I am a relatively new iPad user. The app I most want an update for, on the iPad, is the App Store itself. Grr.

A list of gripes follows.

#1 – When updating, please don’t refresh

I tend to update my apps one by one, in a single session.

I would scroll down the list of apps, pick an app that I want to update, click the “Free” button on the right (meaning “Free Update”?), and it would take me out of the App Store temporarily to show me that my app is being updated.

I would then my click on the “App Store” button again to take me back to the Updates screen. And so I scroll down the list for 1 or 2 seconds, when the screen goes blank and refreshes, and takes me back to the top of the page.

If I scroll back down to where I was, the app that I had just updated is still listed there (since it was still downloading), so the refresh of the page was unnecessary for me, as it made me lose my place and I hadn’t received any new information.

This is really annoying when you are updating several apps in the same session.

Why not give me an option of whether or not I want to refresh the page?

Alternatively, why not refresh immediately when I come back to the screen, instead of letting me use it for up to 2 seconds and then refreshing without warning?

Edit: In fact, much of the App Store exhibits this annoying “refresh” behaviour, including with search results (another pet peeve of mine while browsing the App Store), or browsing any of the lists of apps in general, whether on Featured, Top Charts or Categories.

#2 – Filter/Sort by Category

The long list of apps with updates could be broken down for easier browsing using either of sorting or filtering.

For filtering, you could choose to filter out only apps in the Games category.

Otherwise, at least allow me to sort the apps by category, so I have a general idea that the apps I am currently looking at are in the Games category, and that if I scroll down I can find the those in the Utilities category.

This is useful if, say, I feel like only updating my games, because hey, I want to play my games today 😀

#3 – Unclear of Actual Update “Date”

From the date given in the above screenshot, it implies (since this is the Updates screen) that Oct 2010 is the date of the latest update.

However, I did not download this app until May 2011, and I assume that at the time of download I would have received the latest version of the app anyway.

If I check the app’s information page, I find that the actual date of the latest update is Jan 2011.

Presumably, the date Oct 2010 is the date of the app’s actual release in the App Store.

#4 -No Visibility on Sub-Categories

I had a huge gripe regarding lack of browsing by sub-category in the App Store for iPad, whereas iPhone/iPod Touch users had this feature, but it appears that this has been worked on. 🙂

Lovely!

Now if only some of the other categories had sub-categories as well…

In conclusion: Where may we submit our reviews and ratings for the App Store, Apple? 🙂

Original post written on 2 Aug 2011
Polished and published on 18 Aug 2011