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There are split opinions and contradictory information about TestFlight.

Some sources say you need to go through the old AdHoc Distribution Process and TestFlight only collects UDIDs for you and then helps you spread your AdHoc Build. The same thing you could do with Email.

Other sources say:

Testflight allows you to simplify this process immensely. You just build a normal debug IPA and then put it on TestFlight. They have their own global provisioning profile the users install and run the app with. It's as seamless as mass testing on iPhone can be (Granted, that's not a high bar).

What's the truth? Do I need to mess with AdHoc and UDIDs myself, or is this part done by TestFlight? Do I need to make a normal Debug Build just as if I was building to test on my device, like the quote claims above?

According to this tutorial I do have to mess with the UDIDs myself. No mention of any fancy global Enterprise Profile of TestFlight. Limited to 100 devices.

How does it really work? And what's with that Enterprise signing myth? Can someone debunk that?

Community
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Proud Member
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  • Forget the "enterprise" thing, that's silly. The situation is **hugely confusing**. It works perfectly if you collect the UDIDs, and that adds the convenience of that page on TFA where it **shows you a list** of who's getting it. – Fattie Jun 08 '14 at 13:45
  • Test flight allows you to build you apps by using enterprise provisional profile as well. From their documentation: "When an app is built and needs to be sent out to multiple devices it needs to be built with a distribution provisioning profile (Ad Hoc or Enterprise)" http://help.testflightapp.com/customer/portal/articles/829857-how-do-i-prepare-a-build-for-distribution-through-testflight- it worked for me. – Amit Sep 16 '14 at 06:14

2 Answers2

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You have to mess with UDIDs.

In fact, TestFlight just reads the provisionning profile attached to the ipa you sent. Authorized devices are knwon thanks to that provisionning profile.

I usually use AdHoc profiles, but it should also work with development profiles.

NSZombie
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  • What's the difference between using AdHoc profiles and development profiles? I assume it is not good to use development profiles because you consume slots in your 100 development devices and you can't remove old ones for a year until you renew your developer account. So really it should be AdHoc, or shouldn't it? – Proud Member Apr 23 '12 at 15:41
  • Remember that you can create as many provisioning as you want, and each time you can add up to 100 devices. So there is not really any difference between the two. At first, AdHoc provisionings exist because you can install app via iTunes directly with the ipa, and you can't do this with a developer profile. – NSZombie Apr 23 '12 at 15:47
  • But there is a hard limit of 100 devices in iTunes connect or not? – Proud Member Apr 23 '12 at 15:49
  • Member center says : "Each Development Provisioning Profile will contain a set of iOS Development Certificates, Unique Device Identifiers and an App ID.". It means, one provisioning matches one app id, and one provisioning can have up to 100 devices. – NSZombie Apr 23 '12 at 15:52
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    Yes, but there's a total hard limit of 100 devices per year. – Proud Member Apr 24 '12 at 07:24
  • Did you figure out how is AdHoc working? I'm quite confused about it too. – RichX Jun 12 '12 at 06:16
  • Are you *sure* it works with development profiles too? [Testflight documentation says](http://help.testflightapp.com/customer/portal/articles/829857-how-do-i-prepare-a-build-for-distribution-through-testflight-) that "When you are ready to send out your application to other users **you must use an ad hoc or enterprise distribution provisioning profile**". – Jonik Jun 19 '13 at 14:19
  • I did not use TestFlight for a long time, maybe development profiles do not work anymore. Is there any reason why you can't produce an ad-hoc profile ? – NSZombie Sep 25 '13 at 13:17
  • Development profiles do work, but testflight will warn you when uploading the build. – Connor Pearson Oct 22 '14 at 15:36
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All that matters are that the UDIDs are on the profile that is used in the Archived build. Is it Developer or Distribution? It doesn't care. It does make it easier for you to be able to filter out who gets what build (i.e. only developers can get debugging builds whereas your larger team gets release builds).

SushiGrass Jacob
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