Q&A: Appcelerator's Approach to Supporting New OS Releases
There have been numerous questions about our support around iOS 6 over the past few weeks. With this event, it makes sense that Appcelerator states our philosophy around support of new OS releases inclusive of iOS 6. Below are a few questions and answers that I’d like to share.
When is support targeted for new OS versions?
We target backward compatible support for 30 days after official release of that version. Also, we target new features in the release on a priority basis after that and have quarter releases where prioritized new features are added. We review Jira for items listed and the number of watches of those to help us prioritize the requested features.
How do we test against new OS versions?
We receive pre-release or preview versions of new operating systems and typically wait until the latter part of the cycle so we focus our efforts and resources on the likely release candidates.
If Appcelerator finds issues during testing of a new OS, what is the approach for dealing with those issues?
Our approach is to work around issues when we identify them. If we cannot work around them, we report these issues to the OS provider.
What versions of Appcelerator’s platform would receive fixes for those issues?
We always target applying fixes to the current shipping version and upcoming release. We reserve the right to apply the fix to supported versions prior to the shipping version on an as needed basis.
Do you have a notification process for customers that may be impacted?
The notification process would be through our normal support practices whereby we fix an identified issue and when closed. All tickets associated with it are notified.
If we find issues with our application on top of a newer OS version, what is the support process and turnaround time? In particular, once OS versions go live, how quickly can we expect fixes for problems?
Again, we support new releases within 30 days of release. For any issues that show up, it depends on the issue: it may be an application bug, a platform bug, or an iOS bug. We need to review these on a case by case basis.
Jonathan Rende is the Vice President of Products at Appcelerator. Working with the rest of the product team, he is responsible for the success of the existing products, upcoming product plans/investments and the disruptions we aggressively attack. His objectives are to enable customer, community and partner success alike for their businesses and related activities and works out of our Mountain View corporate offices