[oauea]

Just allow sideloading. It's not hard to not block that. But apple is hell-bent on collecting every cent they can, so of course all app installations must go through their walled garden where they can take their 30%. Anti-consumer behavior at its finest.

[mehrdada]

Sideloading is allowed with a free developer account.

[Andrew_nenakhov]

Not really. You also need a computer running XCode (i.e. a mac), you'll need to follow the instructions out of 9 rather not obvious pounts and you'll also need to build be app you want to install.

Oh, and of course you won't be able to use push notifications, because Apple.

[simonklitj]

Not true anymore! You can sideload .ipa's using AltStore without Xcode and without the source code.

[oauea]

How? There must be some restrictions or this would be HUGE news and Epic would rejoice.

edit: the apps expire after 1 week and need to be constantly reinstalled. This is abusing an exploit in apple's walled garden that will surely be "fixed".

[simonklitj]

They’re not abusing an exploit. You might be able to argue that they’re abusing a policy.

The fact is that you are allowed to sign apps with a free dev account, the cert will just expire after a week.

AltStore’s been around since 2019, so they’ve had ample time to “fix” it.

Edit: they do not need to be reinstalled. With AltStore the cert update is automatic and wireless (your computer handles it and sends the updated cert to your phone). You will never notice their expiration, and never need to reinstall, unless you’re away from your computer for more than a week.

[oauea]

Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to explain all that to my users. Some of them don't even have a computer.