October 2022 Summaries

A significant percentage of users uninstall apps when they run out of storage space, with 20% admitting to doing so. When faced with a choice between apps that are similar but have varying sizes, users tend to opt for the smaller app. To reduce an app's size and improve performance, techniques such as compressing image files, using lossless or lossy compression algorithms, converting raster images to vector graphics, utilizing image compression tools, removing unused resources, and enabling App thinning can be employed. By implementing these strategies, developers can achieve a lower-than-average app size, leading to quicker installation times, better performance, and potentially increased conversion rates and user retention.

Roland Bak, a Support Engineer at Bitrise, joined the company after completing a coding bootcamp and seeking an opportunity to apply his technical skills in a role that combined social and technical aspects. He found his current position as a technical specialist in Support to be challenging yet rewarding, requiring him to balance specialized knowledge with a wide range of knowledge across various platforms. Roland attributes his success to embracing his limitations, dealing with impostor syndrome, and learning from criticism. To work effectively at Bitrise, he emphasizes the importance of empathy, inquisitiveness, and communication skills, which enable users to understand their problems and find solutions. Roland believes that hands-on practice is the most effective way to improve one's skills, making him a valuable asset to the Bitrisers team.

The Mobile DevOps Summit 2022 is a comprehensive event that brings together over 80 sessions across multiple content tracks, including build, test, monitor, release, mobile CI/CD, culture, and collaboration. The summit features keynote speakers, breakout sessions, panels, fireside chats, and hands-on workshops on various topics such as mobile app delivery, accessibility, testing, and automation. Industry leaders from top companies like eBay, FIS, Instagram, and Microsoft will share their expertise, while attendees can network with open-source community members and industry professionals. With a focus on transformation and best practices, the summit aims to drive value for users and improve app development processes.

Measuring and managing code quality is essential for mobile apps as it ensures consistency, reliability, and maintainability of the codebase, ultimately impacting the app's safety, security, and delivery speed. Maintainingable code is simple, clean, and easy to read, while reliability measures the likelihood that a system will run without failure. Testability assesses how well the code supports testing efforts, and portability measures how usable the same code is in different environments. Mobile teams should consider these four aspects when measuring and managing code quality to ensure high-quality code delivery. By implementing tools like Bitrise's step library and Fastlane integration, mobile teams can streamline their build processes and improve code quality. The Mobile DevOps Assessment Survey (MODAS) provides insights into a team's mobile development processes, helping them identify areas for improvement and support enhanced performance.

The text announces the acquisition of Flare.Build by Bitrise, a company that offers software solutions for build and test pipelines based on Bazel, Google's popular open-source multi-language, multi-platform build system. The integration will enhance mobile app build performance by up to 10x, speed up feedback loops, and provide improved development quality, reduced risk, and productivity for mobile teams. Teams using Bazel can now benefit from a turn-key solution for build analytics, distributed builds, and a performant build cache and CDN, regardless of what CI provider they use. The integration also provides a cohesive, integrated user experience, eliminates infrastructure and tooling fragmentation, and enables developers to connect to systems directly from their workstations. For teams not using Bazel, the Flare technology will provide powerful performance enhancements to mobile application CI workflows running on Bitrise. The acquisition aims to further enhance mobile app impact by providing a single platform for build, test, and deployment, eliminating vendor management, minimizing resource costs, and breaking down organizational silos.

To help evaluate a continuous integration server like Bitrise, demo apps are ready-to-build mobile apps that can be used to explore the product's features and get started with setup, integration, and configuration. Demo apps are already integrated into the platform and don't require connecting a GitHub or GitLab account. Users can create a free Bitrise account and run a demo app by selecting the project type, which currently has four options: iOS, Android, Flutter, and React Native. Once the build has started, users can view the build log, download it, and view the YAML file. The demo apps are not connected to repositories and certain features are unavailable, but users can check their credit usage on the account overview page. Users can delete the demo app from their account by clicking the "Delete app" button on the App settings page.

Neo Financial is a Canadian fintech startup that has reached unicorn status by developing user-friendly products with features such as frequent communication, cross-functional squads, transparency across the organization, a focus on quality over speed, and early involvement from all teams in every aspect of product development. The company's collaboration tactics include daily stand-ups, weekly updates, and regular check-ins to ensure everyone is informed and aligned. By fostering this collaborative culture, Neo Financial has managed to keep its feel like a small, close-knit startup despite growing rapidly.

The first assessment of its kind, MODAS is a survey aimed at evaluating mobile teams' performance, productivity, and maturity in delivering mobile apps. Over 1,600 teams worldwide have taken the assessment, providing valuable insights into how mobile finance teams report their own performance. The results highlight key benchmarks for top-performing mobile finance teams, including regular deployment cycles, efficient bug fixing, and high levels of collaboration across the Mobile Product Organization. By comparing these benchmarks to their own team's performance, teams can identify areas for improvement and access a curated list of resources to develop their knowledge and skills.

The mobile app security testing market continues to grow as the number of mobile app downloads increases, resulting in a higher risk of hacker attacks, fraud, and malware infections. To mitigate these risks, developers need effective mobile app security testing tools that can help identify vulnerabilities and provide recommendations for fixing them. When choosing a mobile app security testing tool, it's essential to consider factors such as deployment options, automation capabilities, and add-ons. Paid features like on-demand security tests and pen testing can offer added value, while free and open-source tools can be useful for small teams with limited resources. Some popular mobile app security testing tools include AppSweep, QARK, App-Ray, Data Theorem by Mobile Secure, NowSecure Platform, and Bitrise. These tools offer various features such as continuous monitoring, automated testing, and report generation, and some integrate with DevOps toolchains like Bitrise to streamline the development process.