Would iPad app be same as iPhone app? 31 May 2015 at 9:46PM in Techie Stuff 5 replies 677 views

longwalks1

Hope that makes sense, I use a share dealing app called IGIndex on both iPhone 6 and on my nexus 7 and the iPhone version is much better, layout etc

Would it be the same on the iPad mini? What I mean is would the layout etc be Apple specific, or just for iPhones?

AlecEiffel

There's usually an iPad version that takes into account the larger screen of an iPad. Universal apps download the iPhone version for the phone, the iPad version for the tablet, but appear on the App Store as one app- buy it, download it to whatever device you have. Some apps have separate versions (ie you pay for each) but these are quite rare. The App Store will tell you what device an app will work on.

InsideInsurance

There are two different types of apps in the apple world. There are the universal ones where you install the same thing on both iPads and iPhone/iPod Touch and those where there are two separate apps.

The universal ones may have the identical or different layouts/ functions etc on each device or the iPad may be slightly different to better use the extra screen space - or at least the developers idea of better use anyway. With this you have no option but to use the version for the device you are on (though in theory I guess developers could let you pick they dont generally)

With the others then you can actually install iPad or iPhone versions on an iPad, with an iPhone version it can either be run natively so you get a phone screen sized box in the middle of the screen and black around it or X times normal to fill the whole screen. Obviously in the later its just scaled up rather than higher resolution graphics being used and so whilst its functionally fine it evidently looks like something thats fairly poorly scaled.

Apple increasingly push universal apps so even if they are separate now you may find it being replaced with a universal one in the future.

Cycrow

InsideInsurance wrote: »

With this you have no option but to use the version for the device you are on (though in theory I guess developers could let you pick they dont generally)

its not actually that easy to allow this, as the developer doesn't have any control over which interface is used. They just specify the the different layouts for iphone and ipad, and the OS picks which to use based on the device.

in theory, you could create the interfaces programmatically, but this would be a huge amount of extra work, so not really worth it. And even if you did, theres no guarantee apple would even let you release it, they are quite strict on how interfaces should work

InsideInsurance

Cycrow wrote: »

its not actually that easy to allow this, as the developer doesn't have any control over which interface is used. They just specify the the different layouts for iphone and ipad, and the OS picks which to use based on the device.

in theory, you could create the interfaces programmatically, but this would be a huge amount of extra work, so not really worth it. And even if you did, theres no guarantee apple would even let you release it, they are quite strict on how interfaces should work

It is theoretically possible though, was my point. Fully accept that I have not seen a single one that does actually do it but you know how this forum is, if you say "never" its like red rag to a bull and you can be sure someone finds an obscure example that proves you wrong.

mickburkejnr

Having released an app to the Apple Store, I can say that they give the developer the choice to submit an app that can work on the iPhone/iPod and iPad. They do this by asking you to submit screenshots of it working in the specific screen formats. So if you have the screenshot it must mean it works on that device.

It depends on the app though. The app I made would look weird on an iPad so I didn't submit it for it, but it worked perfectly on an iPhone. Things like games would/could work regardless of screen resolution due to the programming involved.