You sir are single-handedly disposing of many blockers we had from upgrading!
Really appreciate your tireless efforts
And BetterLogic has also just been transfered to me by Patrick, we had a nice call about it!
So, BetterLogic will also be updated to SDK3!
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indeed!
To bad for him he’s no longer allowed to take holidays as he needs to support these apps!
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Indeed, the community loves you @Arie_J_Godschalk!
Betterlogic was on my list of hope-to get-it-supported too!
But indeed; how will you support all these apps in the future? Or will you transfer them back (or to other developers) after upgrading to SDK3?
It somehow frightens me too: what if, for whatever reason, you are not able or willing work on Homey apps anymore? I hope not for you of course, but then a whole lot of app get unsupported at once…
@Henk_Renting I think more developers have multiple apps in the app store (i’m on 19 now). Personally I think it’s better to have a single developer have multiple apps instead of multiple developers which don’t maintain it.
But that’s the risk of community developers right 
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Well, i currently “only” took over 3 apps: Chronograph, Virtual Devices and now BetterLogic.
CountDown i didn’t take over, i just helped Ralf van Dooren (finish) the update to SDK3.
I also offered that to Patrick, but he just haven’t got time, so he prefered to transfer the app.
But i do understand your issue, and let’s forget for a moment about unwillingness (but yeah, that even happens sometimes), what if i get hit by a bus f.i.?
I do have all my sourcecodes open in one place, for everyone to see in and copy:
https://bitbucket.org/QlusterIT/
But, personally, i think Athom /@Emile should add a clause for App developers to agree to, about mantaining there app or transfering them.
I know this would not be easy to get right, but there must be a solution to get users some peace of mine, imho!
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But what about the apps where it’s not possible to contact the developer, because there is no contact option on the app page, or the developer does not respond to contact requests?
Or do Athom has the possibility to contact every developer? I guess not.
I guess the idea is that Athom should add a clause that when a developer can’t be reached (within a certain amount of time), their app(s) will be removed from the App Store.
Which seems rather strange to me, because it might still work perfectly fine.
(and no, Athom cannot decide on behalf of a non-responding developer that their app should be transferred to someone else).
Exactly this. I have one app that is made by a developer that hasn’t answered or done anything for over a year. Athom said they can’t transfer it because the developer needs to agree… A new app which does the same won’t be allowed in the app store. So, in the end nothing happens.
Not removed, but maintained by someone else.
Athom has the sourcecodes. And there mailadressen.
And, there could be a digital-agreement signed when first uploading apps to the store, for example (just a example): If app developers do not react to mails for a few months or something like that, there starts a time period with warnings or something, that the app will be transfered in x amount of time of no reaction is provided.
I mean, common, we now don’t even know if an app developer might actually have past away!
And, no, i would like it if my apps got transfered to someone else without me doing it. So there must be enough time and effort in reaching out.
But if all fails, user should have the (slight) security that apps at least will remain, also with SDK updates.
That’s my opinion as developer and user.
I know it would be a difficult think to get right, so Athom, Developers and Customers/users are all satisfied.
Which app?
Athom is not the owner or copyright holder of the code, so they can’t legally transfer it to someone else.
Developers can’t sign over their apps to Athom either, because practically every app uses external code that they don’t hold the copyright over.
That’s the FireAngel one. Guy once said he’s too busy and that was it. But there are more, so I won’t pick on specific apps.
The thing is that by publishing it in the official app store there should be some clause that says Athom is allowed to transfer the app if the developer cannot be reached for a certain period (or something like that).
For all apps where that is true, the App developer also doesn’t hold the rights.
With the correct agreements needed to be signed to publish apps, this could easily be realized, imho.
I think the big issues for Athom is that it creates a wall for new developers to start creating apps.
But, where the rights belong to devs, they can be (required) to be given to Athom.
Where the dev (can) not hold the rights to the (full) app, it wouldn’t be an issue to have the same app published in the store but uploaded by another dev.
I think the easiest way to keep apps maintained, is to put your source code on github or something else.
Co-developers can make a pull request to keep the app up-to-date
Never have this happen to my sourceodes.
And, if the app developer doesn’t respond, how will you get it in the Store?
They hold the rights to their own code, which already makes it a lot more difficult than you think. Using other people’s code (legally) does not invalidate the rights of the developer using that code.
You apparently have never been in a situation where you have to transfer IP rights to another party. It’s not easy.
You can’t transfer ownership and/or copyright just like that.
I would suggest reading a bit more on how copyrights work.
It all depends on the signed agreement.
I hardly ever own the rights to my own work, most of my customers own those rights.
No, it doesn’t. For one, if you want to prevent future issues it has to be notarised. You also need to be explicit on what exactly it is you transfer, which in the case of Homey apps means that some parts will fall under the agreement (the parts that the developer wrote) and some parts that won’t (open source and/or third party code), and again, those lists need to be explicit.
That’s by choice, then, because you have to be really explicit about it. Just that someone pays you to write code doesn’t mean they own the code or the copyright.
