Panic

Panic Blog

From the desk of Cabel
Portland, Oregon 97205

Transmit iOS 1.1.1 [Updated]

UPDATE 12/11/14: After a considerate conversation with Apple, Transmit iOS 1.1.2 has been released with restored “Send To” functionality.

While the process feels less-than-perfect, this resolution is a nice reminder that, just as we thought, there are good people at Apple who will push hard to do the right thing. We hope you enjoy Transmit iOS 1.1.2.

— ORIGINAL POST —

Transmit iOS 1.1.1 is out, fixing a few bugs in our surprisingly powerful file management app for your iPhone or iPad.

Also, at Apple’s request, we had to remove the ability to “Send” files to other services, including iCloud Drive.

In short, we’re told that while Transmit iOS can download content from iCloud Drive, we cannot upload content to iCloud Drive unless the content was created in the app itself. Apple says this use would violate 2.23 — “Apps must follow the iOS Data Storage Guidelines or they will be rejected” — but oddly that page says nothing about iCloud Drive or appropriate uses for iCloud Drive.

If the issue is just iCloud Drive, why did we remove the other destinations? We had no choice. iCloud Drive exists in this sheet:

locations_1024

The above sheet is 100% controlled by iOS — we can’t touch it. Since we can’t touch the sheet, we can’t remove just iCloud Drive from the sheet, so we have to remove the whole sheet.

delete-3

Our seriously sincere apologies to everyone who used or purchased Transmit iOS with this feature.

The good news? Transmit iOS remains incredibly capable and useful app despite this omission — as further evidenced by this awesome five-mice review for Transmit iOS in MacUser UK.

Transmit-Review-Thumb

There are good people working at Apple who will read this, be frustrated, and hopefully try to fix the situation. Hopefully, we can return this functionality to Transmit iOS in some form, someday. We’ll let you know.

UPDATE 12/11/14: After a considerate conversation with Apple, Transmit iOS 1.1.2 has been released with restored “Send To” functionality.

Posted at 11:30 am 50 Comments

(Speaking for myself: when we get a call from the App Review Bad News Guy — a very nice guy with a very terrible job — we know we’re in for a difficult few weeks. We haven’t shared, and likely never will share, most of those stories. To be clear, we always work all of the angles available to us to keep our software great, and there’s no doubt there are countless great people at Apple who are doing wonderful work and want the best for all developers. But we have to remember Apple is now a massive organization with countless divisions — the App Review team isn’t even in Cupertino, for example — and sometimes that means the wheels turn slowly, or the car, well, drives backwards. It’s hard to describe the legitimate emotional toll we feel when we’re angry or frustrated with a company we love so deeply. But then we realize it’s never Apple we’re frustrated with. It’s always the App Store.)

Jason Sims

12/8/2014 11:41 AM

Unfortunate, but understandable. Hopefully they’ll revisit this weird/dumb rule or at least provide a way to send files to other services and let iCloud Drive be the king of its own castle that nobody visits.

Jough Dempsey

12/8/2014 11:45 AM

Sorry to hear that you removed the only reason I’ve ever used iCloud Drive. Being able to send arbitrary files to it (or Dropbox) that I’ve downloaded from elsewhere was a great feature.

Jamie Shaw

12/8/2014 11:48 AM

It’s a shame that this had to happened, and whilst unfortunate, it is what is. It’s not your fault and there was nothing you could do about it.

On the back of this though, one thing I would love to see is robust for Dropbox as a “remote source”. In my opinion Transmit is the best document manager for iPhone bar none. And if it could extend to Dropbox, it would get two big toes up, in addition to the two things of mine it already has.

It’s clearly not your fault, but it’s sad to see that feature go.
“But then we realize it’s never Apple we’re frustrated with. It’s always the App Store.” isn’t completely true.
Apple created the App Store. Apple creates the App Store rules. That’s like saying I’m frustrated by this movie, but not the director/actors/writers/etc. who created it. The truth is App Review is too f**ked up and Apple really has to do something about it.

Arthur Roussel

12/8/2014 11:53 AM

Since any OSX user can upload anything to iCloud Drive through Finder, I don’t understand why this silly rule.

But hey, I got an iOS app rejected because I was telling people to cut a sausage with their iPhone, everyone has his App Store rejection story.

Upload anything to iCloud Drive from Windows, too. Which means there’s a zillion malware writers with more access to that [expletive deleted] than Panic.

This is a pity, but it is still a really fantastic application.
Can’t you just re-impliment the feature without iCloud drive ? Don’t use the standard sheet.

Chris Jefferson

12/8/2014 12:21 PM

Cabel: I think you should check yourself for Stockholm syndrome, the App Store IS Apple, it’s just a piece of Apple have direct contact with.

“it’s never Apple we’re frustrated with. It’s always the App Store.”

If only there were some sensible engaged ownership of the App Store developers could reach out to and work with, instead of waiting for App Store Inc to change its mysterious hive mind.

Abhi Beckert

12/8/2014 12:55 PM

> The above sheet is 100% controlled by iOS — we can’t touch it.

I have never seen that sheet before in my life and searching google images I can’t see it either.

The dropbox app and all other apps show exactly the same list in a completely different interface, and they don’t have iCloud.

What am I missing?

“It’s hard to describe the legitimate emotional toll we feel when we’re angry or frustrated with a company we love so deeply.”

I know how you feel because I feel that way about Panic. (If I didn’t care I wouldn’t comment.)

Since this is why I bought the program I won’t be updating

Things like this make me question why developers should even bother with the App Store and MAS ecosystems at all.

Every feature is potentially just a complete waste of money to implement.

Josh Lytle

12/8/2014 1:40 PM

In the code you removed, you’ve got an itemWithTitle, can you not check for ‘iCloud’ and not add it?

I’m sure there is more to it than that. Sorry to hear about your misfortune. Still a Panic fan!

Yep, I’ll be waiting for them to “fix” this before updating. I’ve had a few other zombie apps like this that I stopped updating (most recent was PCalc not being allowed to show a calculator in the widgets… but thankfully they reversed that).

(The bigger problem, of course, is that we’ve allowed ourselves into the position of letting corporations unilaterally decide which apps we can install on our own computing devices.)

How about android version of the app?

Apple Fanboi

12/8/2014 2:14 PM

Apple knows best!

How are they going to get more people to use iCloud if they block applications that make use of it? Seems self-defeating on Apple’s part.

Jackson Squire

12/8/2014 2:38 PM

I know you’re trying to be nice and maintain a working relationship with Apple when you say that you aren’t angry with Apple but with the App Store, but the App Store is still Apple; they set it up that way. The buck stops with them. The big question to ask here is: “What is the point of iCloud Drive when I can’t put anything and access anything from all my devices?” The answer: there isn’t a point to it. There’s little use to most of the new features that have come in iOS 8 due to similar subsequently spontaneously appearing rules that cut them off at the knees. Let’s be mindful these are features whose entire point of existence is to play catch-up to Android which has been able to do these things for some time without much difficulty.

I’ve never been much of an iOS user because for it to become more than just my phone’s OS to me it will have to replace my Mac. I bought Transmit for iOS because it filled a void of being a way to get files from random locations into my iCloud Drive. As long as Apple continues to not cripple OS X you can pry my Mac out of my cold dead fingers. I’ll continue to happily toss money towards Transmit on OS X.

OriginalGeek

12/8/2014 2:46 PM

Someone send Tim Cook an email, I think he would likely fix this.

To be honest, I don’t think even Apple knows what to do. They’re completely reactive, and not proactive. The pCalc incident is a good example; take it down, leave it up. As seen in the news already, they are having major organizational issues now, and I don’t believe they know what to do about it. I’m sure they’re scrambling to get good workers, both techs and execs, and that’ll take time to sort out. They’ve simply bit off more then they can chew for now, and have a whole lot of egg on their face because of it. Not sure what else to say about it, just a sad state of affairs.

Because apple is a company of elitists and hatters! They have never played in the IT sandbox. Why Microsoft continues to be nice and develop for them is beyond me. I would just give them the bird and let them die.

It’s pretty clear that Apple’s fiefdoms are not communicating properly. Too much growth too quickly. And the App Store’s always been the redheaded stepchild in terms of logic and reason.

So when an app is both featured and threatened with removal simultaneously (as in the case of pCalc), it’s clear there is no coherent Apple mindset about any of this.

Here’s hoping the recent high-profile cockups finally prompt attention and change from on high. Hoping, but not holding my breath.

Jeff Murphy

12/8/2014 5:22 PM

Can someone post a link to where we should file our complaints with Apple?

*imports a document into an iWork app and watches it get immediately uploaded to iCloud*

Even Apple thinks Apple’s rules aren’t worth following, apparently.

Julian H.

12/8/2014 7:05 PM

Apple has always maintained a feedback form at http://www.apple.com/feedback/

“There are good people working at Apple [probably somewhere, but not App Review] who will read this [doubtful], be frustrated [not likely], and hopefully try to fix the situation. [definitely not]”

In my five years of development for iOS, the App Review team has by far been the most incompetent, illogical, inefficient, inconsistent, unreasonable “team” I have ever had the misfortune of working with. Good luck.

Have you considered releasing a version outside of App store for jailbroken devices?

Sorry to hear that this restriction has been imposed by Apple and you’ve had to remove the send to feature.

I hate to ask, but how can I go about getting a refund? I use transmit on my Macbook Pro and MacPro but never had a need to install it on my iPhone or iPad, until I read about the send to feature and that is honestly and genuinely the only reason I bought it. With this feature now removed I feel a little aggrieved that I have paid for something that is of no use to me any more because the key feature I needed was removed.

I know that Panic are a great dev team and that this situation has arisen because of Apple’s ignorance but I’m still a consumer with rights and have paid money for something that is now broken (wrt to the way I need to use it).

If Apple or Panic can give me a way to roll back to the older (working) version of Transmit until a solution is found, then great, but until then what is the refund policy/route?

David Hroncheck

12/9/2014 2:17 AM

Post-update, Transmit for iOS still beautifully and effectively works up/down with my home server over SFTP w/ key auth. Made a bookmark for the path to my server’s iCloud Drive directory. That still works, I just don’t know what to use it (iCloud Drive) for.

@Scoopz Give me a break. It’s $9.99. Panic didn’t break it, Apple’s App Store review whim of the week did. Go to your local Apple Store and demand a $9.99 iTunes gift card. Tweet at Cook and Schiller for your cheapo redress. Don’t waste Panic’s time with this horseshit. Make (admittedly minor ripples of) trouble, embarrassment, and expense for Apple.

Tim Lawson

12/9/2014 3:35 AM

It still works as originally intended if you don’t update to 1.1.1 doesn’t it?

Losing faith in Apple. Panic app design is without rival so they should welcome deep integration.

Tim Keating

12/9/2014 7:40 AM

filepicker.io has an iOS SDK: https://developers.filepicker.io/docs/

Apple the best! Yes it’s ironc

It’s not good. Guidelines should be clear.
Anyway, awesome coding font! Can anyone recognise the font used in the example code ?

Joe Cassara

12/9/2014 11:35 AM

iOS’s success was handed to Apple by the thousands of talented developers they are now treating like children. And the alternative is not as easy as dumping iOS and developing for Android, as the latter may have more of a global installed base, but their users are still less likely to buy an app.

Abhi Beckert

12/9/2014 11:42 AM

@Snoopz, the receipt emailed when you purchase any app has a “report a problem” link.

Use that.

@Mike: it doesn’t matter who’s fault. You pay for something, and it doesn’t do what you were told it would do, you are entitled to a refund. That’s what the law says.

Mark Berger

12/9/2014 11:51 AM

For that sheet, does iCloud appear if iCloud Drive is turned off?
Can the app work out if ICLoud drive is enabled?

Perhaps the sheet could still be used if iCloud is turned off
i.e. It is useful without iCloud Drive.

Obviously, variation in behavior would have to be explained.

Mark

Ian @ game-tech

12/9/2014 4:20 PM

Lesson learned : always back up your .ipa’s! Thankfully I’ve just restored v1.1.
Good luck working through this with apple, hopefully they’ll see the light.

Good article thank you.

Good that I haven’t purchased the App ;)

@Mike did you even read my entire post? I make it pretty clear that I Know it’s Apple’s fault and not Panic’s and whether it cost £6 or £600 It makes no difference.
As it happens over 20 of my staff have bought Transmit and claimed for it via petty cash. Now I’m looking (as a business) and £120 loss. Is that enough for me to justify requesting a refund?
To that effect I asked all my employees to follow the “report a problem” link in the App Store and state apple pulled a required feature in the hope that somebody at Apple might take note.
I see there is now another update and the feature is back at Apple’s request which is great, due to conversations with Panic and Apple, but if Apple had thousands of refund requests I’m sure it wouldn’t have gone unnoticed.
Stand up for your rights as a consumer, don’t sit there and accept something that isn’t right.
Well done panic on releasing an update so quickly.
Scoopz

I have been a Mac user since Day 1, and before that an Apple ][ user. I have no intention of giving up Mac OS for Windows. However, though I used iOS for a few years, the innumerable limitations grew to be WAY too annoying and I am now firmly in the Android camp. So, I would very much appreciate your releasing an Android version of Transmit.

Tim Lawson

12/13/2014 4:33 AM

Superb news from Apple and so swift getting 1.1.2 out in the wild – thank you, although I have to say that I skipped the 1.1.1 version and “kept calm and carried on”… :-)

Well, in between 1.1.1 & 1.1.2 I submitted a request to Apple asking for a refund. I explained that if Apple can change their mind, I’d like to do the same. The key feature I liked being Send To menu options being gone was a terrible move on Apple’s part. The fact that it took a week to reply is Apple’s fault. In the meantime, as we all know, Transmit restored the functionality after Apple changed their mind for a second time …

Crazy thing is, Apple just issued me a full refund.

I’d like to know how this impacts Panic. I assume you end up giving back the 70% … and I hate that. Do I just need to re-purchase the app?

I’m a huge fan of Panic, with Coda, desktop Transmit & Prompt as mainstays in my daily arsenal of tools.

I have repurchased the app now that the feature has been reintegrated.

Anybody who was issued a refund by Apple, please do the right thing and uninstall the app and return to the app store to repurchase it to ensure Panic aren’t left out of pocket. If you don’t uninstall the app first the option to purchase is replaced with an “open app” option so you need to uninstall first in order to buy it again.

Apologies to Panic devs, I know none of this was your fault and Apple have messed you around and consequently done a U-Turn on their decision. I look forward to more awesome updates in the future.

Merry Christmas to all. x

خرید vpn

12/17/2014 2:41 AM

thank you

It’s been a long time since I’ve looked at Transmit.

This issue – and the restoration of attractive features that were heretofore unknown to me – put the product on my radar.

Consider it purchased!