I saw that MIT has added support for Google Sheets. Did that have higher priority for MIT than delivering a GA release for iOS?
There are many AI2 developers waiting to publish their apps for iOS and it seems that they don’t get the priority they deserve.
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MIT has to fit-in with Apple’s requirements and schedules. Each time Apple see something they don’t like, MIT has to deliver a different solution and then wait for Apple to decide if it complies with their expectations. It’s a “long winded” process and only Apple gets to decide what happens next.
MIT App Inventor is what it is - a fantastic, free tool for developing smartphone Apps. Lots of developers use it to make commercial Apps but it is of course bias towards the education sector.
If you are really not happy, there are other IDE’s you can use, rather than complain about a free IDE with free technical support provided by expert volunteers.
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@ChrisWard I am really unhappy but I don’t have the luxury and time of using another IDE to develop my app made of thousands of blocks again. When I started my development in 2017 I was told that the iOS version will be available in 2018 then 2019 etc.
MIT AI2 still does not have the capability of compiling for iOS and creating a load module for iOS. Don’t you think MIT could assign another resource to work on this?
When I decided to use AI2, I trusted that, MIT being what it is, should be able to honor it’s commitments of time.
This will be a classic case of project management failure for software development. And good example for teaching in project management courses.
Regards,
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Perhaps you could fund the development?
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Dro
The MIT App Inventor Team run a research project funded only by grant money and donations, not by MIT itself. They are a very small team of highly motivated, talented individuals. The team have not chosen circumstance, changes were made by Google to Android that required all-hands-on-deck to avoid losing the ability to make Android Apps. With around 400,000 unique, active Users per month across 195 countries, obviously that had to take priority. Given the success of App Inventor over the past year, certainly not a failure of any kind.
MIT AI2 for iOS is a work in progress and exceptional progress has been made given the circumstances, especially considering the extraordinary differences between Android and iOS plus the differences between Google and Apple -the original App Inventor was developed by Google.
I have written large projects with App Inventor yet they did not require “thousands” of blocks? Since you have so many blocks, your project might not migrate to another IDE very smoothly but if you know what you are doing then it shouldn’t take so long to transfer to an App Inventor offspring. My understanding is that one of the offspring, Thunkable, can compile iOS Apps.
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well instead of complaining why don’t you contribute for the project and help them to wrtie codes and meet requirements of apple ?
wait you can’t ? why you don’t know how ? so stop complaining on things you can’t do and even if you can you wouldn’t do it for free
so it’s free and they are working for free give it their time and efforts
so please appreciate it
i saying that cause you reply provoke me talking aout how unhappy you are and about what you’ve been told and so on forgetting that you get it for free and you did nothing for them
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A- Nearly half of cell phone users in US use Apple iPhones with iOS. Why should iPhone users not enjoy the MIT AI2.
B- If iOS development delay was due to lack of funding that was never communicated or I never heard of it.
C- Hundreds of people have contributed to the development of the iOS support but I don’t know anyone who had contributed for the development of support for Google Sheets.
It seemed to me that:
1- the MIT developers work on anything they like or
2- Google development has the priority over Apple
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I just want to say that I avoid buying an iPhone just because I can’t install my apps on it yet (and I really want an iPhone)
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That's a wonderful reply.
I would suggest to MIT not to quit their day-job.
With the speed at which technology is moving forward, it is safe to say that APP Inventor iOS will never be. It will forever be in a catch-up phase.
I've used AI2 for more than 10 yrs, and although it does not support iOS development I am very satisfied with the FREE continued development of this software, something I've never seen since my days of "QuickBasic". I've gone through lots of of programming software but never saw anything like AI2. The point I want to make is that there ARE other software that can do what you want very easily but you have to dish out $$$. In fact you don't have to go too far from AI2, Thunkable does it, once again for $$$. By the way I supported the iOS development with $$$, and its worth it considering the amount of money I've spent on programming software that are now "Orphanware"
Thanks MIT for your wonderful software and your free and hard work.
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