How to distribute iPhone application among 50 specific users?

Question

I am developing an iPhone application which I need to distribute to an organization of about approximately 50 people, no. of users can increase or decrease in future.

I checked my iPhone developer account, there I got that I can distribute my application via Adhoc Distribution up to 100 iPhone or iPod touch users. So I think it should be best way to distribute my application to that XYZ organization.

On further searching I found that there is also an - iPhone Developer Enterprise Program, which is available to companies with 500 or more employees and a Dun & Bradstreet number.

So I want to know - which will be the best way for me according to my requirements ?

Also I want to know that say if I choose Adhoc distribution then is there any way for automatic up-gradation in it ie. to install new version of my application on user's iPhone or iPod without deleting the old version.

Thanks,

Miraaj

Answer 1

If you do not have something seriously wrong with your persistence frameworks, than you should be able to upgrade the app on devices, while retaining the data just by providing the users with a new version of the .ipa file.

Ad-hoc seems to match your needs best, but remember, that you will have to get the UUID of all 50 iPhones the app will be installed on. A bit tedious and time-consuming. Enterprise would be better in that respect, but you might not be able to qualify for it. It's also extra expensive.

I am not surer what you mean by deleting the old one. If you want to have multiple versions of the app available on a device, they will not be automatically updatable and data sharing will be very complicated. Ad-hoc might be about your best option.