[consulting] iPhone / Drupal app devolopment

Fri Jun 18 20:05:55 UTC 2010

I have a couple friends that run iPhone app only shops. Costs up to $30K per app (though that is generally film specific stuff out of Hollywood) get paid on a regular basis. $5K for a 4 week effort seems to be a floor on pricing.

Compare programming the iPhone to the Droid (I've done both) and you'll find the iPhone is easier to program; has a vastly larger market demand; and generally is a better business proposition.

The standard answer to back-end Drupal integration is the Services module. REST is not a great idea there right now. I'd go with XMLRPC unless you are transferring lots of content. Then you have to ask if the XML is adding so much to the payload that the transfer times get excessive. Also consider if you want to use a CDN -- I've seen people using Flickr (which I don't recommend) up to Akami. In general I find Amazon Cloudfront is a good way to go with this, but your mileage may vary.

iPhone development is fun, even if Objective-C is not generally a transferrable skill. Android programming is designed to wear out your fingers, but you have to pay attention. When their market growth comes at the expense of Apple (rather than, say, Symbian) you have to ask if you don't want to grow with it. Having taken a number of weekends getting practical experience I can assure there is lots that can be done here. The real bugaboo lies in not violating the latest Apple TOS while maintaining a single code base as far as possible.

John S.
john at johnstorey.org

On Jun 18, 2010, at 11:50 AM, consulting-request at drupal.org wrote:

> Send consulting mailing list submissions to
> 	consulting at drupal.org
> 
> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
> 	http://lists.drupal.org/mailman/listinfo/consulting
> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
> 	consulting-request at drupal.org
> 
> You can reach the person managing the list at
> 	consulting-owner at drupal.org
> 
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of consulting digest..."
> 
> 
> Today's Topics:
> 
>   1. Re: consulting Digest, Vol 53, Issue 14 (Joe Murray)
>   2. iPhone App & Drupal Pricing Ballpark (Josh)
>   3. Re: iPhone App & Drupal Pricing Ballpark (Greg Holsclaw)
> 
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 09:02:43 -0400
> From: Joe Murray <joe.murray at jmaconsulting.biz>
> Subject: Re: [consulting] consulting Digest, Vol 53, Issue 14
> To: consulting at drupal.org
> Message-ID:
> 	<AANLkTikVDcAL6CwP8RjVMvN7gJpO-8lF5IMD1pmMmQQr at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
> 
> For Canada, adapting suggested best practices language from the ADR
> Institute's site:
> 
> *
> *
> 
> *Arbitration. *All disputes arising out of or in connection with this
> agreement, or in respect of any legal relationship associated with or
> derived from this agreement, shall be finally resolved by arbitration
> pursuant to the Simplified Arbitration Rules of the ADR Institute of Canada,
> Inc. The place of arbitration shall be Toronto, Ontario. The language of the
> arbitration shall be English.**
> 
> Joe Murray, PhD
> President, JMA Consulting
> joe.murray at jmaconsulting.biz
> skype JosephPMurray twitter JoeMurray
> 416.466.1281
> -------------- next part --------------
> An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
> URL: http://lists.drupal.org/pipermail/consulting/attachments/20100618/c7f44f02/attachment-0001.html 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 2
> Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 14:07:54 -0400
> From: Josh <josh at joshnliz.com>
> Subject: [consulting] iPhone App & Drupal Pricing Ballpark
> To: consulting at drupal.org
> Message-ID:
> 	<AANLkTimtfmHz7JAbpWC4eQouz3W1zdLN5SWs6cFOM0UE at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
> 
> Hello Fellow Drupalers!
> 
> 
> I'm starting iphone app development and have plans to make a Drupal-powered
> back-end for some of the more mundane parts of the new iphone app (News,
> Directory, Locations, etc).
> 
> 
> Does anyone on this list have experience with marrying those two
> technologies? Most of our websites start at 75 hours and go up from there
> into the 600 hours range. (Think $7,500+ for our clients.)
> 
> 
> When I estimate our time for an iPhone app, we're getting close to 130
> hours+
> 
> 
> Does this sound right? Do you think your clients would pay for iphone apps
> in the $13,000+ range? To be honest, this feels high. But with very little
> experience in the iPhone app world, this may be low.
> 
> 
> My apologies if this message somehow violates the protocol for asking these
> kinds of prices. I'm not looking for someone to do the work, I'm just
> looking for some feedback who do this work as well.
> 
> 
> Josh
> 
> 
> 
> Josh Miller WEB / TECHNOLOGY DIRECTOR
> 
> HAAN MARKETING+COMMUNICATIONS
> 
> T  (765) 423-5470          123 North 8th Street
> 
> F  (765) 742-2881          Lafayette, IN 47901
> 
> www.haanmc.com
> -------------- next part --------------
> An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
> URL: http://lists.drupal.org/pipermail/consulting/attachments/20100618/634728e0/attachment-0001.html 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 3
> Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 11:42:18 -0700
> From: "Greg Holsclaw" <greg at t2media.com>
> Subject: Re: [consulting] iPhone App & Drupal Pricing Ballpark
> To: "'A list for Drupal consultants and Drupal service/hosting
> 	providers'"	<consulting at drupal.org>
> Message-ID: <00b901cb0f15$fbaeae10$f30c0a30$@com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
> 
> Without knowing the specifics app, it can be a bit hard consider. For our
> Dog Park Finder app,
> http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dog-park-finder/id362002678?mt=8 , (Drupal
> backend, link for example we don't need more downloads doing fine as it) I
> initially spec'ed it out and got 6 bids. Ranged from $3000 at $20/hr to
> $18,000 at around $75/hr. The low end were all off-shore vendors with less
> provable experience to high end established Houston based group.
> 
> We decided to do the dev in house (for a myriad of reasons,
> cost/maintenance/desired in-house expertise..).With the learning curve it
> was over 200 hours to develop (but that curve has spun out another app
> already and another to come, all Drupal backend).  
> 
> If you are starting from zero iphone dev experience, you had better add a
> huge pad to your total time estimate. There are many twists both in the
> iPhone and Drupal intregration you will have to account for.
> 
> If you client is willing to pay for both the product and the learning
> curve, more power to you.
> 
> Greg
> 
> 
> From: consulting-bounces at drupal.org [mailto:consulting-bounces at drupal.org]
> On Behalf Of Josh
> Sent: Friday, June 18, 2010 11:08 AM
> To: consulting at drupal.org
> Subject: [consulting] iPhone App & Drupal Pricing Ballpark
> 
> Hello Fellow Drupalers!
> 
> I'm starting iphone app development and have plans to make a Drupal-powered
> back-end for some of the more mundane parts of the new iphone app (News,
> Directory, Locations, etc).
> 
> Does anyone on this list have experience with marrying those two
> technologies? Most of our websites start at 75 hours and go up from there
> into the 600 hours range. (Think $7,500+ for our clients.)
> 
> When I estimate our time for an iPhone app, we're getting close to 130
> hours+ 
> 
> Does this sound right? Do you think your clients would pay for iphone apps
> in the $13,000+ range? To be honest, this feels high. But with very little
> experience in the iPhone app world, this may be low.
> 
> My apologies if this message somehow violates the protocol for asking these
> kinds of prices. I'm not looking for someone to do the work, I'm just
> looking for some feedback who do this work as well.
> 
> Josh
> 
> 
> Josh Miller WEB / TECHNOLOGY DIRECTOR
> HAAN MARKETING+COMMUNICATIONS
> T  (765) 423-5470          123 North 8th Street
> F  (765) 742-2881          Lafayette, IN 47901
> www.haanmc.com
> -------------- next part --------------
> An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
> URL: http://lists.drupal.org/pipermail/consulting/attachments/20100618/094427a8/attachment.html 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> consulting mailing list
> consulting at drupal.org
> http://lists.drupal.org/mailman/listinfo/consulting
> 
> 
> End of consulting Digest, Vol 53, Issue 15
> ******************************************