Shipping Notifications Without Asking First — Provisional Authorization in Rork Apps, and the Expo Snippet That Quietly Undoes It
iOS lets you start delivering notifications with no permission dialog at all, via provisional authorization. The catch: expo-notifications reports granted as false for provisional devices, so the registration snippet in Expo's own docs re-requests permission and fires the very dialog you were avoiding. Here's why granted lies, a hook that models authorization as five states, how to write notifications for quiet delivery, when to ask for the upgrade, and how to keep provisional out of your CTR.
The Three-Minute Video That Kept Failing — Moving Rork's Gemini Uploads Off the Worker
How I rerouted video uploads to the Gemini Files API from a Cloudflare Workers relay to a direct device-to-Google path — why the 128MB isolate limit breaks the relay, how to hand out a resumable upload URL without leaking your API key, what Expo SDK 54 broke on the device side, and how the 20GB project ceiling and media resolution decide the bill.
When a Poisoned Cache Crashes Your App on Every Launch — Designing a Safe-Mode Boot Your Users Can Escape On Their Own
When a persisted cache goes bad and the app crashes at the same spot on every launch, the only option left to the user is to reinstall. This article designs a safe-mode boot for Expo (React Native): the app counts its own early crashes, confirms a launch only once it becomes interactive, and resets just the dangerous state in graduated steps.
Building a Developer Debug Menu Into Your Rork App — Verify Ads, Purchases, and Remote Config Before Release
A production-safe developer debug menu for Rork apps — switch environments, force test ads, simulate entitlements, and override Remote Config, with working TypeScript code and the pitfalls I hit running six apps.
Tracking Down BGTaskScheduler.submit Error Code=1 (Unavailable) in Rork iOS Apps
When BGTaskScheduler.submit returns Error Code=1, the cause space is finite — six of them. Covers telling Code=1 from Code=3, the identifier trap in Expo-based Rork apps, submitting from a widget extension by mistake, and a getPendingTaskRequests self-check.
Auditing Privacy Manifests for Rork-Generated Expo Apps — A One-Day Pre-Submission Workflow for Indie Developers
A pre-submission workflow for indie developers shipping Rork-generated Expo apps: enumerate every dependency, tell ITMS-91053 apart from ITMS-91061, and catch the Pods that npm names never show you — hermes included.
Fixing 0x8badf00d Watchdog Kills That Wipe Out Rork Apps at Launch
Your Rork iOS app dies right after launch on real devices, but never on your bench. Crashlytics shows exception code 0x8badf00d. Here is how to read the exact watchdog budget out of the crash log and rearrange your launch path so it stops.
Keeping Rork Apps Fresh While Closed — iOS BGTaskScheduler, Silent Push, and Android WorkManager
Silent Pushes that never arrive. A BGTaskScheduler that stays quiet. This is how I pushed background refresh in a Rork-built app up to production quality on both iOS and Android — and what the success-rate numbers told me to fix first.
Adding Expo Dev Client to Your Rork App
Added a native module to a Rork app and Expo Go no longer opens it? Here is how to set up Expo Dev Client (a custom development build), including the prebuild trap, when a rebuild is needed, and how EAS Update fits in.
Rork's Free Plan and Free Trial — What You Actually Keep When the Credits Run Out
What ends a Rork free trial is messages, not days. Export while it is still free, verify it builds outside Rork with a small script, then decide about paying.
When Your Rork App Binary Tops 150MB: 5 Causes to Isolate and a Step-by-Step Slim-Down Plan
My Rork-built app archived at 180MB and App Store Connect stopped me cold. Here is how I broke the bloat into 5 measurable causes and got it down to 69MB — including the three cuts that backfired.
Integrating Siri and Shortcuts into Rork Apps: App Intents with Expo, Without the Pitfalls
A production-grade guide to adding Siri Shortcuts and App Intents to a React Native app generated by Rork. Bridge native Swift via an Expo Config Plugin, model AppShortcut / AppEntity / EntityQuery correctly, and ship Donations and Control Center widgets without breaking Apple's conventions.