Your app is crashing on various devices. How will you tackle this sudden surge of issues?

Immediate Response: Alert Monitoring: Ensure that your monitoring systems are alerting the team about the crashes. Communicate with Users: Inform users that you are aware of the issue and are working on a fix through in-app notifications, social media, and app store announcements. Crash Reporting: Analyze Crash Reports: Use crash reporting tools like Firebase Crashlytics, Sentry, or Bugsnag to gather detailed crash reports. Identify Patterns: Look for common patterns in the crashes, such as specific devices, OS versions, or app actions. Replicate the Issue: Use Emulators and Real Devices: Test on emulators and real devices to cover a wider range of scenarios.

Absolutely, data is paramount. I would ensure that comprehensive crash reporting is in place using tools like Firebase Crashlytics or Sentry. These tools provide real-time insights and detailed logs, helping to identify patterns and trends. In addition to the device and OS information, I would also look at the state of the app just before the crash (e.g., user actions, active sessions, etc.). This holistic approach often reveals more than just the surface-level crash data.

Start by identifying if the crash is happening only on iOS or ADR or both, across a specific device etc. Then move on to see if the crash is happening on the latest release candidate that was made available for users. See if the crash can be reproduced to gather exact steps to reproduce. Start further root cause analysis by reviewing the code to see if recent changes are affecting the feature that is crashing. Is it app code or api or 3rd party integration. Understanding this is important as it allows ownership for triaging. Additional use customer feedback or reviews to get more data. See if it is affecting business/revenue. Work with engineering and business to see if a rollback can be released or if a fix can be made to minimize impact.

Data is the raw material for the crashes in mobile apps. if not, integrate the crash reporting tool into your app. Consider it to high-priority. This will give you insightful data on the crash with code snippets and the exact cause of the crash.

Thoroughly reviewing the code is crucial. I would prioritize areas that have undergone recent changes, but also pay close attention to any critical or complex sections of the codebase. Utilizing static code analysis tools like SonarQube can help detect potential issues such as memory leaks or improper API usage. Additionally, reviewing error logs and stack traces from crash reports can point directly to the problematic code.

Your pull request or merge request must be reviewed by your peers before merging them. You can also implement AI tools that review the code and give insights on loopholes, breaking/infinite loops, and code suggestions for improvements.

In addition to the testing methods mentioned, I would employ automated testing tools like Appium for mobile apps to simulate various scenarios and edge cases. Continuous Integration (CI) tools like Jenkins can help run these tests automatically with every code change, ensuring that issues are caught early. Testing on a range of real devices is indispensable, as emulators can sometimes miss hardware-specific issues.

QA must be done for all the features or modules before going to release. from the development side, developers should ensure all the test cases of unit tests and integration tests. UI and navigation flow should be tested on various screen sizes and devices. Emulators and Simulators can help with this.

Provide an option to the users in an app to report a crash with screenshots, videos, and a description field where they can write the execution steps. This will give the proper insights to the developer of every crash reported by users. Plan to fix them on the next release.

User feedback is invaluable. I would create a streamlined process for users to report crashes, perhaps integrating a feedback mechanism directly within the app. Using tools like UserVoice or Zendesk can help manage and analyze this feedback effectively. Engaging users through forums or social media can also provide additional insights and help in understanding the context of crashes better.

Post-deployment, I would use application performance management (APM) tools like New Relic or Dynatrace to monitor the app continuously. These tools not only track crashes but also monitor app performance metrics such as response times, throughput, and error rates. This proactive monitoring helps in identifying and resolving issues before they affect a large user base.

Regular updates are a must. Implementing a structured release cycle with beta testing can help catch issues before a full rollout. Using feature flags can allow for gradual rollouts and quick rollback if new problems are detected. Keeping dependencies up-to-date and following the latest best practices in development helps in maintaining app stability and performance.

Code Reviews: Regular peer reviews can catch issues that automated tools might miss. User Analytics: Integrate user analytics to understand user behavior and identify potential problematic patterns leading to crashes. Documentation: Maintain thorough documentation of known issues and troubleshooting steps, which can speed up the debugging process. Team Communication: Ensure that the team is well-coordinated, possibly using project management tools like Jira or Trello to track crash-related tasks and progress.