is no longer a concern.