PDF Report: My first program for the iPhone
Hello, readers Habra! I want to share the story of creating my first program for the iPhone: PDF Report .
1. Search for ideas
The desire to write a program for the iPhone came to me for a long time. It took several months to find the idea of ​​the first application. Digging in the App Store and conversations with colleagues did not give a positive result. The insight was found on me when visiting the IKEA store.
In IKEA, you need to record or photograph the article of your favorite product and its location in the warehouse (number of rows and shelves). Just sfotat and leave in the general album of photos - not an option. I have full porridge there without them!
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The most convenient way to store pictures of selected items in one PDF. The page with the product that you managed to buy from the first visit can be deleted from the PDF. And the data of the goods, which was not in stock or for which the money was not enough, will be saved for the next time. For the saved article number, the presence of a particularly scarce product can be clarified by phone before the next trip to the store.
2. Development
To buy a Mac for the sake of a trial project, I considered it a barrage. I limited myself to installing VMWare Workstation on my work computer and setting up a virtual machine with Mac OS X Lion downloaded from the Internet.
Well, the further was already a matter of technology, because All the functionality was implemented in the framework of the public API provided by iOS. Special thanks to I want to tell the site stackoverflow.com . Without him, my life would be much worse.
When developing the program interface, I had a long-standing dream of all users in my head: a program with one window and one big button “Do what I want!”. For this reason, the interface is made in a “strict style” and with the minimum required number of functions. Because It is assumed that the program should be able to use any person who goes to the store. And not only advanced users, ready to read the manual.
Minimalism in wasting time and money in developing this trial program for me is explained by the fact that there was no certainty even that it would be taken on the App Store. Therefore, there is no adaptation for the large iPad screen, and the interface language is only English. In the next version, if the PDF Report shows its commercial perspective, of course, all the defects to me that are known will be refined. Yes, and users have already begun to send their wishes to the program.
3. First sales
Waiting for the adoption of PDF Report on the App Store lasted more than a week, and I already thought that Apple decided to ignore me. The fact that the program was taken to the store I learned 2 days later from a letter to the support service from the first customer, who demanded to add support for a new function.
The first few days of sales held at 2-3 per day. And this is without any advertising, but only due to being in the NEW section on the App Store! Comparing this result with my experience in selling programs for Windows, I will say that I was very impressed. Without knowing the market, make a program at random, put it on a site like download.com and immediately get a sale? Yes, this has never happened!
4. What's next?
The answer to the question "Can I sell software for the iPhone?" I received. Now I am looking for answers to the questions: “Is it possible to make this program profitable?” And “Will I be able to make a program that will start selling itself?”. Ideas already gathered the sea. Now I will add this article and proceed to the implementation.
PS: Promo codes for Habr's readers
L4E3P7KXM79T
E66K4JX97XKK
P6YM9JPMX4XW
6M6Y3PP4E9NK
YHKTX4WY3EP7
UPD: I forgot to write in the article that would be unsubscribed, if someone takes a promotional code. I would delete used ones. And then people, apparently, sort out the already extinguished codes, and then minus the article from annoyance.
1. Search for ideas
The desire to write a program for the iPhone came to me for a long time. It took several months to find the idea of ​​the first application. Digging in the App Store and conversations with colleagues did not give a positive result. The insight was found on me when visiting the IKEA store.
In IKEA, you need to record or photograph the article of your favorite product and its location in the warehouse (number of rows and shelves). Just sfotat and leave in the general album of photos - not an option. I have full porridge there without them!
')
The most convenient way to store pictures of selected items in one PDF. The page with the product that you managed to buy from the first visit can be deleted from the PDF. And the data of the goods, which was not in stock or for which the money was not enough, will be saved for the next time. For the saved article number, the presence of a particularly scarce product can be clarified by phone before the next trip to the store.
2. Development
To buy a Mac for the sake of a trial project, I considered it a barrage. I limited myself to installing VMWare Workstation on my work computer and setting up a virtual machine with Mac OS X Lion downloaded from the Internet.
Well, the further was already a matter of technology, because All the functionality was implemented in the framework of the public API provided by iOS. Special thanks to I want to tell the site stackoverflow.com . Without him, my life would be much worse.
When developing the program interface, I had a long-standing dream of all users in my head: a program with one window and one big button “Do what I want!”. For this reason, the interface is made in a “strict style” and with the minimum required number of functions. Because It is assumed that the program should be able to use any person who goes to the store. And not only advanced users, ready to read the manual.
Minimalism in wasting time and money in developing this trial program for me is explained by the fact that there was no certainty even that it would be taken on the App Store. Therefore, there is no adaptation for the large iPad screen, and the interface language is only English. In the next version, if the PDF Report shows its commercial perspective, of course, all the defects to me that are known will be refined. Yes, and users have already begun to send their wishes to the program.
3. First sales
Waiting for the adoption of PDF Report on the App Store lasted more than a week, and I already thought that Apple decided to ignore me. The fact that the program was taken to the store I learned 2 days later from a letter to the support service from the first customer, who demanded to add support for a new function.
The first few days of sales held at 2-3 per day. And this is without any advertising, but only due to being in the NEW section on the App Store! Comparing this result with my experience in selling programs for Windows, I will say that I was very impressed. Without knowing the market, make a program at random, put it on a site like download.com and immediately get a sale? Yes, this has never happened!
4. What's next?
The answer to the question "Can I sell software for the iPhone?" I received. Now I am looking for answers to the questions: “Is it possible to make this program profitable?” And “Will I be able to make a program that will start selling itself?”. Ideas already gathered the sea. Now I will add this article and proceed to the implementation.
PS: Promo codes for Habr's readers
UPD: I forgot to write in the article that would be unsubscribed, if someone takes a promotional code. I would delete used ones. And then people, apparently, sort out the already extinguished codes, and then minus the article from annoyance.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/151208/
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