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Is there any way to get application insatllation time in iPhone? I wanted to use this information as a unique identifier, can I use it for this purpose?

Dee
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4 Answers4

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There is no way to get the application installation time.. You can keep track of the first launch of your application within your application using NSUserDefault.

In application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions: you could do 

NSDate *date =[[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults]objectForKey:@"FirstLaunchTime"];
if (date == nil) {
     // nil means your application running for the first time
    [[NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults]setObject:[NSDate date] forKey:@"FirstLaunchTime"]; // set the current time
}
Anil Varghese
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NO. You don't know anything about the actual installation (duration / time) within your app. You only know the first start date.

For unique IDs, check this answer:
How to get the UDID in iOS 6 and iOS 7

Community
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calimarkus
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  • There is restriction on using UDID by apple na, we can not use it and I have provide support for my app from iOS 4.3, so I guess I cann't use UUID also. Thinking about MAC adress as an alternative. – Dee May 23 '13 at 09:35
  • That's why I posted a link showing alternatives... only the `uniqueIdentifier` call is deprecated. – calimarkus May 23 '13 at 09:39
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You can have a field in user setting for this and when user installs and opens it you will get a callback in appDelegate's didFinishLaunching method.

Here you can check if the particular field is nil then only store current date time. You can use this date time in your app.

Amit
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What you could do is check the /Documents directory to see if there's anything it when it is first run (there shouldn't be if it's the first time it's been installed on that device). If not, write a file there with the current time stamp.

I guess you could use this information as a unique identifier, but in theory, there could be multiple people who open the app for the first time, at the same time. I wouldn't do it.

techthrow.techie
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