Introduction
In my last article we saw the Life Cycle of a Windows Store application. In this article we will see some important guidelines to pass the Windows Store certification. If you are a Windows Store application developer and planning to develop any Windows Store app then you need take these points into consideration while posting your app in the Windows Store.
As all of you know, if we want to post our application in the Windows Store (I explained about the Windows Store in my first article) then our application must pass the test given by Microsoft to be shown in the Windows Store. In this article we will see those useful points we need take into consideration to pass the Windows Store app certification. So let's get ready.
1. Value to customer
- Our Windows Store application must provide unique, creative value to our customer.
- Functional Application: When you are submitting your application in the Windows Store then I must remind you that your application must be fully functional and working correctly. It must not have any kind of programming errors that causes your user to feel uncomfortable when using your application.
- Trial Functionality: If you are providing any trial version of your application then you must disable some of the features of your application. When the user purchases the application from the Windows Store then you must enable those features.
- Only One Tile: As we discussed tiles in my last article, every application must have tiles to denote your application in Windows 8. When the user installs your application on their systems then your application must display only one tile at a time. After installing and on user demand you can create secondary tiles but not initially when your application is being installed.
2. Advertisements
- Not Only ads: You can display ads in your application but note that your application must not contain only ads, it must also contain some useful functionality.
- Ads must not be displayed in the application description, tiles, and app bar etc.
3. Behavior
- Windows Runtime API: While developing your Windows Store application keep in mind that your application must use only the Windows runtime API and does not communicate with another local Desktop application or Windows service.
- Errors/Crash: Before posting your application to the Windows Store, properly test your application and ensure that it will not stop responding or unexpectedly shut down. This may lead to failure of your Windows app certification.
- User Experience: As we all are aware of technology. A different user uses a different kind of technology on their system. For example the variance of processors provide varying user experiences on various processors. While posting your application in the Windows Store post a different app for each processor.
- Updating: If in the future you are updating your Windows Store application then while updating make sure that existing functionality has not been removed from the application. You can change the existing features for your application to some extent but cannot remove that specific feature from the application.
- Input Support: While posting your Windows Store application in the Windows Store make sure that your application supports various input devices or methods to work with. It is the compulsion in the Windows Store app developer that his app must support touch input, mouse/stylus and keyboard devices.
- Performance: Before posting your application in the Windows Store make sure that your application launches in a maximum of 5 seconds or less and suspends in 2 seconds or less on low-power computers.
- Minimum Requirements: Before posting your application in the Windows Store make sure that you have provided all the information about required software and hardware to the user. If you did not provided any information about those software and hardware requirements then while executing your application on the user's system at that time if any feature is not supported due to minimum requirement then provide the user friendly messages to the user.
4. Customer in Control
- Privacy Statement: If your Windows Store application uses a network connection and transfers the data or any user personal information to other sources then your application must have a privacy statement.
- Permission from User: As we discussed above, your application must have a privacy statement if it posts any data to other sources. If you are transferring user personal data to a third party or some social sites then before doing that you must get permission from the user.
- Respecting system setting: While developing your Windows Store application your application must respect the system settings. For example if the user disables notification for your application or for the system and you are sending some notification from WNS or any other sources in this case your app must have to be functional.
- Metered Network: If, in your application, you are providing upload/download functionality then you must consider using a metered network which has limited data transfer. Before doing this kind of task in your application then first take a permission from user to complete this task or not.
- Transactions/ Payments: If your Windows Store application contains any functionality like online payment/transactions then while doing this you have to clearly state who is the responsible person for this transaction.
5. Identification
- Unique Name: Your Windows Store application must have a unique name that means it can be identified easily. You can provide additional name in other languages also but those must be unique.
- Technical Support: While posting your application to the Windows Store, keep in mind that Microsoft will not provide any technical support for your application; you are singly responsible for providing the technical support for your application.
Conclusion
Here I'm stopping this discussion about the requirements for obtaining Windows Store app certification. I hope you will keep these things in mind while posting your application to the Windows Store.