do iphone app beta testers need a developer's license?

Question

I'd like to distribute my app to a beta tester (ad hoc distribution). Do they need to have the apple developer's license? Do they need a Mac? Or is it enough for them to just have iTunes?

also, is the ad hoc distribution process different for Xcode 4? I know the process for submitting it to the app store is different.

Answer 1

Taking your questions in order:

1. Beta testers don't need a developer licence.

2. Nor do they need a Mac.

3. They don't even need iTunes. (You can deploy via a link they open in Safari on the device itself.)

4. The process is somewhat different for Xcode 4. (It's quite a bit easier that said.) Whilst I don't like to link to off-site resources, there's a very good blog article that details ad-hoc provisioning using Xcode 4 at: http://diaryofacodemonkey.ruprect.com/2011/03/18/ad-hoc-app-distribution-with-xcode-4/

Answer 2

ad hoc distributin works via itunes. only the perso who makes the app needs a developer account. you will need to provision the app you make to all the devices you want it to install on. via itunes this involves the insane process of clicking on a long serial number which does not look at all clickable to reveal an even longer uuid.

not sure about xcode 4 compared to anything else. only ever used one version of xcode.

Answer 3

No, beta testers don't need to be registered developers.

To make beta testing of iOS apps really simple, please have a look at Hockey Framework:

https://github.com/TheRealKerni/HockeyKit

Beta testers receive their test app over the air and the Hockey Framework even informs them automatically, when a new beta update is available OTA.

Additional reading:

http://www.buzzworks.de/blog/announcing-developer-framework-hockey http://jeffreysambells.com/posts/2010/06/22/ios-wireless-app-distribution/

Answer 4

Also try testflightapp.com to distribute your Adhoc builds. You can keep track of the installs and even crash logs.

PS I don't work at testflight, but find it a lot helpful for beta testing.

Answer 5

No, they don't need a developer licence. Actually, if your user has iOS 4 or higher, they don't even need iTunes. You can use something like iOS Beta Builder . They do, however, need to tell you the UDID of their device. You can get that in iTunes or there are apps in the App Store that find it.

Answer 6

No, beta testers don't need to be approved iOS developers. You will still need to whitelist the UDID of the testers though.

I'd suggest you use Diawi to share your ad-hoc builds with beta testers wirelessly without iTunes, I've tried several solutions and I found it to be the simplest of the pack. synching