iPhone App Submission (part 2)

Intro

iTunes Connect Submission

1. Export Compliance: You must notify Apple if you use encryption in your application as certain levels of encryption is illegal in some countries.
2. Overview: You will see a list of fields that will be used to identify your application on the Apple App Store.
   • Make sure you put something short but sweet in the Application Description. This is where you will sell the application to the user reading about what the application does.
   • If you only want your application to run on certain devices then you must declare it in your info.plist file (website developers will be familiar with type of configuration file; it is very similar to a web.config file).
   • Primary and Secondary category should be chosen carefully to ensure your application can be found in the correct place on the Apple App Store. A user might be using the category selection to find an application for a specific purpose, so you want your app to appear for them when they go searching for it. A secondary category is not necessary but is recommended.
   • In the next fields, enter your company/personal name, a version number (usually 1.00 if it is the first version) and a SKU number – this is a unique number for your reference.
   • Choosing the correct keywords is as important as choosing the right category, your application will appear when a user searches on these keywords, just in the same way that a website would appear in search engine listings for the keywords you type.
   • Enter your work/personal website in the Application URL field, I believe this is important as it provides a way for users to get to your website and is good for promotion (although it will not provide you with any link-value). The support URL must be setup so that users can contact you in case of bugs with the application, and the same goes for the support email address.
3. Ratings: You must tell Apple of the content your application includes, this screen is pretty self explanatory, just tick the boxes that apply to your application and Apple will give your application an age rating. Note: You cannot include any Graphic Sexual Content or Nudity in your application as it will be outright refused by Apple.
4. Upload: This screen is where you upload your application binary, screen shots, and icon. You have the option to upload the application binary later here if you just want to setup the application in iTunes Connect ready for the actual application to be built. I find this would give a project a bit more incentive for a target as all they would have to do at the end would be upload the binary and click submit.
5. Localisation: If you aim to target multiple languages with the application name, description, etc. then you can add another language, otherwise click Continue.
6. Pricing: If you want your application to appear on the app store at a future date then you can set an Availability Date. The price tier option allows you to choose the price of your application. You can set which country you wish your app to appear in on this screen so that if you have an app that, for example, only works in the UK because it relies on the GPS location being in the UK then it will only appear in the UK app store.
7. Summary: The final screen allows you review your choices and select what country app store you wish Apple to review your app in. This is also important based on what I mentioned in the step above.
   Click Done and your application will be visible from the application splash screen page. Click on the icon for the application and you will see the details of the app you just created.
   Here you can see the status of the application and how far through the review process it is. The status indicator will change as and when Apple starts reviewing it, up until when they accept or unfortunately in some cases refuse it.