betatesters
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iOS app developers can now recruit up to 10,000 beta testers
You'll now have a bigger chance of beta testing upcoming iOS, tvOS, watchOS and even iMessage apps from your favorite developers. Cupertino has expanded the number of beta testers devs can invite on TestFlight to a whopping 10,000 from a measly 2,000 people. The tech giant acquired TestFlight's creator in 2014 to give its third-party developer community a simple way to invite testers before releasing their products on the App Store. All they need to send out invitations are email addresses, so they can easily solicit for help online if they're looking for bugs or send previews to members of the press.
Vista SP1 out now... for beta testers
That right kids, it's everyone's wildest dream come to fruition: Vista SP1 is now officially available for your beta testing pleasure. According to a report from Geekzone in New Zealand, the update is now making its way into the hands of beta testers, with a broad rollout planned sometime in March. Apparently, those desperate to get with the newness will have to use a standalone installer as opposed to the updater, and there are some minor issues with driver compatibility -- but we're pretty sure that won't stop you from going to town on this baby. Get it now if you're a beta tester... or have a BitTorrent client.
Are We All Just Beta Testers?
GameDaily has an interesting article up about how game developers seem to be using players as beta testers. Buggy code is released as a final product to the public with the thought that it can always be fixed with a later patch. And, while the article specifically discusses single player games, the argument is perhaps even more applicable to large MMO's in which regular patches to add content (and fix old bugs) are the norm. While it's understandable to an extent - World of Warcraft is a massive game, and it would be impossible to test every race, class, and talent spec in every situation - some of the bugs are sufficiently obvious that they make one wonder how much testing happens at all. However, perhaps MMO's are so expansive that it's imposible to give them the full quality assurance treatment in the traditional sense - which is why we've ended up with test servers and a regular patch cycle. What do you think - are we beta testing the software we're paying for? And should we be?
