Those numbers are close to my app's update rates as well. I found it surprising that it happened so quickly too, but then noticed how my wife updates her apps: she hates those little red numbers, so will update almost immediately to make them go away.
Wow, that graph is very surprising to me. I only update apps when I update iOS (very rarely). I find it supremely annoying to update things manually. I would worry that the population being captured is not representative of the general app using population.
>> "I find it supremely annoying to update things manually"
What's annoying about it? It only takes two/three taps:
1. App Store
2. Updates tab
3. 'Update all'
A password isn't even required anymore. Personally I don't see how anyone could find that annoying but even if they did most app updates come with new features and the benefits of those far outweigh the 10 seconds of time it took to update.
I'd hazard to say that the graph is representative of the general app-using population and you are the outlier. You're one of a very small handful of iOS users I know who do this (my girlfriend is another one).
For me it's the Peter Principle - update until the app becomes worse than it was before. I don't trust them not to ruin more things in the future and I can't really revert, so that's where things stay.
I think the better option is to update the app until it starts getting worse, then switch to something better. If I was depending on a particular app to a point where losing feature X or Y would be any kind of disaster, I'd be actively looking for a different solution.
I only update the apps when I had a chance to read the reviews. Often the latest versions have bugs and may reduce the functionality, so I make sure there is an improvement before updating.
For example, I have my old kindle app from 2011 that allows in-app purchases.
I'm also pretty curious about this. I'd assumed that auto-update was a pretty basic feature and that of course iOS would have it- it's only with this thread/article that i'm discovering otherwise. Is there any particular reason that iOS doesn't do automatic updates in the background? I've just got "update automatically on WiFi only" set up on my Android phone and I've never had any problems.
Here's their decision: Update or Delete. People don't like that extra notification laying there. So you will either retain them or loose them when you update. Some who are disengaged will just update all, but those users you care about will either update or delete.
I'd like to point out that Octopart customer base is probably tech friendly (as they are an electronic parts search engine), I would be more curious about numbers from an app geared toward general consumers such as Yelp.
That curve fitting seems a bit off in the middle and at the tail. What does the log plot show? Log-log plot? That will nail down a power law or exponential law if there is one.
Along these lines, it was surprising to me that many non-techies never close out their apps. They leave them running in the background and are not even aware it was possible to close an app.
As a developer, this means the only time many users will "restart" the app is when they update, and the restart is forced upon them. So make sure your apps are stable!
More surprising to me is that ANYONE closes out their apps.
I've never ever ever pressed that little red (-) icon. On pretty rare occasion, I need to hold power and then hold home to kill an unresponsive app. But I've never "quit" an app when I was done with it. I've had an iPhone since the beginning and my battery life and performance has always been stellar. Only apps that passively use GPS have been a problem , so I uninstall those.
This is also (mostly) true on my Mac as well. I leave DOZENS of apps running and only kill them if they start sucking down CPU cycles. Generally, most apps sit there, do nothing, and get paged out to the flash disk.
I'm also a little annoyed each time I meet a non-techie who had some techie tell them "Oh, here's how you close apps. It will make your phone faster." Try as I might, I can't convince my girlfriend that it has absolutely no effect. She religiously closes every single app in that little tray once or twice a day.
It's 2013 people. We don't (shouldn't?) need to manually manage memory for our computers.
This is false. The OS will auto close apps when it gets memory pressure from other apps. The "app tray" is an LRU & has nothing to do with whether the app is running. Our app (used once a day) gets restarted almost every day on old phones, and more than once a week on newer phones
[+] [-] chrisa|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] corylehey|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nwhitehead|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] k-mcgrady|13 years ago|reply
What's annoying about it? It only takes two/three taps:
1. App Store
2. Updates tab
3. 'Update all'
A password isn't even required anymore. Personally I don't see how anyone could find that annoying but even if they did most app updates come with new features and the benefits of those far outweigh the 10 seconds of time it took to update.
[+] [-] jgeorge|13 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] koyote|13 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] HaloZero|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brilee|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] quahada|13 years ago|reply
As a developer, this means the only time many users will "restart" the app is when they update, and the restart is forced upon them. So make sure your apps are stable!
[+] [-] snprbob86|13 years ago|reply
I've never ever ever pressed that little red (-) icon. On pretty rare occasion, I need to hold power and then hold home to kill an unresponsive app. But I've never "quit" an app when I was done with it. I've had an iPhone since the beginning and my battery life and performance has always been stellar. Only apps that passively use GPS have been a problem , so I uninstall those.
This is also (mostly) true on my Mac as well. I leave DOZENS of apps running and only kill them if they start sucking down CPU cycles. Generally, most apps sit there, do nothing, and get paged out to the flash disk.
I'm also a little annoyed each time I meet a non-techie who had some techie tell them "Oh, here's how you close apps. It will make your phone faster." Try as I might, I can't convince my girlfriend that it has absolutely no effect. She religiously closes every single app in that little tray once or twice a day.
It's 2013 people. We don't (shouldn't?) need to manually manage memory for our computers.
[+] [-] lincolnq|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arn|13 years ago|reply
I'd say most techies also don't close out their apps. I certainly don't.
[+] [-] danilocampos|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] k-mcgrady|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kbutler|13 years ago|reply
-- Steve Jobs iOS 4 introduction http://www.pcworld.com/article/193590/liveupdate.html
You don't need to do that to save battery life. Trust the iPhone. -- Steve Jobs email http://www.johnsphones.com/all-articles/steve-jobs-trust-the...