Tag: Windows

| Justin

The Woes of Windows Store App Submissions

I recently submitted a Windows 10 / Windows Phone app to the Windows Store named Data Viewer for Dota 2. I’m here to warn the world just how awful the process of submission can be.

Microsoft first created the concept of the Windows Store with the release of Windows 8, Windows RT, and Metro Apps — I mean Windows Store Apps — I mean Universal Windows Apps. Whatever you want to call them, the store quickly became an unregulated messy disaster full of copycat and scam apps. Many, many apps were nothing more than front ends to scamming websites, copies of things like Facebook, or general do-nothing apps with a price tag and description which made it seem like a good purchase.

In order to address this problem, in normal Microsoft fashion, Microsoft decided to wait 3 years and come up with a new process of submitting the app. Every app would be held to “rigorous” standards which would guarantee all apps were clearly named and labeled to prevent confusion and scams. There are several guideline posts out there from Microsoft, and you can rest assured that all of them are vague and barely helpful.

So how did this affect my app? Originally, the app was named “Dota Database” after its sister site and had the same icon as appears on that site. The first submission resulted in this super helpful message: The app name and icon do not accurately represent the features.

Uh…OK? I’m not sure it could even get more vague than that. So as a guess, I figured maybe they were complaining about the word “Database” since the app isn’t literally a database but instead is a viewer into a database. I renamed the app to “Dota Data Viewer” and tried another submission. That was apparently a mistake because guess what message came back after failing? The app name and icon do not accurately represent the features.

At this point, I tried emailing the support address suggested by the submission report. I decided to get to the point and ask for more information about why the app was failing submission and asked about what specifically I should change. The response was kind of helpful: Hello Developer, you will need to make your app distinguished from other apps in the store with a unique name such as “Skype for Windows” or “User Guide for Microsoft Word.”

Then I changed the app name to “Data Viewer for Dota 2” which is specific and distinguished from any other apps. In addition, I changed the app icon to the one you now see in the Windows Store which clearly states the app is a data viewer and not an actual game. Surely success will come after this! Wrong. The app was rejected with the exact same copy and paste message: The app name and icon do not accurately represent the features.

Now I’m upset. I email the support desk again and receive the exact same response: Hello Developer, you will need to make your app distinguished from other apps in the store with a unique name such as “Skype for Windows” or “User Guide for Microsoft Word.”… Read more

| Justin

How to Rename Your App in Windows Store

This applies to the Windows Store and Windows Dev Center as of March 1, 2016 and assumes you are uploading a Windows 10 Universal Platform App.

The Windows Dev Center started out badly back in Windows 8, and it hasn’t improved too much since then. I have to be honest when I describe it, because it’s sometimes nothing short of painful. One of those pain points is the UI and poor documentation regarding the concept of the “App Name”.

In order to submit to the store, you need to create “App Packages”. Each package has metadata associated with it that you define in your “App Manifest” (Package.appxmanifest in your project). This manifest is where the app’s name must match exactly with whatever names you have reserved in your Dev Center for that app.

Creating the App Name

When you create an app submission, you have to pick an “App Name”. This is the name that is displayed across your Dev Center Dashboard and the Windows Store. This name also has to match exactly in your app’s created manifest. That secret bit of information isn’t documented well and seems to only appear in tiny text when you are creating an app package through Visual Studio.

Changing the App Name

If your app has not yet been submitted to the store, then you can change the name by reserving a new one in the Dev Center, changing the manifest to that name, creating an app package, and then uploading that package. Don’t try to rename directly from the Dev Center (that’s where I kept looking). Instead, you have to reserve the name and change it in the manifest to match. There is no way to rename an app from the Dev Center!

If your app has already been submitted, you will need to reserve the new name, create a new update submission, change the manifest accordingly, create the package, and upload it to the new submission. If the submission is approved, the new name should show up in the store. I think there’s a delay in the new name showing up (16-24 hours).… Read more

| Justin

Resolving the problem where “WADLogsTable” is not created in Windows Azure Diagnostics

I’ve been using Windows Azure to host a Worker Role in a Cloud Service for an in-development version of my new app, Steam Community Viewer. This service will allow users to be notified of when their friends come online or start playing a game through Windows 8 Toast Notifications. Additionally, it will push updates to Live Tiles for new Steam deals.

During my tests, I tried to turn diagnostics on, but failed to save them to a permanent storage because the table that gets created when you enable basic logging wasn’t actually being created! Windows Azure Basic Logs will be saved in Azure Storage Tables under “WADLogsTable” based on a logging level (error, critical, verbose, etc…). This table is supposed to be automatically created when the service is uploaded and deployed with tracing enabled. If you find that the official Windows Azure documentation on using diagnostics is not helping you with this task, try the code below in your service OnStart() overload.

// instantiate and add a new diagnostic monitor trace listener
// before doing this, you should make sure no listeners are defined in your web.config or app.config
var tempListener = new DiagnosticMonitorTraceListener();
Trace.Listeners.Add(tempListener);

// creates a diagnostic manager instance based on an azure storage account
// before doing this, setup a storage account using the azure web portal
string connectionStringName = "Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString";
var storageAccount = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(connectionStringName));
var roleInstanceDiagnosticManager = storageAccount.CreateRoleInstanceDiagnosticManager(RoleEnvironment.DeploymentId,
RoleEnvironment.CurrentRoleInstance.Role.Name, RoleEnvironment.CurrentRoleInstance.Id);

// setup the basic logging configuration options
// ScheduledTransferPeriod is how often the trace log is copied to the storage account tables
// ScheduledTransferLogLevelFilter is the filter on the messages to copy
// BufferQuotaInMB is how much space is available to the local buffer (when limit is reached, old data is purged)
var config = roleInstanceDiagnosticManager.GetCurrentConfiguration();
config.Logs.ScheduledTransferPeriod = TimeSpan.FromMinutes(1.0);
config.Logs.ScheduledTransferLogLevelFilter = LogLevel.Undefined;
config.Logs.BufferQuotaInMB = 5;

// setup the windows event log configuration options
// adds the System and Application level windows event logs to the sources
// other options are the same as the basic logging
config.WindowsEventLog.DataSources.Add("System!*");
config.WindowsEventLog.DataSources.Add("Application!*");
config.WindowsEventLog.ScheduledTransferPeriod = TimeSpan.FromMinutes(1.0);
config.WindowsEventLog.ScheduledTransferLogLevelFilter = LogLevel.Undefined;
roleInstanceDiagnosticManager.SetCurrentConfiguration(config);
… Read more
| Justin

Why did my application fail Windows Store Certification?

I just finished watching a presentation on a broad overview of how to setup a Windows Store Developer account and submit applications to the store for certification and sale. Here are some guidelines that I found useful to follow in order to minimize the chances of having your application rejected during certification. The speaker noted that you will most likely fail certification for the first time, especially if it’s your first submission. Annoying, but I guess things have to be very specific to succeed.

1. The application must function in full

  • You must provide a test account for any required logins in the “Note to Testers” fields
  • Your application must not consist primarily of “Coming Soon” and “To be released later” content
  • Your application submission details must not contain false information or false screenshots
  • Your application must allow the user to control audio properly

2. The application needs to meet performance guidelines

  • Your application must launch in <= 5 seconds
  • Your application must suspend in <= 5 seconds

3. The application may or may not require a privacy policy

  • If your application indicates that it requires internet connection, you need to add a privacy policy in the application’s settings and provide a URL during submission

4. Your application must be localized as defined in your app manifest

  • Application chrome and content
  • Application metadata
  • Any and all screenshots and promotional images

All of this information was found from the slides presented in the Build 2012 presentation: “Windows Store: how does it work?”… Read more

| Justin

Making Sense of Windows Store Developer Accounts

I found it rather annoying having to dig through pages of documentation regarding publication of Windows Store Apps just to figure out what kind of account I needed to create. So, here’s a quick table to see the comparison at an extremely basic level.

Individual DeveloperCompany DeveloperEnterprise DeveloperOEM Developer
DreamSpark / Student Account CapableX
Submit Modern UI (aka Metro, aka Windows Store) Apps to the Windows StoreXXXX
Submit Desktop Apps to the Windows StoreXXX
Create Account with SSN (US only)XIf registered as Individual
Create Account with EIN (US only)XIf registered as CompanyX

One other thing to note is that Individual Accounts cannot use the following “app capabilities.”

Reference: Publishing your app to the Store… Read more

| Justin

Windows Vista – Moving C:Users to Another Location

Moving your personal documents to a location other than the system partition is a good idea for several reasons. Namely, if your system crashes, you can format and reinstall Windows without affecting your personal files or requiring you to move them to another location. Of course, this does not work if the entire drive crashes and takes your personal files with it!

Follow these steps (D: is the name of my location, change it to match yours):

  1. Backup your C:Users folder to an external location
  2. Boot from Windows Vista install DVD
  3. Click “Repair” from main install screen
  4. Click Command Prompt
      • robocopy C:Users D:Users /mir /xj
      • rmdir /S /Q C:Users
      • rmdir “C:Documents and Settings”
      • mklink /J C:Users D:Users
      • mklink /J “C:Documents and Settings” D:Users
      1. Reboot

      You’ll notice that C:Users now has an arrow on its icon designating that it is a link to another location. Remember to set proper permissions and remove read-only status from the new D:Users so all applications work properly!… Read more