iCombat

When I decided to create my application idea by going with international development it took me quite some time to figure out the best way to do it.  I’m pretty resourceful at finding what I need on the web so when I couldn’t find any advice on the topic I decided to document my process for others thinking about outsourced development.

Being new to programming and having just started to learn the iPhone SDK I felt time pressure to get my app idea out to market before someone else beat me to the punch.  I thought about the trade off between time, money and certainty of getting a launchable product and decided that I should invest the money necessary to get a working version into the App Store as quickly as possible.  That way I could also put more time on designing the game as well as the marketing.

I’ll say from my experience so far that outsourced iPhone app development is a big business but seems to have largely remained a practice for the enterprise realm.  Many start-ups and medium sized businesses are outsourcing their work and sometimes probably don’t even know it as it is passed through local development houses.  What I have learned through the various quotes I received was that any type of iPhone app development can run in the tens of thousands of dollars in the US, both because of the demand for developers but also because of what I noticed in several cases was developer inexperience.  Many of the quotes I received were astronomical (in both time and money) and were by development houses that didn’t even have one iPhone application in the App Store.  Bottom line, iPhone application development is far from becoming a commodity so you have to be very careful about whom you hire.

So why has there been little discussion about this topic?  Part of it I’m sure was Apple’s until recent tight NDA keeping discussion on the web muted.  Also, while there is clearly altruism amongst the iPhone developer community in terms of learning (the documentation and forums for learning both Objective C and the iPhone SDK are great), there just doesn’t seem to be such a push to help non-programmers who want to create something.  This is probably because people like me who are trying to create something through an external / outsourced process, try to HIDE IT, as they are worried about sharing credit or appearing as less than a real company.  While I understand this reasoning, I think it’s important to show everyone that people without much programming experience can create something of quality as well.

So I hope this blog is helpful and more importantly I hope that the advice I give actually works out to be a testament to how to create a great application.  If my application bombs, then just do the opposite of everything I write and you should be fine.  And PLEASE share your experience or post any good sources of advice for other readers.