AppleInsider Staff
Making good on a promise from this year's Worldwide Developers Conference in June, Apple on Monday rolled out a new iTunes Connect feature that streamlines screenshot and app preview uploading for developers marketing software across multiple device types.
Dubbed screenshot simplification at WWDC, the new feature baked directly into the redesigned iTunes Connect content management tool allows developers to quickly upload a batch of screenshots and share those images across multiple App Store assets.
As noted in the WWDC presentation, Apple affords developers five screenshots per device, per screen size. Accounting for multiple iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch screen sizes, as well as localization in 28 languages, iTunes Connect supports up to 980 different images.
With simplified screenshots, developers upload one set of images per device family, such as iPhone, which are shared as screenshot assets for both 4.7- and 5.5-inch screen sizes. Screenshot settings can be tweaked in a new Media Manager section, which also lets developers upload custom images for smaller or larger screens, different languages and devices. This latter consideration is convenient for apps whose user interface changes based on screen size.
As the crown jewel in Apple's services business, the various App Stores and their supporting apparatus like iTunes Connect are crucial to ongoing success. During a recnt investors conference call, Apple CEO Tim Cook expects the company's services business alone will be the size of a Fortune 100 company by 2017.
The last major iTunes Connect feature addition came in March with opt-in weekly App Analytics updates via email. A subsequent update to the iTunes Connect iOS app introduced unit sales and proceeds metrics to the Trends analytics tool.
Developers can access the simplified screenshot tool in the latest version of iTunes Connect.
Charles Martin
Marko Zivkovic
Mike Wuerthele
Malcolm Owen
Andrew Orr
Christine McKee
William Gallagher
7 Comments
All well and good except the service is now as slow as molasses, certain pages don't load and I can't submit an app for review due to "localization errors" and yet I had just submitted the app on Friday with no charges in localization or the submission.
Apple really needs to figure out how to launch things properly. I can always tell when Apple is charging things for a new release because their stuff starts breaking.
iTunes Connect isn't just about App Developers. Authors, Musicians, Broadcasters, Podcasters, all of these and more. Having published my first novel via iTunes Producer and iTunes Connect I can testify that some rough edges which I passed suggestions internally to Engineering, but much of the confusion on using these for the first time were on me.
The whole process of publishing an app could use a serious overhaul, both in iTunesConnect and XCode. Currently, It is a complicated, slow and frustrating experience. Apple should have a decent look at how Google is organizing the publishing process for Android.
I submitted a bug report for this 18 months ago and was delighted to see that Apple addressed it. Before this change, if I wanted to update one screen shot, I would have to upload 100 copies of the new screen shot (2 versions of my app x 5 screen sizes, tablet and four phones x 10 languages). Now I only have to upload a minimum of four (2 versions of my app x 2 screen sizes, tablet and phone x 1 default language).
Many features of Apple's submission process seem like a conflict between their ideal of how things should work (separate screen shots for every possible screen size and every language my app is published in) and the reality of a developer's priorities (I'd rather spend my time improving the app itself than generating hundreds of screen shots that add little value) and it's nice that they relented on this one.