How do you manage your app collection?

Discussion in 'General Game Discussion and Questions' started by spyky, Nov 4, 2010.

  1. spyky

    spyky Well-Known Member

    Oct 18, 2010
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    I'm sorry if this has been posted before, please point me up to any existing discussion if it exists!

    How do you guys manage your collection of apps and games? After purchasing many apps as well as downloading hundreds of those "limited time free" apps, my iTunes is now slow and buggy and lags worse than a snail, especially when choosing apps to sync. Not to mention trying to click update all apps is almost impossible (>200 updates and always fails). And after months of using both my desktop and laptop AND a friend's computer followed by multiple computer reformats, I'm quite sure I have many forgotten good apps/games.

    I've way too many itunes "Receipts", and going through them all seems like a slow and tedious process.

    So the question is, how do you guys manage your collection? Do you stash the IPA files away from iTunes to make it perform better? Do you keep an excel sheet of downloaded apps? Or do you just finish a game and permanently forget it?
     
  2. dyscode

    dyscode Well-Known Member

    Apr 11, 2010
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    I just crossed the 1000 Apps mark which equals about 26GB of data.
    I just a few days ago took the pain of going thru my email receipts and turn them in an excel sheet.

    of of these apps are ´active´ in my iTunes lib. But also I check daily for updates.
    I always think about slimming the lib out, but then I cannot keep track
    of what´s going on. Sometimes a dev comes back to their old app and submitt an update that makes it actually playable or something.

    Some optimization or categorization in iTunes would def. be nice.
    Even a simple Star-rating system like with the music files would be nice.

    But I guess for now there is only the hard way to manage them.
     
  3. backtothis

    backtothis im in ur base killin ur d00dz
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    Jul 13, 2009
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    I've deleted every free app besides 3 and my library totals 489 right now, about 37gb of data..I have 234 games on my actual 32gb 4th gen, but yeah..I've played about 30 of them.
     
  4. thumbs07

    thumbs07 Well-Known Member

    Jul 20, 2010
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    I have them in categories :D If they don't make the category they go off the device or into a redundant folder.
     
  5. Chocolate

    Chocolate Well-Known Member

    Jan 10, 2010
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    Apple unfortunately provides very poor (and that's being nice) app management.

    There really is no good way to do it (maybe there is if you JB, I wouldn't know since I'm not JB).

    I have over 1100 apps (most were free of course, thanks to appshopper) and yeah, itunes is laggy as hell when scrolling thru the list to choose what to sync. It's completely horrible. And why can't we pick apps to sync from the regular apps list?!

    iTunes is so horribly archaic. It's like Apple thinks people only have a few dozen apps at most. It too them a while to realize gaming is actually something do on this platform. I guess it'll take them a few years to realize many people collect tons of apps after a while.
     
  6. 270Kp

    270Kp Well-Known Member

    Oct 27, 2009
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    I have my games into two folders, games and apps. About 150 games, and 20 apps. I use FolderEnhancer off of cydia.
     
  7. Coldar

    Coldar Well-Known Member

    Dec 26, 2008
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    I keep all my receipts on file labeled per year on a few folders. I've done this since buying my first game/song/app. I know they are also on file in iTunes but like to keep my own.
    I've never totaled any for fear of what I've truly spent.

    As for the apps on the device I label each according to genre (as most probably do) and have a "Worthy" folders for ones that don't fit into those categories and keep a lite folder for any lite games I'm trying out and all secondary games are on the full pages behind the folders page.

    So far this has been the most effect way of managing my receipts/apps.:)
     
  8. spidey

    spidey Well-Known Member

    Jun 24, 2010
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    Well, for starters, I have now stopped downloading every game which becomes free. Next, I deleted every app that had not held my interest. I am down to 200 from around 600. For the apps that I have, I have category based folders. It's still cumbersome. The final answer as of now has been to not keep apps that are not going to be used for that "just in case" reason.
     
  9. sammysin

    sammysin Well-Known Member

    Feb 23, 2010
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    Just like my closet. I collect junk for months and one day get sick of seeing it, so decide to have a clean out that takes hours and almost kills me.
     
  10. dyscode

    dyscode Well-Known Member

    Apr 11, 2010
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    Yes that "just in case"-Issue is the real problem here!

    Maybe i would also be able to cut down to 200 or so. But the problem is I don´t know which games I like later.
    I ONLY download what I find interesting. Even if it´s free!!!
    And still I amassed such an amount of apps.

    One possibility could be you can remove Apps from the lib display panel and still have them in your library, so you just don´t see them anymore.

    But if I remove them I never play them.
    And I also NEVER keep LITE versions for long.
     
  11. spidey

    spidey Well-Known Member

    Jun 24, 2010
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    #11 spidey, Nov 4, 2010
    Last edited: Nov 4, 2010
    One more rather drastic solution is to NOT visit appshopper. Because here in TA they keep updating the good games that go free so you do not miss it. Yes, you might risk a free or sale pick of a good game because TA has not covered it... but the good thing is you won't have to fight the temptation of not downloading all those free games that appshopper tells you about.

    Edit: Forget I ever said that! Just picked up Chop Chop Soccer courtesy appshopper! :)
     
  12. drelbs

    drelbs Well-Known Member

    Jun 25, 2009
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    Hehe, I've gotten to to the point where it takes something interesting for me to download a free app. (And I love AppShopper, BTW! ;))

    3180 apps in my library - I don't update via iTunes anymore - I check for updates for apps on my iPhone, then download those via iTunes.

    It used to be that if I deleted an app while my iPod or iPhone was synced to iTunes that it would get removed from the list of apps to sync, but now it doesn't seem to do that anymore - now apps are re-downloading, I have to either uncheck the boxes by hand (which also fails sometimes.) I think it has to do with the fact that I'm using an iPhone now and sometimes syncs get interrupted by calls. :confused:
     
  13. araczynski

    araczynski Well-Known Member

    Oct 5, 2009
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    omaha, ne
    i know the feelings here. I have about about a 1000 games on my iPad64 (about 11gigs left).

    the folder functionality in ios4 is at best 'tolerable' for use on my itouch32, i mean at least i can browse through everything that's on there eventually, without having to guess letters and see what they pull up.

    hoping things improve when ipad gets ios4.2, maybe some kind of better folder management.

    i despise itunes itself, the program is obviously developed by a group that has no clue as to how to develop for windows (not sure if the mac version is any better with a ton of apps though).

    so basically, for now, i transfer purchases from the ipad to the main pc where i also sync, but usually avoid synching, since it seems to want to occasionally uninstall ipad apps during synching. i have to keep an eye out on the progress bar and make sure its not doing something i don't want it to.

    postponing grouping/pruning till folders are available.

    although i do delete demos all the time. i would like to be able to force myself to only keep ipad/universal apps on the ipad, and iphone games on the itouch, but ever since getting the ipad, i've hated playing anything on the itouch, just seems too ridiculously small to enjoy any longer.

    at least it makes it easier to ignore iphone/retina only releases. i just think "whatever, i'll wait for an ipad version or till this hits 0.99/free on the iphone".

    if folders in ios4.2 for the ipad is as weak as ios4 for the iphone, i'll probably look into jailbreaking, getting tired of the "we know what's good for you" attitude from apple.
     
  14. wootbean

    wootbean Well-Known Member

    Feb 8, 2009
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    the next whiskey bar
    I hide them all with sbsettings except the one I'm playing now
     
  15. Googlyhead

    Googlyhead Well-Known Member

    Nov 19, 2008
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    Can't answer that question - I gave up trying!

    Yes, i'm also over the 1k mark, they won't all fit on my iPhone even if there's nothing else on it! I also have an iPad and touch which I'd love to keep in sync, but as the iPad isn't @v4 yet it's not possible.

    It's annoying that app data (ie. game saves) isn't retained in iTunes, nor sync'd across devices. Just sort that out, and it's instantly easier to add and remove apps as required.

    Also; why are folders specific to a device? You should be able to group and organise in iTunes, and have the arrangement retained in a similar way to the playlists. Let's call it an applist, and then you can select which to sync to any device...
     
  16. Enco

    Enco Well-Known Member

    Oct 8, 2010
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    This!

    Please Apple, fix this!
     
  17. f e a r l e s s

    f e a r l e s s Well-Known Member

    Mar 12, 2009
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    AppShopper is THE best way to keep track of your inventory. I just wish the app had ratings like the website. I even keep 1 star apps backed up just incase an update comes out.
     
  18. backtothis

    backtothis im in ur base killin ur d00dz
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    Jul 13, 2009
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    I can't wait for when itunes allows us to have folders...ugh
     
  19. drelbs

    drelbs Well-Known Member

    Jun 25, 2009
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    There is some hope for this - File Sharing in iTunes allows you to put data in and retrieve data from apps. So far I mostly use it for Music apps (and iDos ;)) but The Quest allows you download your saves (extra points - these files work with the PC and other versions of The Quest!)

    If all apps did this, I could take my save game off and delete the app, then recover it properly if I wanted to.
     
  20. Qordobo

    Qordobo Well-Known Member

    Jun 11, 2010
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    #20 Qordobo, Nov 5, 2010
    Last edited: Nov 5, 2010
    I don't see how it can be the best, "My Apps" section is just a basic list and scrolling it is a pain because each time you need click to dowload the next 20.

    I have started using a Calc but yes it's a pain. Here what I'm trying to do, I have a calc of buy and continue maintain it separately.

    Then I have this new calc for worthy app. Each time I remove an app, I have answer the question, is it worthy or not. In case I doubt I consider it worthy. So when the game i am removing is worthy I add it in the calc with some information:
    • Name of the game
    • Dev or Publisher
    • Tech Type (iPad/Universal/iPhone)
    • Game Type 1 (Platformer/RPG/Race/Adventure/Puzzle/TD/and so on)
    • Game Type 2 (A subtype of type 1)
    • View Mode (Top Down/Iso/From Behind/First Person/Over the Shoulder/and so on)
    • Main Control Mode (Touch/Swipe/Pad/Stick/Dual Stick/Tilt/And so on)
    • Rate from 1 to 5 (knowing it can be approximative or unfair it's just a little clue for me)
    • Online user id/pw used if any
    • A short comment for some games.
    For now I'm cleaning my iPad and each game I delete and consider worthy I add it in the Calc. The good point of doing it with the game deleting is if I don't care much to lost local saves then it's much more easy to delete a game from my iPad, at least I won't lost track of it thanks to the Calc. So I answer a first question: Is it worthy? If no then delete. If yes I have to answer two questions: Am I playing it or have to do it asap? Can I lost local saves or scores? If both answers are no, then add in calc and delete.

    Wish me good luck. :D
     

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