undefined | Better HN

0 pointsnavaati5y ago0 comments

It’s frustrating to have to pay, but I think you can shell out something like a 100 bucks to get an Apple developer account and it allows you to install your own code on your own phone. I hope it’s a 100 bucks forever and not once per year…

Can someone confirm ?

0 comments

8 comments · 3 top-level

DeusExMachina5y ago· 3 in thread

It's once per year. Source: I have a paid developer account.

MrGilbert5y ago

But I also need a mac for signing, don't I? Like, a Mac Mini? That's the most annoying part, tbh. I feel fine-ish for paying 8 $ a month for my dev account (if you calculate it that way), but buying additional, expensive hardware? No, not really.

vbezhenar5y ago

I think that you can rent a mac for a day and do all your signing. Something like https://www.scaleway.com/en/hello-m1/

1 more reply

htrp5y ago

AWS has mac minis by the hour (not cheap though)

vbezhenar5y ago· 2 in thread

I can pay, but, as I said, my apps will expire in a few days, so I would need to rebuild and reinstall them every day to keep them working. The only way to have non-expiring apps is to submit them to AppStore which is obviously not possible, as it's only for me.

saagarjha5y ago

If you pay your apps will expire once a year rather than once every couple days.

vbezhenar5y ago

That's very interesting to know. I guess that's an ultimate solution to my problems then, rebuilding once a year is perfectly acceptable.

Terretta5y ago

See my other reply in this same thread:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26399788

Long story short, you pay $100/year or $8.33/month for access to a suite of services that make apps frictionless for your users, and easier for you as a developer to offer high end features like authentication, notifications, and sync:

    - App discovery, hosting, distribution, updates
    - CloudKit, iCloud Documents, iCloud K/V Store
    - Push Notifications
    - Sign-in with Apple
    - etc. (NFC is also in the list)

Details: https://help.apple.com/developer-account/#/dev21218dfd6

You do not have to pay anything if you do not want any of those services, however you will have to “refresh” your test app cert weekly or work around that.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse