Reporting app crashes and exceptions to a particular Web service in iOS

Question

I've been told to send that information in a custom way to a REST service even from release versions from an app... what should the best way to do this be? Saving information into a file and sending it before the app closes? Should you request the user's permission for reporting errors?

Thanks in advance

Answer 1

I'm using the open source PLCrashReporter. The steps are:

1. Download the framework and import it into your project.

2. In your applicationDidFinish...:

   - (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions
   {
       // Crash Reports
       PLCrashReporter *crashReporter = [PLCrashReporter sharedReporter];
       if ([crashReporter hasPendingCrashReport]) [self handleCrashReport];
       [crashReporter enableCrashReporterAndReturnError:nil];
       ...
   }
   

3. Add the following methods in your AppDelegate.m:

   #pragma mark - Crash Reports
   
   - (void)handleCrashReport
   {
       PLCrashReporter *crashReporter = [PLCrashReporter sharedReporter];
       NSData *crashData;
       NSError *error;
   
       crashData = [crashReporter loadPendingCrashReportDataAndReturnError:&error];
       PLCrashReport *report = [[PLCrashReport alloc] initWithData:crashData error:nil];
   
       if (!crashData || !report) {
   
           [crashReporter purgePendingCrashReport];
   
       } else {
   
           NSString *stringRepresentation = [PLCrashReportTextFormatter stringValueForCrashReport:report withTextFormat:PLCrashReportTextFormatiOS];
           [self sendDataOnLatestCrashToServer:stringRepresentation];
           [crashReporter purgePendingCrashReport];
       }
   }
   
   - (void)sendDataOnLatestCrashToServer:(NSString *)crashString
   {
       NSDictionary *params = @{
                        @"StackTrace" : crashString
                        // Add more parameters as you want
                        };
       NSData *jsonData = [NSJSONSerialization dataWithJSONObject:params options:NSJSONWritingPrettyPrinted error:nil];
   
       NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:@"http://www.YOURRESTSERVER.com"];
       NSMutableURLRequest *request = [NSMutableURLRequest requestWithURL:url cachePolicy:NSURLRequestUseProtocolCachePolicy timeoutInterval:20.0f];
   
       [request setHTTPMethod:@"POST"];
       [request addValue:@"application/json" forHTTPHeaderField:@"Content-Type"];
       [request setHTTPBody:jsonData];
       [NSURLConnection sendAsynchronousRequest:request queue:[NSOperationQueue mainQueue] completionHandler:^(NSURLResponse *response, NSData *data, NSError *connectionError) {
   
       }];
   }
   

Notice that the stack trace will be sent to server only on the next app startup (due to iOS limitation).