Hello,
I've submitted a build of my app, and it appeared in iTunes Connect under "TestFlight > iOS Builds." Then, after a minute of processing, the build disappeared without any warnings or errors being issued.
As usual, I had to search Google and StackOverflow to figure out what the problem might be. The consensus was that this is due to a missing privacy key in my Info.plist file. People on the forum wrote that errors involving privacy keys will not show up in iTunes Connect, but will be sent via e-mail.
First point:
- WHY are these errors only sent by e-mail?
- WHICH e-mail are they sent to, and how do I find this out?
- WHY doesn't iTunes Connect also display these errors within the iTunes Connect web interface?
- WHY does iTunes Connect constantly force developers to play guessing games and solve riddles for hours in order to figure out why their latest app update won't go through?
So, I checked every e-mail I have access to, and all of my Spam folders, etc. No e-mails ever showed up. So, I began the iTunes Connect Guessing Game Ritual that has become so familiar to iOS developers for the past 8 years. I had added Location Services to the app, so that was the likely culprit. Adding those keys solved the problem.
Second point:
WHY didn't iTunes Connect even bother to send me any e-mails which would help me figure out why the submission failed?
If it weren't for StackOverflow, I would be sitting here for hours or days without a single error message or explanation about why the app update submission disappeared. I would submit several more updates, which would all disappear. Then, I would give up and have to do some kind of git bisection of my code to figure out what caused the problem, (submitting half a dozen more builds until I located the commit that began the problem.
This isn't the first time iTunes Connect has pulled these sorts of tricks on me. Like I said, it's become a regular occurance over the past 8 years. Waiting for these sorts of bugs to get fixed doesn't work, because months or YEARS can go by without any fixes.
Thanks.