Beta program for iPhone App about vesc_tool HOT 6 CLOSED

I think the answer is simply that if you want to participate in the beta-testing you either have to use something that is not apple or compile it yourself. Supporting a device that does not let you install software without the permission of the vendor is not something that I'm very enthusiastic about. It really shows that even though you paid for it they still own and control it, which is the complete opposite of the ethos behind the VESC Project. Just the license workaround we had to do so that they can maintain control are already unacceptable to me, I just agreed to do it because people kept asking for it and Jeff offered to support their platforms.

Edit: If Jeff is up for putting some work into a beta-program for apple I have nothing against that of course, that it up to him. I'm just pointing this out because I still mostly work on the VESC code in my spare time and I share everything because I care about that a lot. I want to involve and teach people how it works and give them a tool that no one can take away from them. A company like apple that does everything they can to lock people in and control them is in such a conflict with that and I think it is important that people understand this and maybe push back against them a little.

Edit2: Just some clarification as I don't think that @surfdado and probably many others understand what the problem is. The simple fact that I cannot compile a program and install the generated file on a device I purchased or give that file to someone else to install on a device they purchased is a huge problem. You have to ask apple for permission to do that and go via their store + pay them a yearly fee for it. Also, apple can at any moment uninstall that software and take back that permission. That is completely insane to me.

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I don't personally know all that much about Apple's ecosystem but I do know that beta versions can be pushed to up to 10k users without any of Apple's involvement. If Jeff doesn't want to do it I could give it a try. But that would be awkward because it would be under my Apple account.
Also, is the source code that Jeff uses publicly available? I am able to build iPhone apps but the VESC Tool app isn't one of them. It looks like Jeff has at least some XCode project files that aren't part of the vesc_tool code base. Not sure what else he had to do to make it work

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All the code used to build is in the repository. You have to install xcode and qt creator on a mac and then build for iOS, I think you also need an apple developer account to deploy to your own devices. At this stage I don't think it is worth the effort of running and maintaining a beta through test flight as most everything gets tested through other platforms already and I do the testing for iOS here myself. Having someone else manage a testflight release would just create more communication and work in my view, I think as it is now is fine for the near future.

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I do have the Apple Developer account, but I'm not very experienced with XCode/Apple. I'm doing a lot of work with the VESC beta versions but am forced to label them "6.0" so I can keep using my iPhone. So I would LOVE to have a beta build of the iOS app. I'd very much appreciate if you could point me to some build instructions.

Note: I haven't installed Qt yet - is QtCreator what's used to build the whole iOS app? Because I don't see an XCode project file in the code base. Thanks!!

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Yes, you first build from qt creator and then it creates an xcode project during the build. Though generally you do not need to open xcode to deploy to the phone. Just download Qt creator installer from the website check the box to install Qt 5.15 for iOS when you install it then just open the vesc-tool project in qt creator select ios as your target and it should build. If you just do some general googling on how building Qt projects for iOS and deploying to iphone works it will probably be more effective than me explaining it second hand.

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Sounds great, will give that a try, thank you!

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