
App Center: Build, Test, Distribute and Monitor Apps in the Cloud - dstaheli
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/vsappcenter/introducing-visual-studio-app-center/
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keithba
Hi - author of the blog post here and PM on the team!

We are very proud of what we've built here. Regardless of how you built your
app (Swift, Java, React Native, Xamarin), we offer CI, releasing to your beta
users and the app stores, Crash reporting, analytics, and even push messaging.
Let us know your thoughts!

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CharlesW
This seems…great?

Why did Microsoft create this? Specifically, I'm not interested in the
"because we love developers" story, I'm interested in the "this is strategic
for Microsoft now and for the next decade because" story.

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keithba
The team is extremely passionate about creating developer productivity tools.
App Center's creators include the founders of HockeyApp, Xamarin Test Cloud,
and CodePush. This is something we were all iterating towards individually,
and when we met up at Microsoft, we realized we now had the team and ability
to make it happen.

Microsoft is very serious about creating amazing developer tool across any
app, platform, and language for a variety of reasons. Making Azure the most
productive place to power your app is part of it, of course. But, in the long
run, the easier we make development, the more the world benefits.

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lardo
What a lovely nonanswer.

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tkjef
Seems like it's to get more people on Azure. Doesn't look like it works with
AWS or GCP.

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vdepizzol
Product page: [https://appcenter.ms](https://appcenter.ms)

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fro0116
Notably, support for [https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-
windows](https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows), the React Native
plugin for building UWP apps, is missing, which is a bit of a curious omission
for a Microsoft product.

Anyone here have experience working with react-native-windows? How's the
experience compared to React Native for Android/iOS?

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keithba
We are investigating what it would take to support RN with Windows. I'm a huge
RN fan (and we include CodePush inside of App Center.) If you have a moment,
shoot me an email as I'd love to ask you more about your scenarios.

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vblord
Looks pretty good, but a lot depends on implementation. The testing on devices
is cool, but $100 a month is a lot... especially since many developers don't
make that much off their apps.

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keithba
Most of the services are free. You don't have to use the test service if it is
outside of your budget. For instance, you could push your successful builds
directly to beta testers, if you'd like.

We've gone out of our way to make sure everything in the product is accessible
via our REST API, and we also have a CLI you can install from npm.

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vblord
Just curious, why is the testing so expensive? I've seen other products that
provide this same testing service and they are all very expensive. Is it
because of the hardware required, an ROI thing, a first to market thing, or
something else?

