Feedback Assistant
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After constant frustration with what seems like a system designed to fail, Apple developer Jeff Johnson wants developers to band together and forced Apple to take notice of feedback glitches.
Anyone who pays attention to the developer community has probably noticed a slow rise in complaints about Apple's bug reporting system. Feedback Assistant is marketed as a way to communicate directly with Apple engineers, but developers believe that instead, they sent the report to the wall.
According to a blog post by developer Jeff Johnson, creator of apps like Stop The Madness, he intends to stop reporting using Feedback Assistant altogether. The boycott will be carried out in three simple steps.
- Submit a new review of Feedback Assistant (under Developer Tools and Resources) that lists the issues below and states that you will boycott Feedback Assistant until the issues are resolved.
- Do not submit new ones feedback until Apple resolves the issues.
- If Apple requests a response to a previously submitted review, respond only by saying that you are boycotting Feedback Assistant and contact your Feedback number provided in step 1.
Johnson hopes that developers can make each Review as unique as possible to force Apple to end the boycott. If feedback pours in about Feedback Assistant itself, Apple will presumably be forced to respond.
The idea behind this boycott also involves Apple getting free labor from developers for finding bugs. While developers can find workarounds for bugs, Apple benefits most from users finding bugs.
Johnson lists several reasons why Apple Feedback Assistant is a broken and hostile program. Bug reports often go unanswered for months or years, reviews are unceremoniously closed without comment to the developer, and Apple requires aggressive system diagnostic reports, often for no reason.
The boycott is not a complaint directed at individual Apple employees and engineers. In fact, this community would benefit from an improved Feedback Assistant system.
Apple employees have previously spoken out on social media or in interviews, suggesting that the system would be difficult to improve due to the incredible number of reports submitted every day. Johnson believes Apple is in control of its priorities, and if that's a problem, it should hire more staff.
Feedback Assistant is an app that appears on iOS, macOS, iPadOS, and other platforms when developers participate in developer beta testing. The application is automatically installed during beta testing and cannot be uninstalled.
