Open Questions
Is Haiti the first release partner? Guam or Haiti – focus on both initially
What is the timeline?
Who can address this from Testing? Answer: Diarmid
Who is our point person on implementation (Global Rollout)? No single point person. Seeking a contact
Who is our point person for legal? Lee Brody
UX
Ali Raizin has started thinking about this. There seem to be four broad buckets:
Minimal co-branding
Country name in app name
Country or government name and logo on splash page, on start page, in design template
Content delta(s)
Release partners likely to request changes to the base copy in the app
translations
additions, subtractions, changes
Custom (added) content
Ideally minimal.
Might include resource links or phone numbers
Might include text or other resource content
(Only necessary when the existing health authority news feed won’t suffice.)
Marketing / Promotion
Customized App Store and Google Play branding/text
Legal Issues
Implementation
Handling submission officially
Ask: “Please ensure that legally we have a person who is submitting on behalf of the nation?
'Whatever whitelabel mvp we can create and help distribute, the app needs to legally be from the country we are supporting the app release from. So, we either need to support the country in creating account et et. Or we need to have some legal document that we can act on the nations behalf.””
Background
Ensuring the Credibility of Health & Safety Information
March 14, 2020
The App Store should always be a safe and trusted place for users to download apps. Now more than ever that commitment takes on special significance as the world fights the COVID-19 pandemic. Communities around the world are depending on apps to be credible news sources — helping users understand the latest health innovations, find out where they can get help if needed or provide assistance to their neighbors.
To help fulfill these expectations, we're evaluating apps critically to ensure data sources are reputable and that developers presenting these apps are from recognized entities such as government organizations, health-focused NGOs, companies deeply credentialed in health issues, and medical or educational institutions. Only developers from one of these recognized entities should submit an app related to COVID-19. Entertainment or game apps with COVID-19 as their theme will not be allowed.
We understand the need to get these apps into the hands of customers as soon as possible. We encourage developers that meet this criteria to select “Time-Sensitive Event” on the expedite request form to ensure prioritized review since App Store review may take longer.
If you are developing an app on behalf of a client, please advise your client to add you to the development team of their Apple Developer account. If your client does not yet have an Apple Developer account, they can enroll in the Apple Developer Program. Nonprofit organizations, accredited educational institutions, and government entities that plan to distribute only free apps on the App Store can request to have their annual membership fee waived, if based in an eligible country.
https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=03142020a
If national entity has its own app store presence(s) already
Get added (temporarily) as an authorized developer and sign and submit the app for them
Walk their IT staff through signing and submission
If national entity does not have its own app store presence(s) already
Offer to set them up for them
Walk their IT staff through setting up an app store accounts
What is a “Branding” at code level?
TBD, but assume some defined set of files, to include
logo
app name
any replacement text
defined set of languages supported.
Ideally we would have a repository of brandings, under version control.
Plus a pipeline that takes a new Safe Paths build, and for each branding under version control, creates branded versions of the App (APK / IPA files), ready for use in testing.
TBD whether this repository & pipeline belongs as part of the Safe Paths repo, or is external to that maintained & PM’d bey a different team. Probably makes sense for repo structure to match org structure - which I thinks points to this being external to the App.
However there are likely synergies, but also possibly tensions, with how we manage translations for text in the App, particularly when a partner wants to modify substantial parts of the text in the App and do so in multiple languages - this may point to tighter coupling with the main App codebase.
Testing
There are 2 key concerns for our internal Test team
Are the branding process & pipelines fit for purpose? Is it well-documented, usable etc.?
Actually testing the branded versions of the apps, ahead of use by a customer.
It is likely that as we get comfortable with the process, we will get a sense of where the key risks lie in Branding, and be able to tailorr the testing under 2 to just focus on these risk areas, rather than having to retest the whole app. In the short term, while we are still developing this understanding, we should expect to perform a pretty comprehensive test of the first few branded apps.
We also need to consider how the custmer will test their branded version.
For Android, we can distribute APKs
For Apple, we will presumably need to use TestFlight. Some thought needed to make that work.
(maybe we should put a “rough”version of the branded app - maybe not even branded at all yet - into the App store submission immediately at the start of the process, to reduce delays later)
Operationalizing the Pipeline
We will need clear definitions for the customer regarding:
What they can brand
What they can’t brand
What assets they must provide for the things they want to brand, and what formats are acceptable (SVG, hi-red bitmaps etc.)
In the short term, the key for efficiency will be precisely defining this set of information/assets, so we can collect with minimal iterations.
Manual collection of these assets (and manual check-in into the Repo) is probably acceptable in the near-term, at least for the first few brandings. More automation here starts to be necessary as we move into 10s of brandings.
Assumptions / Restrictions
Selection of Health Authorities will be as per the standard app, with all HAs available for subscription, and recommendations/auto-subscriptions made based on location, rather than based on branding.
We won’t offer any means of pre-provisioning HAs, or restrcting access to other HAs.
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