

Apple ignores bug report - phoboslab
http://www.phoboslab.org/log/2012/07/what-the-fucking-fuck-apple

======
alttab
You're telling me Apple is unresponsive to support requests from their
developer ecosystem? Really? _Get out of town!_ I don't believe it.

Despite all of the rightful moaning of iOS developers, for some reason they
continue to flock to the Apple platform. Apple will continue to treat their
developers like second class citizens until there is a financial incentive to
do otherwise. Right now, when one pissed off developer leaves or goes bankrupt
because their app was yanked from the store or wasn't approved for some BS
reason, 50 developers replace him.

~~~
EnderMB
The fact that so many of the comments replying to yours are quick to defend
Apple says it all really.

Developers will put up with more crap than they should when platform religion
gets in the way. Sure, there are arguments against switching platforms to
Android or Windows, but most of these mean very little. Those that refuse to
ditch iOS aren't doing so because they'll miss out on potential customers,
it's because they like the idea of building apps for the most popular phone on
the market, despite the crap they have to put up with.

It's the equivalent of dating a bitchy model. You could be a lot happier with
the cute girl next door, but you'd rather put up with her shit just because
you can say to your mates "I go out with a model".

~~~
sedev
"Platform religion"?

That's a bit rich considering that the iOS app store is where developers can
_make money._ I think that's a far, far more powerful motivating factor than
"platform religion." The Blackberry had plenty of fervent followers and
advocates: look where that got them.

Also, comparing Mac/iOS users to members of a religion is the oldest,
saggiest, most lackluster thought-terminating-cliche in the book. Come off it
already.

~~~
EnderMB
Are you from the US? If so, you can make money on the Android market quite
easily. The idea that iOS is the only platform that can make money is a very
dated idea, and one that never really had any merit in the first place.

There's a reason why the cliche exists, because it is true. The biggest truths
in this world are the obvious ones, not the exciting ones. You pick a platform
on perceived value and it's likely that your gut feeling (along with the
crowd) will lead you to Apple.

If I'm wrong, then why aren't developers ditching Apple? Why is no one
boycotting a platform that is happy to litigate, rather than innovate? Why are
there so many weak money-related excuses to not developing for Android? It's
because of personal belief, and it is your personal belief that iOS is better
and will make you more money.

By that logic, we'd all set up shop in silicon valley, otherwise working would
just be pointless...

~~~
qq66
We are building LiveLoop's mobile client for iOS, and not Android, for
monetary reasons, and I feel that I can justify this easily.

First of all, the cost of developing for Android, for us, would be higher,
because our code to render slides is somewhat resolution-dependent and
iDevices come in fewer resolution variants than Android devices. One could
make the claim that we should be doing everything in a completely resolution-
adaptive way, but we haven't.

Second, developing for iPhone gives you the iPad for a negligible development
cost, giving you access to the tablet market where Android does not have a
meaningful presence yet. The great thing about the tablet market is that
people spend more money on similar-functionality apps for iPad than for
iPhone.

Third, the fact of the matter is that while you can make money on the Android
market, the revenue economics of iOS apps are currently completely dominating
Android. Both upfront and recurring revenue is higher on iOS. We don't have
any qualms about leaving Android on the table _today_ \-- obviously, changes
in any of these three premises, or huge growth in Android marketshare on
tabloid and handheld, could change this.

------
zoop
Being critical is great. Creating workarounds is even better. Being entitled
is not so great.

If you want to talk about how Apple is terrible to developers, fine, talk
about the App store double-standards and the developer agreement. But this is
hardly an exceptional case of a company being 'anti-developer'.

I can't tell you how many bugs I've filed from OS X, chrome, to various python
libraries well the response is pretty much "welp its broke" (if that). If you
depend on some sort of functionality that you're not getting, it's time to
move on or create your own.

The tone of this post reminds me of 'why I'm not developing for twitter' post
... where the take away for that was be weary of developing on platforms you
don't control. I would assume that most of us have learned that the hard way
with esoteric libraries with ghost-maintainers. Myself, I'm becoming weary of
turning every inconvenience into some sort of political issue. This is
_hacker_ news. Can we get back to making clever and disruptive solutions
please?

~~~
phoboslab
I built a lot of workarounds to make my game engine ( <http://impactjs.com/> )
work on iOS, Android and other browsers. But I couldn't find a viable
workaround for this multitouch bug. The touchstart/move/end events are the
only way to detect multiple touches in Mobile Safari - and they don't work as
they should.

This bug is affecting many HTML5 games and as long as I'm not allowed to
install another browser (engine) on iOS, I will keep complaining.

~~~
genwin
I think it's great that you're complaining in the way you are. It'll be
interesting to see whether Apple responds. MS-Word has retained some of its
obvious bugs since 1995.

------
mootothemax
Whilst I think Apple took too long to look at this bug, the instructions in
the given test case are, for me at least, ambiguous:

 _1\. Hold one finger down in the blue area above_

OK, that's easy enough :)

 _2\. Touch straight down with another finger - don't move your fingers on the
surface_

And here's where the confusion lies; I thought you wanted the tester to slide
their finger down the screen or something like that. From the video it appears
that you want to ensure that they "hold another finger on the blue area" or
something like that.

Now, I confess that I don't own an iPhone, so couldn't test whether that made
much of a difference, but that could be one reason why they rejected your test
case. If in doubt blame incompetence, not malice :)

~~~
phoboslab
I'm not a native speaker, so these instructions may very well be ambiguous.
Any suggestions on how to clarify it?

Back then, I built the test case and asked on twitter if anybody else could
confirm the bug. I got several answers (e.g. one from mrdoob within the
minute: <https://twitter.com/mrdoob/statuses/6896165488427008> ) so I thought
the instructions were fine.

~~~
ta12121
1\. Touch the screen in the blue area with one finger and hold the finger
there.

2\. Use another finger to touch the screen somewhere below the first finger.

3\. Lift your second finger and repeat step 2.

~~~
rdl
You may want to say "touch (but do not drag)"

------
quonn
I have filed dozens of OS X and iOS bugs over the years. Almost all of them
were closed with the claim that Apple already knew about that bug. However
many of them were really subtle and it was unlikely that anybody else had
already reported them, especially if a developer preview introducing the bug
had just been released. Furthermore some of them are not fixed even now, years
after the first report.

My experience is that Apple will almost never admit they don't know about a
bug. The only exception are security bugs where one actually gets real
feedback.

~~~
Spooky23
My experience is that Apple isn't that bad. I have filed several bugs with
Apple over the years, and IMO their response is pretty good compared to other
vendors, particularly given that I have no paid support relationship with
them. The bugs ranged from AD integration issues to PDF rendering problems, to
an ActiveSync issue specific to our unusual configuration.

I do have an expensive support relationship with Microsoft, and I've gotten
similar results for the same types of problems. We log bug reports, and the
serious ones with business impact get fixed. UI glitches or corner-case
Outlook problems get fixed more slowly, or only via custom hotfix. Serious
bugs get fixed more quickly, and typically get rolled into a future patch.

In the past, I've had similar or even worse results from other large companies
like IBM, Oracle, Informix and Sun.

Software has bugs, and low-priority bugs persist for a long time, for reasons
that may be good or bad. In any case, posting expletive-laden rants railing
against a vendor is unprofessional and unlikely to garner a positive reaction.

------
vosper
With all that swearing you could be forgiven for thinking Apple had been
caught skinning kittens for iPhone parts. Save the hyperbole, please.

~~~
cobrausn
Two year wait and 40 hours of developer time spent on a simple bug is worth a
bit of swearing.

~~~
john_flintstone
So let him swear at his wife. Or at Apple. Why should we have to read it?

~~~
cobrausn
It's not like the title didn't give away the fact that the rant would be full
of swearing. Also, you didn't have to read it.

~~~
vosper
My problem with the level of vitriol is that it doesn't leave much room for
when things are truly bad - this has caused an inconvenience and lost time to
him personally, but it's not like he's really suffered, like so many people do
on a daily basis around the world. I'd love to see this passion directed at
(for example) issues of social justice.

~~~
ricardobeat
I think you're underestimating the importance of this bug. For the developer
of a HTML5 game platform this is a huge roadblock - it can totally ruin
gameplay, prevents the use of more complex controls and ultimately hinders
adoption.

~~~
vosper
I have to assume this comment was sarcastic...

------
richardv
I have so much sympathy for you. (Along with anyone else that tries to produce
anything that runs on any iOS device and it's walled garden.)

It's easy to see that when building a platformer game, unimpeded multitouch
functionality is pretty essential. Have you been able to identify other games
that have the same problem? I would of thought that this would be resolved so
much sooner than 2 years. It's a core part of multitouch functionality.

At least you still have your app available on iOS!.. It is total BS how
developers are treated. Apple has built up a product which sells hundreds of
millions of units per year, largely in part due to the developers who have
invested time in their ecosystem, but it's total shit how they return no
investment back to the people who have supported this system. (Yes, developers
are largely to thank. Look at how RIM and MS are failing, because they don't
control nor have the content).

Everyone deserves better.

~~~
crag
I agree. But, the only reason anyone writes for iOS is money. It's one of the
best selling phones on the market. And iPhone uses tend to buy a lot of apps.
There's a long list of developers who made fortunes on that platform.

So if you don't want to write for it, then don't. The only force that can
change Apple's behavior is the consumer. Apple doesn't care about anything
else. And they never will.

So stop complaining. Write your app. And hope it's a hit. Then you can sell it
and buy a house on the beach.

------
trotsky
Is there any evidence that Apple wants game developers targeting mobile
Safari? It's a classic platform tactic to abuse APIs you don't want used
(HTML5) to drive people to the one you do want used (ObjC). Between platform
lock in and 30 cents on the dollar it's clear Apple wants developers making
native apps.

~~~
thechut
I think this whats really at work here. For the same reason they won't let
Mozilla, Opera, or Google make their own web browsers. Apple is affraid of
people building their own HTML5 apps and subsequent app stores. This would cut
into Apple's app store monopoly and cost them their 30% on every app that is
sold.

Apple only cares about what makes it money, not delivering the best experience
to consumers.

And you can be damn sure that they don't give a shit about developers,
especially if they aren't making native iOS apps which aren't being sold in
the app store.

~~~
nickheer
> I think this whats really at work here. For the same reason they won't let
> Mozilla, Opera, or Google make their own web browsers. Apple is affraid of
> people building their own HTML5 apps and subsequent app stores. This would
> cut into Apple's app store monopoly and cost them their 30% on every app
> that is sold.

> Apple only cares about what makes it money, not delivering the best
> experience to consumers.

I disagree here, mainly because the amount of money Apple makes from the App
Store is tiny, relative to their overall revenues. This year at WWDC, Tim Cook
announced that Apple had paid $5 billion to developers on the App Store, which
translates into a little over $7.1 billion in apps sold, or $2.1 billion in
revenue for Apple since 2008. That's about $130 million per quarter, against
revenue of between $7 billion and $30 billion per quarter. That's without
considering hosting costs and credit card fees.

$130 million is certainly no small change. But for Apple, in the big scope, it
isn't printing money for them.

~~~
wavephorm
You're right, it's not directly about money. But it is to reinforce their
closed platform and ecosystem.

If a great application can be used instantly off the internet, with no
download, no install, no hassles, no App Store, (the way software should be)
then the consumer has no particular reason to buy an Apple device over one of
their competitors.

By preventing developers from building quality web applications, Apple helps
maintain the need for developers to build for their native platform, which
means consumers need to buy Apple devices to use those applications.

------
Fliko
Don't worry man, I have this Nexus One phone where the touchscreen registers
touch on the side of the phone, and the advertised multitouch doesn't even
work, never mind not receiving updates for the rest of my life (my hardware
bugs cost me over $600!!). Your game has no chance to work on my phone, why
don't I see a "What the Fucking Fuck, Google" post. All systems are plagued
with bugs, and a lot of them get neglected forever. Instead of aggressively
attacking a company (Apple hateboy?), expecting them to fix something after
some f-bombs were dropped, why not write a meaningful blog post.

~~~
Karunamon
> why don't I see a "What the Fucking Fuck, Google" post.

Because you haven't written it yet?

~~~
shinratdr
Why should he have to?

Plenty of Android devs owned Nexus Ones. It was the Android dev phone for a
pretty important year. Yet we heard little griping at Google from devs over
the fact that they cheaped out on the hardware for their flagship device.

Moreover there are countless ignored bugs in Android, many of the most starred
issues have been there for two years or more. This griping about Apple is
ridiculous.

They're a massive faceless software & hardware vendor, big surprise a low-
priority bug (never once seen someone who isn't a dev or similar play an HTML5
game in my life) slipped through the cracks.

This isn't new, nor is it unique to Apple, so it would be nice if we could can
the melodrama and focus on the issue.

~~~
Karunamon
Except in Android's, and especially the Nexus series of phones case, any
random can do whatever fixes to the core code they wish - that's not something
you can do in Apple land. I'd be shocked to learn that third party patches
don't exist for at least some of the rough edges.

------
jonhendry
I've only filed a couple of radars, but actually received pretty good
response. However, they weren't api-related.

One was about an issue I was having running the Britannica encyclopedia. I
don't recall what it was, but Apple even called me about it.

One was about a bug in Lion, where if you pick a large desktop image, and tile
it, it gets all corrupted and there are artifacts in the desktop image that
respond to movement of windows above the desktop. The corruption of the image
looks like what happens when CIAffineClamp is applied to an image: a row of
pixels at some place in the image is repeated out to the edge of the screen.

The response was that it was fixed in a point release, but the fix was to
disable the Tile option for large images. Except if you have it set to
alternate images periodically, with the Tile option selected, a large image
can still be tiled and displayed incorrectly.

------
TwistedWeasel
So he let this bug sit in his game for two years without thinking of a work
around himself?

The situation where any platform owner has a bug that impacts your software
you should try as best you can to work around it because you never know if and
when it will get fixed.

~~~
AshleysBrain
This doesn't sound like the kind of issue that can be worked around. The OS
sends you the wrong touch events. How do you work around that?

~~~
TwistedWeasel
Change the game design slightly? He claims he wants to walk and jump at the
same time, maybe adjust the control scheme to make jumping triggered in a
different way.

This bug, in particular is not a an easy thing to work around, I agree and
maybe he did try all sorts of things but none of them worked, we don't know.

My point is - in the general case you should not rely on Apple fixing a bug to
make your product work correctly.

~~~
AshleysBrain
In case you didn't know, the post is by the author of the ImpactJS game
engine. The job of engine writers is to make sure everything works - working
around it for one specific game helps only that game, but does not ensure all
games using the engine will work. So the next best thing the engine author can
do is pressure the OS maker (Apple) in to fixing the bug, which is what this
post is about, since there is no feasible way an engine or library can work
around problems like this _in general_.

------
SigmundA
Reviewing the test case code the basic bug seem to be that sometimes a
touchend event won't fire when a secondary finger is lifted.

You can make your code much more reliable by handling all touch events and
looking that the touches or targetTouches respectively instead of incremental
a total touch counter on each start and decrementing on each end. This causes
even the slightest movement to trigger a touchmove event which and the entire
current touch state is in touches within all the events. So changing your test
like so gets close and you can at least see the use more clearly:

var i = 0; var numTouches = 0; var out = document.getElementById('out'); var
indicator = document.getElementById('indicator');

function handleTouch( ev ) {

    
    
    		ev.preventDefault();
    	
    		i++;
    
    		numTouches = ev.touches.length;
    		
    		out.value += i + ': ' + ev.type + ', ' + numTouches + '\n';
    		
    		indicator.style.backgroundColor 
    			= (numTouches == 2) ? '#8e6' : '#fb7';
    		
    		out.scrollTop = out.scrollHeight;
    
    	}
    	
    	var ta = document.getElementById('ta');
    	ta.addEventListener('touchstart', handleTouch, false);
    	ta.addEventListener('touchend', handleTouch, false);
    	ta.addEventListener('touchmove', handleTouch, false);
    	ta.addEventListener('touchcancel', handleTouch, false);

------
ottoflux
1) Yes, Apple is closed and lame. This isn't new.

2) I almost fell over laughing when you mentioned a whole "40" hours. I think
if I went through that whole process with Apple, I'd be happy if I got it out
of the way in 40 hours.

Apple "used to" (as in, they cast a damn good image of) following Dieter Rams
type of design philosophy, but that's long gone in the freak show app-orgy
that exists within iOS now. It's a mess, it's terribly disorganized, it's not
"less, but better" it's "more, and worse".

Personally, I'm surprised that they let iOS get this stale. But apparently as
long as the penumbra of Steve's[RIP] reality distortion field exists, they
will blindly march on.

What Apple needs is a new visionary. Not someone to try to emulate Steve Jobs.
And they need to open the hell out of their products.

If you believe your hardware and OS are best, then open the hardware to
letting people install Android on it if they don't agree, and write a version
of iOS to run on other hardware.

It's not going to happen (and I hope they prove me wrong). Apple is designed
as a coupled HW-SW ship, and I don't see them changing course any time soon.

My advice: Pay attention to your perspective bed partners before you commit
and get into bed with them.

~~~
astrodust
It's not like Android isn't without it's infuriating problems. Worse, most
people are running several versions behind and the uptake on new ones is
slowing, so some problems may never be fixed.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
My phone has ICS and honestly I'm not getting a lot out of it. I could be back
on 2.3 or 2.2 and not even notice. I think Android versions don't really have
much for the end user unless he or she needs a specialized application that
makes use of the newer APIs.

I'd rather go with something thats open-ish and stale than this controlled
freakshow that is the iOS ecosystem.

~~~
astrodust
Android in its present form is an uncontrolled freakshow. To test an Android
app properly requires at least a dozen devices if not more, and even then
you're only scratching the surface. You need a veritable museum at hand to be
sure you've got it right.

What Apple's doing right is introducing new features and then aggressively
pushing these down to the devices. iOS 5 is by far the majority of devices
now, and very few are on anything under 4.

Android on the other hand seems perpetually stuck in 2.3 land. As you point
out there's not much in the way of advantages if none of the apps are
dependent on features introduced in 4.0. This further stalls the upgrade
cycle.

To succeed Google is going to have to take a more active role and ensure that
there's fewer conflicting interpretations of their standard, well-defined
reference devices, and more urgency to get users to upgrade.

------
timkeller
Apple are way more focussed on UIKit and the rest of the iOS frameworks, than
they are in fixing a minor Mobile Safari glitch.

Two years spent building a work-around would be a far better use of OP's time.

------
kalleboo
Going to a WWDC lab is basically the only way to guarantee an acknowledgement
of a bug from Apple. Too bad it costs thousands of dollars and you have a 2
hour window in which to seize your chance.

------
nixle
There is no need to get emotional. It won't help anything and it just clutters
the issue. Just mind you language and stick to the facts, we are all grownups
here.

~~~
ahoge
This was 100% deliberate. It's just some spin. The post gets more attention
this way, which makes it more likely that the underlying problem will be fixed
somewhat sooner.

Besides, with a headline like this it will also get automatic upvotes by
everyone who dislikes Apple.

------
johnohara
phoboslab:

 _I filed all the bug reports in a professional manner, without insults or
swearing. I have a lot of respect for the engineers working at Apple, ..._

Why are we excluded?

------
andrewfelix
There are more accurate ways of registering the second touch. Have you tried
using 'event.targetTouches'?

~~~
phoboslab
The touchstart event isn't fired. There's no 'event' object to access.

------
NinjaWarior
This is not a only blocking problem for HTML5 gaming. Chrome Canvas latency
problem, Firefox canvas performance bug, HTML5 "poor" Audio, HTML5 "poor"
video, Canvas "poor" API, SVG never works correctly, underestimated
fragmentation cost, poor programming language (why the hell did they abandon
ECMAScript 4?), when the hell can we use WebGL? etc...

People was complaining Flash was vendor lock-in. So kicked out Flash and now
we are prisoners of fucking browsers. Kicked out poor Adobe, and Apple, Google
and MS rules! Yay! Do you enjoy this?

I think plug-ins were clever, liberal and democratic software designing. We
were able to choice the best technology we want to use (including Java Applet,
Unity Web Player, Silverlight and even Shockwave). We were even able to
develop our plug-ins freely. We had a freedom of programming language other
than fucking JavaScript.

I feel people's enthusiasm for HTML5 is completely wrong. At least they should
stop saying "HTML5 is a cool technology" "HTML5 is an open technology".
COMPLETELY WRONG.

------
Iv
What the fuck, developer ?

how could you not know that iOS is a closed garden ? Stop being complicit of
this dangerous ecosystem. I understand that a lot of people have spent a
decade or more in a very good relationship with Apple, swimming in wonderful
hardware, nice frameworks and a helpful and friendly community, but it is
finished now. This is not the Apple of today anymore.

~~~
ahoge
Don't put spaces in front of question marks. If you're French, okay, you're
forgiven. However, a regular space is still completely wrong and it will
totally break word-wrapping.

~~~
Iv
Sorry, French here indeed. It is strange. I have made that mistake for several
years when writing in English fora but recently, in the space of two months, I
got several people making me noticed this. I am trying to lose this habit in
English but why is it that this mistake is now fought more thoroughly? Has
there been a particular event raising the awareness of this?

~~~
ahoge
>Has there been a particular event raising the awareness of this?

Not that I know of. You probably just started hanging out with people who tend
to complain about this kind of thing. I, for one, complain about this stuff
because it's a defect I have to fix if I happen to see it in someone's copy.

It also might be a frequency illusion [1].

[1] The illusion in which a word, a name or other thing that has recently come
to one's attention suddenly appears "everywhere" with improbable frequency.
Sometimes called "The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon".

------
ademuk
I wouldn't be at all surprised if this was intentional in order prevent devs
creating HTML5 games on par with those of the AppStore.

~~~
wavephorm
It absolutely is intentional. And with that same intention Apple forbids other
companies from writing web browsers that fix these and other issues with
mobile Safari. Auto-playing audio and video in the browser is also forbidden,
which prevents any sort of online music, or video app from being created,
among other things.

So games, music, and video apps in mobile Safari are all hopelessly hobbled,
and if you build a browser that fixes these issues you'll be banned.

Happy developing!

~~~
sedev
_"Auto-playing audio and video in the browser is also forbidden, which
prevents any sort of online music, or video app from being created, among
other things."_

It also prevents MySpace. I consider that a Good Thing overall - I remember
the period of the web where it was trivial to auto-play video and audio, and I
remember that the consumer reaction to that was deeply hostile. HTML5
music/video apps certainly are an interesting thought, but you must consider
what happens when you let random or malicious developers do those things too!

~~~
wavephorm
What are you talking about? How exactly is it malicious to build a game or
build a music web app?

On desktops with Flash or the HTML5 Audio/Video API you can already do these
things. I don't see anyone complaining that things like Youtube and
Grooveshark are malicious, so why should iOS be sabotaged? Non-Apple devices
like Android, and Playbook work just fine. You can build music, and video, and
game web applications on those devices without these limitations, and it is
not a problem. Apple simply wants a hobbled platform, to force all content
through the iTunes store instead of over the internet.

~~~
sedev
It's not malicious to build a game or a music app. What I'm saying is that
before you hand out tools to do that, you have to at least think about what
else those tools can do. Microsoft has been repeatedly burned by this, cf
Raymond Chen
[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2005/06/07/42629...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2005/06/07/426294.aspx)
, and it's a very, very basic principle of platform/API design.

I argue that Apple's focus on the user experience, especially in the areas of
responsiveness, battery life, and consistency with the general Apple design
aesthetic, cause Apple to make choices here that you disagree with, but which
aren't necessarily bad decisions.

 _"You can build music, and video, and game web applications on those devices
without these limitations, and it is not a problem."_

Actually it is a problem: Android malware exists, and I say that it proves my
point: if you hand out capabilities without thinking through the consequences,
it will come back and bite you.

The uses that you intend for tools are never the only possible uses of those
tools.

------
jamesflorentino
I think I was more interested in the iOS game demo in the video than the rant
post itself. That was smooth as butter.

------
drucken
I think the author is overlooking the likelihood this is deliberate behaviour
for various touch UX and lock-in reasons.

Though, I am impressed by the combination of vitriolic text and cool, crystal-
clear and calm bug explanation in the video. :)

------
TwistedWeasel
FTA: "On the iPhone, you're as locked in with HTML5 as you were with Flash
everywhere else before"

In what way has Flash ever been the only way to display web content? This
statement is absurd.

~~~
lmm
The point is: the reason Flash was bad was that the only way to display Flash
content was with Adobe's (buggy) implementation.

HTML5 on the iPhone is just as bad: the only way to display HTML5 content is
with Apple's (buggy) implementation.

~~~
TwistedWeasel
That makes sense to me, as I read the article it sounded like he was saying
that outside iOS he was locked in to Flash in the same way as he is locked in
to HTML5 on iOS.

The iOS restriction is very real and enforced, there is nothing forcing people
to use Flash for any popular platform.

However if you put it in terms of "if I want to use Flash, I'm forced into
Adobe's implementation" then I can see that argument.

------
VeryVito
Just playing devil's debugger here: Are you SURE the bug is with Safari, and
not related to something else in your code? In BioLab Disaster, for example,
while it's true I can't RUN and press the JUMP button multiple times, I can
definitely RUN and press the FIRE button multiple times.

Why would the FIRE button be immune to a bug in the browser? Any chance this
is a timing issue in your own code, rather than a bug in the browser?

------
commanda
HTML5 is definitely not the only way to write a game for iOS. It seems
glaringly obvious, but the OP could perhaps try writing their game as a native
app.

~~~
noonat
That would be a bit counter-intuitive, as OP's product is an SDK for HTML5
game development on iOS.

------
john_flintstone
Who else is affected by this bug. And by who else, I don't mean this one guy's
customers / users. If the answer is no one else, or if no one else has
reported it, then it's probably so far down the list as to be inconsequential.
Which probably means the new guy on work experience gets to deal with it.

Not all bugs are fixed. There's only so many hours in the day, and some bugs
are simply not worth fixing.

~~~
icambron
It's true that Apple might decide the bug isn't worth fixing, but then they
should say that explicitly, so that devs don't have to file the bug a zillion
times and wonder where it is on Apple's priority list. The issue here is
really the lack of transparency. Bug reports shouldn't go into a black hole.

It's also not clear to me why you think no one else is affected by this bug.
How many duplicates from other reporters have been closed? We have no way to
know. Presumably others, though-- not every instance of an issue results in a
front-page HN article.

------
melvinmt
Could the issue be that you use an onClick event that has a well-known 400ms
delay instead of a touchstart/touchmove event?

~~~
lukifer
I'm quite sure that this developer knows the difference. :)

Still, this does smell like it's a "feature", where the event is thrown away
in an effort to prevent accidental touches or such. I imagine the bug is being
ignored because of the difficulty of fixing it without removing the feature in
question.

Alas, I suspect that Apple's secrecy harms their process as well as ours: they
probably live in such a bubble that they don't see these bugs as being
problems. And I really wish Android was a better HTML5 alternative, but it's
been problematic as well, as evidenced by Sencha's HTML5 Scorecards (we'll see
with Chrome on Jelly Bean).

------
septerr
To tell you the truth, I couldn't really see the bug in the video. It's
probably just me. Since the bar every time eventually turned green in the
video, I couldn't see the case when it does not turn green. Nor could I see
the bug in the video game. I am sure folks at Apple or regular game players
will be able to tell.

------
barrynolan
An example in how to title a blog

------
chmars
I haven't reported bugs to Apple due to such problems, there's simply no
incentive. Apple as a quality company has of course always been focused on
hardware and third-party developers have traditionally provided high-quality
apps.

------
donniezazen
I didn't know that Apple bug tracker is private. They are more secretive than
CIA and FBI together.

------
pjmlp
Native applications is the way to go.

------
brm
I can't help but read this and feel that your life priorities and response
levels to problems are out of whack

------
J3L2404
A comment from the blog sums it up nicely and keeps the reddit-esque tone:

"boo fucking hoo. I guess their fucking priorities don't line the FUCK up with
yours. "

------
glenntzke
You fortunately now have the option of running Chrome on iOS. I'd like to see
the side-by-side comparison for compatibility issues.

~~~
phoboslab
Chrome uses Mobile Safari's "WebView" internally. It's the same browser engine
- Apple doesn't allow other browser engines on iOS. So the bug is present in
Chrome as well.

------
epo
Perhaps they did use your page and perhaps it worked for them? Or perhaps your
whiny tone made them disregard you as a serious witness, and so perhaps the
problem is you. As other commenters point out you can't write clear
instructions, what confidence should we have in your ability to write correct
code?

~~~
phoboslab
I filed all the bug reports in a professional manner, without insults or
swearing. I have a lot of respect for the engineers working at Apple, I just
hate their company politics.

The blog post on the other hand was written in that manner to get public
attention - which seems to have worked.

The code for the test case is about 20 lines of JavaScript. You don't have to
trust me to write correct code, you can easily check it yourself.

~~~
salgernon
The corporate overlords are not screening your bugs, the engineers are. Your
mention that your bug got closed as a dup? And that the dup was closed as not
being reproducible? It seems likely that either it wasn't really a dup or that
the second bug didnt have steps that allowed it to be reproduced. In your
case, I would think re submitting your as a new bug, referencing the other
two, would probably bring some traction. Openradar is also an option for
making your reports more public, and possibly getting more traction.

