The last week of May saw Apple drop the first public beta of iOS 11 (iOS 11 beta), now available for download. Apple plans on releasing the final version later this fall, rumored to be rolled out alongside the new iPhone 8 rolled out alongside the new iPhone 8. The iOS 11 beta includes a flock of UI refinements and other new features.
In this blog we will discuss about what developers can expect from the new update, which devices it will support and briefly about what does it mean for testers?
What’s new in iOS 11
The most significant changes have been brought in through several back-end enhancements to Siri, Messages, Photos, Apple Pay and other first party apps and services. Maps, for example, gets a new Do Not Disturb feature for safe driving and additional assets for indoor mapping for major malls and airports. Also, Siri gets an updated voice response system and other smart features. Most notably, on the UI front, the Control Center is now completely redesigned with a panel system flaunting a wide array of app and system controls.
Finally, it is worth noting that Apple has been up to new tricks that are proving a game changer due to upgraded Core ML for Machine learning and the new ARKit tools which boosts user experience as they would have plenty of augmented reality apps to browse through. This comes at a time when Apple has weighed heavily on the importance of artificial reality, the new Home-pod speakers to be launched later this year and machine learning.
So what does it mean for developers and testers around the world? Let’s dig a little deeper into their most promising new updates.
Apple embraces the augmented reality with ARKit for iOS
Apple had praises for Pokemon Go as it went on making changes to the company’s App Store. It also introduced a new set of APIs that will allow more developers to bring augmented reality apps to the iOS devices. AR had quite a year with endorsements and a healthy attitude from top tech companies. Facebook brought in the AR Camera platform at F8 and Google continued to update Tango as well as Google Lens, the new AR app. Greg Joswiak, Apple VP worldwide, recently referred to the ARKit Demo App called AR Measure that went viral earlier last week in social media platforms.
The ARKit is basically a solution for placing 3D objects realistically in a ‘real’ place, augmenting reality. And this is going to be a game changer. Take the furniture and interior décor industry for example, who have millions of images with 3D models of their assets saved up which can now be used to exploit this tool. There is a big demand and a mass reservoir of content to populate the AR universe, ready with 3D models. Apple has now opened up the path to millions of available portals with every physical outlet has a potential for layering with AR. This will comes as an upward mobility in skills for designers up the stack, visualizing the real world into a mobile devices. The focus of thinking on the application will also come in conjunction with other technologies like voice, photography and voice, without having to adapt to an existing AR system or building it from scratch.
Complete transformation for the iPad
Apple has taken transformative focus on iPad with the new iOS 11, with upgraded features and expanded functionality, leveraging the multitouch technology. The UX has been changed completely with main emphasis on multitasking, with more smooth and connected experience for iPad users, which has been a major complaint. For example, its drag and drop functionality comes with a new dock that allows you to move between apps, on the top of your full screen app. If you need to use two apps at the same time, you can still open them both using the split view feature, replace any of these apps by dragging an app from the dock and dropping it on the side you want and so on. Developers will have to embrace the new frameworks.
Devices getting iOS 11
Many iOS powered devices are getting iOS 11 and some will miss them. The latest iPhone’s and iPad’s are getting it including iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 6, iPhone 5s, iPad Pro, iPad mini 4, iPad mini 3, iPad Air 2. Officially, Apple says that iOS 11 will be released in the fall “for iPhone 5s and later, all iPad Air and iPad Pro models, iPad 5th generation, iPad mini 2 and later and iPod touch 6th generation”, which means iPhone 5, iPad 4 and devices older are out.With no other iOS 10 releases in the future, it’s possible that iOS 10.3.3 will be the final update for iPhone 5.
Testing iOS 11
The iOS 11 beta has been open to developers since June 5. Beta testers who have signed up for the Apple’s beta testing program will receive the iOS 11 beta update over-the-air after installing the proper certificate on an iOS device. Needless to say, because the iOS 11 update is fairly transformative, Testers need to expect a few challenges when they test the beta.
A few mentioned below:
1. Battery Drain: The early Beta builds of iOS 11 is not meant to sustain an entire day of usage without heavy battery draining. Later builds will focus on the optimization of battery life, however now, keep a battery pack at hand.
2. Buggy Apps: Not all of the apps will work, or perform suboptimally. The iOS Beta is available to test just that, so that DevOp teams can get early access and optimize their apps so that they don’t misbehave later.
What Testers Can Do
Apple has opened their feedback option open to all to know more on the stability and reliability of the iOS 11 build. Along with the new Beta build, a new Feedback app is also installed into the phone. Users can sign in and get used to the interface, and provide bug reports to be sent to Apple. This helps everyone make the iOS devices more stable and then delve further into issues that may occur with third-party apps.
For more detailed information on the new features coming to iPhone and iPad this fall, Apple’s newsroom will take you through the important things you would want to know about the iOS 11 update. We will discuss the differences between iOS 10 and the new iOS 11 in a later blog. Be sure to check out MacRumors in the meantime to get a better idea about the iOS 11 Beta.
We are committed to keep you ahead of others: pCloudy is one of the fastest to release support of iOS 11 beta devices on cloud, as always
Apple has just released the iOS 11 public beta for their upcoming iOS 11 release expected soon. With the iOS 11 beta version released in the market, lots of enthusiastic Apple users are already moving to iOS 11.
Have you started thinking: is your IOS App compatible with this latest release?
pCloudy is happy to announce that we have released our support for iOS 11 on our cloud.pCloudy customers can use the iOS devices with iOS 11 for testing their applications either manual or automated way.
Manual Testing
You can access the IOS 11 device like any other IOS device and check the compatibility of your App
Automated Testing
If you are using Appium, we are happy to announce support of Appium 1.6 to take care the execution of Appium scripts on IOS 11.
pCloudy recommends all the customers to start testing their iOS apps on iOS11 to identify glitches.
The development world bumped into a new surprise by announcement of developer release of latest Android version: Android O. The makers have made everyone curious about its christening, wondering which sweet it has been named after (Oreo, rumour has it). On the developers front however, it seems to be a good time to assess this developer preview and its included features that might have implications on the apps on your phone and their quality, as well the future it holds for us.
So let us lay out the key details and focus on the challenges or opportunities that developers will run into due to the changes in the OS features and application development environment.
With major share of the market with Android M and L, i.e. 60 percent, fragmentation is still in growth within the Android landscape. During most Android OS changes, a few basic fixes make the app compatible with the newer version. However, its API changes and several features make changes to the appearance and functioning of the existing apps. It can result in unstable applications and confusion among the users. This means that there are not only more devices and OS combinations in the market to test against, but also that from both supported test cases and features, there should be different branches that combine the test suites with a device/OS combination and a supported capability.
Sneak Peek into the New Features of latest android version – Android O and the Challenges to Testing:
The first release of Android O is just for devs to get a sneak peek into their bag of tricks behind the show and the help needed for that transition. E.g. adding extra layers of security options to prevent malware entry into your phone. Of course there will be more UX and UI based improvements in the beta releases. Let’s take a brief look at their features and the challenges they present to Testing.
Revamped Settings and Changes in UI: This feature is one of the most outward change in the preview. That means new icon, condensed and summarized organization, which makes the navigating app superior and pleasant. There are several other similar organizational and in a many places functional changes in UI including lock-screen shortcuts, icon badges, picture in picture feature etc.
However, this immediately opens a range of visual test automation scenarios that will need insights into different resolutions and themes to assure the new animated look, movement or adaptation as required.
More Control over Notification Channels: Changes again in the Notification shade for UI improvement, with more icons in the status bar, a cooler shade and a bit more subtle yet stronger control over its notification channels by Notification Grouping. I.e. option to choose for notification from people in your contacts and more manageable system and processes alerts.
This means, more testing to be added to support the granular notifications, the configuration traits of the device and network environment related testing.
Enhanced Auto-fill: So far, other than Chrome, no other system has made the process so seamless, making jumps between password managers or switching to special keyboards. Android O’s brand new auto-fill API lets you support specific needs like password management, without having to launch the app in parallel, making the process a lot damn faster.
This also means that each app will have external requirements like password management and testers would need to understand which apps can serve as auto-fill for their app under test, and then test against them.
Better Control over Battery Power and App Background Resources: Android O is changing the way how the OS functions in the background by enforcing more limits on app resource usage in order to save battery and how frequently background apps can retrieve your current location, and implicit broadcasts.
That means, more new tests and branches of these tests need to be added in order to assure correctly that the limitations apply based on the location constraints set by the developers and other limits that are supported.
We just touched on a few immediate implications of the new latest Android version – Android O release for developer and testers, who need to be ready to usher in a not just a new set of challenges and branches of testing, but also prepare themselves for early versions that are to be launched soon. To know more on the specifics of migration to Android O, you can go to the official Android Documentation at their website.
PCloudy is happy to announce several exciting features as part of it’s latest release.
ADB Bridge (for In-premise cloud): Connect and take full control of any Android device using Android Debug Bridge. It provides access to a versatile command line tool that lets you communicate with a remotely connected device over the cloud.
ADB Commands (Available as part of Enterprise package): You can run ADB commands from your computer to the remotely connected device on a Private Cloud Lab.
Network Simulation (for In-premise cloud): Control the network connected to the device on which you will test your application. Set Network Profiles, modify existing profiles and apply it to the network connected to the device.
Battery Consumption Reports (For Android devices above 5.0): The platform now displays real time battery consumption data of device and App under testing. You can view a graphical representation of battery consumed by your apps with the total battery used by the device.
Monkey Tool (UI/Application Exerciser Monkey): Perform Stress and crash test on your application by simply selecting a device and running monkey tool on your application. The tool sends out a stream of pseudo-random user events such as clicks, touches, or gestures, as well as a number of system-level events, which acts as a stress test on the application software you are testing.
New implementation of iOS Instruments: Several improvements for running Appium and Calabash scripts on iOS devices
Volume Up & Down buttons for Android: Separate keys to control Volume of the devices. This is just the beginning, there’s something bigger coming.
Wifi control button for Android: Separate keys to Switch-on/Switch off wifi settings on Android devices
Support for IOS 10 beta : Get your App ready for Testing for upcoming IOS 10 release. You can test on iPhone and iPad with IOS 10 Beta version.
Several Bug fixes
We would be happy to send you more information. Please contact us on info@pcloudy.com
We have been continuously working towards a mission to create a world class yet affordable platform for testing of apps in connected world.
In this journey we are committed to bring you best of features to make your App testing quicker, easier and cost effective.
I would like to introduce PCloudy 3.0, our latest release. So, what’s new here?
IOS support
We have added latest IOS devices on our platform which means you can test your IOS apps on real devices exactly the same way you tested your Android apps. You can find latest devices like IPhone 6S, IPhone 6 plus and IPad Air 2. Moreover, you can find IOS devices with older versions as well.
Appium support
Running your Mobile App automation was never so easy. Now you can focus on building your scripts. Leave the execution to us. Just create your Appium scripts in Eclipse or using your own framework. Insert a small piece of code within your script and you are ready to run your scripts on multiple devices in parallel.
Test your Apps on real Network
We have enabled real network on many of our devices. Now, you can test your Apps across 2G, 3G, 4G and wifi across various network providers.
You can switch between networks while executing your test cases.
On-device performance Metrics:
This has been a big pain area of testers and developers. How to measure and analyze resource consumption (CPU, Memory and Network consumption) for App on a real device. Well, it’s a click away on our platform.
Latest Devices:
We are constantly updating our device matrix to provide our customers latest and greatest devices available in the market.
Improved Performance:
Our commitment is to provide you a working experience as close as possible to a real device. We have done many perf improvements on our platform. Moreover, we moved to a new Data center. It’s an ISO 27001 certified Data center with 99.99% uptime commitment.
How Long will it Take to Fix This Bug ? This is the first question asked
Well, i need to understand the story. Need to find the bug from the story. Now , i need to reproduce it! . may be some ping-pong between teams or tester. Then finally when i give-up, i will take Debug Logs, Stack trace, Performance data and what not.
Damn, it will be fixed when it is fixed 🙂
This is the usual Life cycle of a bug, they live too long, more than they deserve to. basically they live through the time we waste on re doing things, developer re doing things which a tester gone through already.
How can we fix this bug quick, And make the cycle efficient.
I will demonstrate some tools provided by pCloudy to collaborate effortlessly between developer and tester, To fix a bug so quick, with out wasting time or re doing things.
Some of the data pcloudy record’s from device session, which a developer can use to fix the bug Complete video is recorded, which is the steps to understand and reproduce the bug. A Video Is Worth 1.8 Million Words
Screen shots can be taken at any point
Debug Logs are recorded
Crash log/Stack trace are recorded
This is fully automatic, that’s what i meant by effortlessly.
As i said, A Video Is Worth 1.8 Million Words, I have recorded a short video explaining these tools.
Now when you share this bundle with the developer, What more a developer expect ? This is possibly everything he needs to start fixing the bug. No re-doing things or ping-pong.
Collaborate effortlessly using pCloudy
Lets build better apps together
