I quite agree, it IS a deep dirty hack.
And I don't really disagree with your advice, but I have a slightly
more nuanced view on deep dirty hacks.
I view it as a trade-off -- one that has to be made very objectively
and carefully. One must be very careful to exclude showcasing one's
hax0r sk1llz from the equation, and focus on the users.
Start with "What value do you bring to the user?". Then factor in the
disruption that may ensue when it doesn't work in a new release, or
when the user changes devices. Is it still valuable enough when the
user can't depend on it being there? Often, the value disappears right
there.
But sometimes, it's daily value is high enough for at least some users
to be worthwhile. But probably not to all users. Can you communicate
the risks well enough so the user can make an intelligent choice? Or
are you leading a lot of users down a path that they'd not choose to
follow. If so, you may be doing more harm than good.
Can you mitigate some of the risks? Careful error handling may help in
some cases, but not really with sending undocumented intents. Giving
users the ability to disable the functionality if it doesn't work on
their device, with careful instructions about how to verify it for
themselves may help. Giving yourself the ability to disable it
remotely in environments where it is discovered not to work might
might; I don't know of anyone doing that, but I'd expect it to be
helpful but imperfect.
Can you assume some of the risk yourself -- by testing on a wide range
of devices? If you can, you're more likely to be able to limit the
negatives.
Can you quickly turn around new releases when things change -- new
devices, new releases, new information?
The key here is to look at it from the user's perspective. Would the
user MADLY want this feature, even if it might suddenly start failing?
As a user, I think calendar integration IS a good candidate for this.
It baffles me why there's no specification to allow such integration.
This is something *I* would have expected to be in the first Beta! It
is a huge deal in the business world -- and also extremely valuable to
soccer moms and college students.
However, "no big deal again" is not a good attitude for success in
dealing with it. It very definitely IS a big deal. Users want reliable
apps. They will come to depend on calendar integration.
Remember, too -- your reputation is on the line.
On Aug 1, 5:53 pm, Mark Murphy <mmur...@commonsware.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Aug 1, 2010 at 7:51 PM, { Devdroid } <webnet.andr...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Sorry, but it's quite pointless advice. It's just one intent, not deep
> > dirty hack.
>>
> What you're doing is no different than calling an undocumented
> function on an undocumented .so/DLL/.NET assembly. Yes, it
> demonstrates your mad hax0r sk1llz. It is not a recipe for a reliable
> app, to the detriment of some of your users and to Android as a whole.
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