It Ran Fine in Debug, but the Release Build Died on Launch with a Resource Not Found. A File I Looked Up by Name Had Been Shrunk Away
A release-only crash at launch, caused by images and sounds looked up by a name string being removed by resource shrinking. A keep.xml written at prebuild, plus a post-build check that confirms it worked.
When Pasting the Submission Log Didn't Fix It, Read From the First Error, Not the Last Line
When a Rork App Store submission fails and pasting the log back to Rork keeps returning the same failure: a 40-line script that pulls out the first error, and how to match it against the four causes Rork's docs list.
Three checks to run before you ask the AI again about a black preview screen
When a fresh Rork preview opens to a black screen, split the problem into three layers — device, rendering, native — before sending the same fix request again.
When EXPO_PUBLIC_ Values Read Fine in Dev but Come Back undefined in Production: Telling the Spellings Apart
The API URL reads fine while developing and turns undefined once the app is built. The cause was how process.env was written. I lined up babel-preset-expo's output for dev and production and tabulated which spellings get replaced and which are left behind.
When adjustsFontSizeToFit Shrinks Just One Row, Suspect the Box Height, Not the String
Only the 10th row of a list drops to 4pt on iOS, though the data and strings are fine. I read the Yoga rounding and font-fit sources, then counted how often the box comes up short in Node.
When Only EAS Build Fails with "No matching variant", Check Your Local android/build First
Gradle passes on your machine, but the Android build on EAS stops at "No matching variant of project". Reading the reports on GitHub, I traced how a Windows-generated autolinking cache can reach the Linux builder, and wrote a small script that checks for it before you queue a build.
App Review Says "Guideline 2.1, Blank Screen": Three Places to Look in an Expo Release Build
It opens fine in TestFlight, yet review rejects it for a blank screen. Here is the order I check things in an Expo + EAS release build: which environment holds your variables, secret visibility during config resolution, and what the reviewer's device does differently.
When only notifications fail in Expo Go: three checks, then the shortest move to a development build
If push notifications never reach your Android device in Expo Go, check these three things before touching device settings, then move to a development build with the fewest steps. Also: how to spot what else Expo Go can't test.
Japanese Headings Won't Turn Bold on Android: How to Trace and Fix a fontWeight That Does Nothing
A troubleshooting note for Rork apps where headings look bold on iPhone but stay thin on Android. How to tell the symptoms apart, pick weights through fontFamily, and verify the fix.
A build that stops with exit code 0 — the flag that silenced the log, and the check that let an empty file through
Two reports landed in the same week: eas build --local stopping with exit code 0 but produced no further output, and a zero-byte stub that never got embedded. Both came down to settings that reduce output. Here is how to audit your own scripts.
Nine Expo patches shipped in thirty days. Which one is your app actually running?
A tilde in package.json does not mean you are on the newest patch. The file that decides what actually gets installed is package-lock.json. Here is what npm did when I ran the checks myself.
Version code 1 has already been used — who owns that number, app.json or EAS?
When a Play upload stops on versionCode, check where the number actually lives before bumping it. A one-command way to tell whether app.json, EAS, or build.gradle wins.