Uncle Operations: Apple is preparing to overhaul the App Store: abandoned software will be removed!

Apple App Store is one of the two largest mobile software stores in the world, with more than two million software titles. However, there are also a large number of old software titles that have been abandoned by developers, affecting users' installation and usage experience. Recently, Apple announced that it will carry out a large-scale cleanup of these abandoned software.

In addition, Apple also separately announced that the length of iOS application names must not exceed fifty letters.

According to the American technology news website TheVerge, Apple recently sent an email to iOS developers around the world, saying that it will launch a new review mechanism to find out some old software that has been abandoned by developers.

How does Apple determine if a mobile app has been abandoned? There are mainly the following indicators: Apple will look for software that has problems and has not been upgraded for compatibility with the recently released iOS or macOS versions.

Apple also identifies software that doesn't do what it claims. In addition, older software that does not meet current review standards will be phased out.

On the developer page of Apple's official website, Apple also provides a detailed explanation of the review process for the above-mentioned old software.

If Apple finds the above-mentioned software, it will send an email to the developers, notifying them to make modifications and upgrades within thirty days. If the developers fail to do so, Apple will completely delete these old software from the software store.

It should also be pointed out that even if the software has passed Apple's old software review process, if the software crashes and exits upon startup, it will be immediately deleted from the software store.

"Quality is very important to us, and Apple knows that many of you work hard to deliver innovative software and continually update it with new features and capabilities," Apple wrote in an email to developers.

Apple also stated that the above-mentioned action to clean up abandoned software will not be retroactive, that is, if Apple users have downloaded these software in the past and are still using them, they can continue to use them in the future even if Apple removes them from the shelves.

Software name length

Apple also notified another matter in the email: in the future, the English name of products submitted to the Apple Software Store must not exceed fifty letters in length.

Apple said such restrictions are mainly intended to prevent some developers from "game" the search algorithm of the Apple Software Store. It is said that in the past some software developers used very long names, even including some function descriptions and content unrelated to the software, in order to improve search rankings and increase downloads.

Apple said that long software names will not be displayed in full, which also reduces the user experience.

Interestingly, Apple’s move regarding name length was announced before iOS 10 was released. In the new version of the software store, Apple will launch search ads, and developers can pay a certain fee to have their products ranked higher in search results.

The above-mentioned measures to clean up old software and limit the length of names will take effect from September 7, which is also the time when Apple holds its fall new product launch conference, launches new versions of mobile phones, second-generation smart watches, and releases the new version of the mobile phone operating system to the public for the first time.

The media pointed out that there are currently more than 2 million products in the Apple Software Store. The quality of these software varies greatly, and there are also a certain number of junk software. Therefore, it is time to do a "spring cleanup" of old software.