I just completed my first app (they are actually two) and got them to the AppStore (one of many available). Here is the story of that accomplishment.
You Owe Me
When you are just a user, often you feel like the developers and the companies owe you something because you happened to support their service or device. You often hear "Windows Phone is doomed because there's no apps, it's all Microsoft's fault" or "That App is iOS only, that because you cannot get money from Android" or even "The App experience is crippled because restrictions made by Apple".
What the users don't know is that politics takes such an important part of bringing the app you want to your preferred platform. And sometimes is not the fault of Google, Apple or Microsoft that the app is crippled or is taking a lot of time to come out.
No Man Is an Island
No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine...
— John Donne (Wikipedia)
Just like that "No App Is an Island". They are just a few Apps that don't depend at all from a 3rd party framework, control or technology. Even an in-house backend may be problematic to integrate in a brand new app. If you add that dependency to politics you get a more complete picture about the current state of App development.
Next time you see a high profile app coming to a new platform think about all those dependencies that had to be addressed to complete the App. If the platform is popular those dependencies should be addressed already, and people (the providers) will care if they are not working as advertised. If the platform is not so popular, well you may have a bad time and your project may get delayed.
App Reviews
App reviews are so important, for real. Before this app I didn't realised this. From reviews you can get bugs, UX issues and features request. As you read the reviews it feels like if you were in the middle of a hostage situation, people start blackmailing you because you OWE them.
The app is fine but because it doesn't have my favorite soccer team, it deserves 1 star. Add my team and I will change the rating to 5 stars.
— Average user
It's funny because a lot of the things they are asking are already in the TO-DO of the developer, or even waiting for the next update to be up. But often the developer won't have a chance to say that directly to the user.
Conclusion
This experience was awesome. It was stressful because some crazy changes to requirements and hard deadlines but AWESOME at the end. It's a shame I cannot say I did THAT, either way feels great when you read that people love your work.
