Buttons that do not do anything and approval process

I have a question for the iPhone Development community. I am currently building my first app, and on two of my views I have some buttons. Sales and Marketing have requested that these buttons do nothing and have the title of “Feature Available in Pro Version” or have a title of an application but when touched, an UIAlertView is displayed stating “Feature Available in Pro Version”.

First off, I think this is wrong from a user interface and experience. Secondly and more importantly, I think this will cause a denial when I finish the application and send the app in to the App Store for approval. I have look into the iOS Human Interface Guidelines and really can not find whether this will be an issue or not. I would like to tell Sale and Market开发者_运维百科ing that their request is stupid and will not get the application approved and they need to stick to their jobs and quit trying to play programmer.

Any comments would be greatly appreciate.

Quoting http://developer.apple.com/news/ios/appstoretips/

Only display the UI for what your "Lite" version will do. Grayed out menu commands, "more track/car choices" you can see but not select, etc. makes your "Lite" version feel more like a commercial than a product, and an annoying and ineffective one at that.

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It's important to follow these simple rules not only to create a better user experience, but also because your app will be returned to you by the App Review Team for modification if it is found to have time limits, incomplete functionality, or disabled functionality.

Come up with some better options for your clients. They are not trying to "play programmer", they are trying to market their product. Also, try to mitigate the risk of the app being rejected by getting it in a submittable state as soon as possible, or at least make sure that you have a plan B for the things that you suspect might fail to get approved.

It sounds like you're just looking for a stick to beat your sales and marketing team with - there are quite a few apps out there in the wild that exhibit precisely this behaviour, painful though this might be to you. (The buttons do something after all - they show a dialog.)

That said, it's hard to recommend a more pleasant alternative without knowing more about your app. (Does it have the concept of "levels" for example? If so, you could replace the buttons with a nicer "purchase the full app to unlock additional levels" style message.)

I am pretty sure this never used to be allowed. If you show user interface elements they have to be fully functional. I don't know in which document or agreement this is stated, though.

It also may not cause your app to be rejected, at least not initially. The app may be removed from the store at a later date, though.

Apple has been known to quickly reject apps for non-functional or grayed-out buttons, especially if these non-functional UI elements are just to advertise Full or Pro versions in Lite apps.

Apple has also been known to approve apps with a non-functional button or two (happened to one of my apps, got a bug report several weeks after the app had become available in the App store), but this is probably due to oversight, and not a policy that anyone should count on.

If you want an advertisement for your Pro version, make it look and act like a standard in-app advertisement, and not a misleading UI element. Serving house ads, or mostly (99%) house ads is a widely done practice.