Very good points. I think that some developers take the one-star rating the most hard when they have few ratings. An app with few user ratings can very quickly drop with even one one-star rating. Of course, then new potential users don't want to give it a shot because it has a bad overall rating. But I whole-heartedly agree with your assessment of the situation regarding different configurations, custom builds, and lack of a good way for users to report meaningful bug information. The best way to attempt to get anything useful is to build into your app a way to get that information and save it so the user has an opportunity to send it to you easily.
On Sep 18, 9:13 am, niko20 <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi all devs, > > I just wanted to quickly bring up a topic that I had noticed lately. > This comes to my attention for two reasons, firstly someone had posted > that he had a user that reported a vague error message like "deleted > all my pics", and the dev's were not able to reproduce it. Secondly, I > myself have seen bug reports that really may not be relevant to my > application. > > I had recommended to that first dev to just ignore the error for now > since there was not enough info to reproduce it, and also for a second > reason, there is no way to know what the user is truly running. > > For example, I've had a few bug reports, where a user says of my app > "Doesn't work on HTC hero", but then another user will post "Works > fine on Hero". I also had found a posting on the internet in a forum > where a user had tried to use some of my software on a custom ROM, and > he was having problems. > > I guess the issue I'm bringing up here is that with the android market > being somewhat "limited" in functionality, it makes it very hard on us > developers to handle any customer issues such as bugs, etc. Especially > since they could be using a custom ROM, or have ROOT access which also > may even be affecting the software. My point is that developing for > android in a professional manner is really not an easy task, and > possibly it's just starting to be worth it (with market 1.6 at least > there are some improvements) to develop paid apps. Basically Google > needs to work harder though to improve this situation - and if users > expect better apps (there are lots of complaints about the market > being full of junk) then they need a way to report issues better, etc. > And really it's not even up to a dev to try to match up with a custom > ROM, technically it's not supported! (It's up to the dev of course if > they want to investigate and try to support it). > > What seems is going to happen is android is not only going to have > multiple configs (which fortunately for us seems that the market will > help filter them out if you app does not support them), but also we > never can really know what is on a user's system. They may have some > custom stuff, and they see a bug, but it could really not be our bug, > but rather, in the system itself. > > This is why I still recommend that bug reports have to be weighed > carefully as to whether they may really be a problem or not. It's an > investment in time and while makers of free apps no doubt may not > mind, those of us who develop paid apps don't want to multiply our > costs by going down blank pathways. > > I don't think I see any resolution to the situation in the near > future, but I just wanted to make it clear that if a user reports a > bug in their comments and gives you one star, it's not the end of the > world. If you can reproduce it quickly and fix it, then that is great. > But if not, move on - there is no way you can know exactly what they > are talking about. I think some devs get too anxious about that one > bad report. There is no way we are going to avoid that report! Because > they may be using an untested ROM or such anyway, and it may not be > worth your time to look at it in the long run. I've had few low stars > here and there as well, and trust me, just keep improving your app and > you will rise back up. > > As devs we need to encourage one another and I just want to try and > help devs not get anxious about things that are really beyond their > control. > > -niko --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
