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#cljsrn
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2017-12-14
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pesterhazy13:12:36

Any TestFlight ninjas around? Is there a way to publish an alternate branch of an app? The idea would be to build regular TestFlight builds continuously from master, whereas developers can choose to push an alternate branch to a TestFlight "branch" to test things out on device.

vikeri13:12:06

If you use fastlane you can deploy to a specific group using fastlane pilot distribute

pesterhazy13:12:39

I do use fastlane of course

pesterhazy13:12:00

that looks good. do you have a pointer to docs?

vikeri13:12:22

This is completely undocumented… But I can show you what I got working

pesterhazy13:12:35

that'd be fantastic

vikeri13:12:57

fastlane pilot distribute --app_platform ios --distribute_external --changelog “Bug fixes” --group “The Testflight Group”

vikeri13:12:21

Unfortunately I can’t call that straight from within fastlane. Maybe my Ruby fu is letting me down but I couldn’t get a straight answer after posting an issue

pesterhazy13:12:58

let me see if I understand this

pesterhazy13:12:17

so you make a separate group - say, "Canary"

pesterhazy13:12:34

whoever wants to check out Canary builds gets added to that group

pesterhazy13:12:49

when you upload, you upload via --group Canary

pesterhazy13:12:09

the build shows up only for testers in that group

pesterhazy13:12:18

is that correct?

pesterhazy13:12:48

as a tester can you distinguish Canary builds from Mainline builds in the TF app?

vikeri13:12:52

I actually don’t know if you can choose or if you can belong to different groups. But other than that yes. I’m no expert though.

pesterhazy13:12:31

sounds like groups are the way to go

pesterhazy13:12:54

I'm gonna give this a try

pesterhazy13:12:58

& report back

vikeri13:12:41

:thumbsup:

pesterhazy14:12:08

I've said it before and I'll say it again - itunes connect's UI is a disaster

vikeri14:12:18

Haha, tell me about it… Lucky that the API is so awesome troll

pesterhazy14:12:29

not for the itunes connect users

vikeri14:12:48

Ok, too bad. I guess ad-hoc distributions could possibly help? Then you’d have to setup your own delivery setup though

pesterhazy14:12:53

this articles is the best I could find on the recent "multiple builds" feature: http://blog.mallow-tech.com/2017/04/new-features-updated-in-testflight/

wojciech15:12:29

@U06F82LES A walkaround (that I wouldn't recommend) is to become an external tester on a new apple ID. You can use multiple IDs on a single devices, it's just a big hassle. I currently have 5 Apple IDs…

pesterhazy16:12:44

@U3D2K2D55 I see I'm not the only one running into this limitation

pesterhazy16:12:12

I'd be fine with getting a 2nd apple id for myself but I don't want to make all our testers, PMs etc do that

wojciech18:12:56

True, that's a hack

wojciech18:12:23

Keep in mind there are also alternative way of distributing builds. You don't have to use Test Flight. I'll be looking into Code Push literally tomorrow and let you know

pesterhazy10:12:41

Good point https://docs.fastlane.tools/getting-started/ios/beta-deployment/ lists the following alternatives: CrashLytics, HockeyApp and TestFairy