Ape Apps

Over on the Ape Apps Account Portal, there is a new section called Payment Methods, where you can now link a credit card to your Ape Apps account. The service is provided by Stripe (which has already been processing Ape Apps credit card payments) and no payment details are stored on the Ape Apps server.

What is the benefit? Basically, faster purchases. With a stored payment method, you can quickly purchase things like more Ape Coins when needed, without having to leave the app that you are in or enter your PayPal/Credit Card details. You can also use your stored method to quickly unlock premium or to subscribe to Ape Apps Gold.

There are also lower transaction fees, especially if you set up a bank account as the payment method using Link, but that is more of a benefit for me than for you guys.

Anyway, enjoy the easier payment method if you are interested in it!

The Ape Apps Cloud Sync server is about due for a maintenance purge and reset. As you may know, the Cloud Sync service is meant as way to sync saves between devices only, not as a long-term storage solution, although I know many users utilize and rely on it as such. Unfortunately, the way it is designed does not lend itself well to long-term storage, and periodically needs to be cleaned out and optimized.

I am in the process of rebuilding the Cloud service from scratch, moving it to a bigger server with more storage, and also allowing permanent save data storage for Ape Apps Gold members. The new server setup is going to be so different though, that it is not really feasible to transfer all of the old cloud sync data over.

Over the next few months therefore, I will be migrating all of my apps and games over to the new Ape Cloud server. This will be done on a per-app basis instead of all at once. So from this point forward, as an app or game gets updated, it will be moved over to the new cloud server, meaning that more frequently updated (popular) apps and games will make the transition first.

So if you rely on cloud sync, it is important that you make backups of your data. In most instances, it should be enough for you to just open your files and view/save them, as local copies are always stored on your device as well. For more important items, you might want to save a local copy for peace of mind.

You can also install the Ape Web Apps Desktop Bridge (either the PWA or desktop client) and spin up your own private cloud instance on your own computer. This tool lets you specify a folder on your computer as your private cloud storage and is now supported by almost my entire library. If you have only one private cloud instance set up on your account, it will be automatically selected as your default in pretty much any of my apps and games. As long as you are signed in to your Ape Apps Account, your apps and games can save to your own private cloud folder from anywhere you have an internet connection.

So that is what is up, let me know if you have any questions!

A few months ago I did a complete revamp of the Ape Apps Account Portal, and now I have expanded the account customization options even further, and also added the beginning back-end for cool things to come. Let's take a look!


Since I first launched the Ape Apps Account system, the two biggest requests I have gotten were a) ability to change e-mail address, and b) ability to change username. I checked off the e-mail address bit on the last update, and now I have come up with a solution for the username bit too, the new Display Name field.

To let users actually change their base username was going to be a lot of work and would also break a lot of older apps that rely on the username staying constant, so I have come up with the next best solution. You can now set your account Display Name. You will still log in to Ape Apps using your registered account username, but over the coming months, your Display Name will start showing up in various apps and games instead of the username. What's more, the display name can have spaces, some special characters, and more.

Note that the individual apps and games will need updated to take advantage of the new display name feature, but you can go ahead and set it up now and it will start showing up in the weeks and months ahead.

Be reasonable with what you pick for a display name!

I generally do not like doing account moderation, but if my hand is forced I will reluctantly need to crack down, so please use common sense when choosing a display name. Kids are on here too.

In addition to the display name, you can now also set an About Me string and a Profile Header Graphic. Currently, the Ape Apps forums (this website) supports an About Me tag, but it is not tied to the overall account. It will soon be replaced by the new global About Me tag from the Accounts Portal, so if you want to customize yours, you need to set it there. This will eventually show up in various places, such as the Ape Apps Launcher and when you select a friend from your friends list in-game.

The Profile Header graphic will also be used in the Launcher and various other places. If you have used Twitter/X and seen the little background header image at the top of people's profiles, you know what it is for.

Finally, I am going to be implementing a user feed into the Ape Apps Launcher, that will show things like unlocked achievements or screenshots taken in-game. When you open the launcher, the home page will now, instead of the all apps listing, show your friends user feed. The feed is based on the ActivityPub/Fediverse specs, and in theory it can be viewed by third party fediverse apps such as Mastodon.

I say "in theory" because it only sort of works right now, based on my testing. Your Ape Apps account address for Fediverse stuff is @{username}@accounts.ape-apps.com. So for example, mine is @bastecklein@accounts.ape-apps.com. So if you log in to something like Mastodon and do a search for that account, it should show something like this:


Some things show up, some don't. I haven't been able to get test posts to show up, but frankly I am not overly concerned with Mastodon or the larger Fediverse outside of Ape Apps, what is important is that the feed is coming for friends lists in the Ape Apps Launcher and that is what this is primarily for. If there is strong interest to get the Mastodon stuff working I will spend more time on it, otherwise I am not going to worry about it too much.

So that is it for this round of Account Portal updates. I am planning a complete revamp of the Ape Apps forum/website at some point that will start tying a lot of the new account features in, and everything is going to be coming to the Launcher as well. So stay tuned for all that, and feel free to check out the new Account Portal updates and update your profile information!

https://accounts.ape-apps.com/

#apeappsaccounts

Since I finally got the Ape Apps mailing lists working earlier this week, users who subscribed years ago and forgot about it have started suddenly getting emails from Ape Apps. I noticed that some people were using the unsubscribe option over and over and couldn't figure out why, until I noticed that the unsubscribe feature was actually broken on my server 😐

I apologize to anyone impacted by this, I'm really not trying to spam you!

All in-email unsubscribe links should be working now. To verify your mailing list status, just log in to the account portal at the link below and choose which lists you want to be attached to:

https://accounts.ape-apps.com

Today I am announcing the release of a complete rewrite of the Ape Apps Account Portal (https://accounts.ape-apps.com/), the online site for managing your Ape Apps Account, avatar, purchases, Gold membership, etc.


The site is now more of an app (it is a fully installable PWA now as well), which was a necessary change for when I eventually integrate it more tightly into the Ape Apps Launcher and Discussions (which will also be superseding both Ape Chat and these forums at some point). The interface is a lot cleaner now and easier to navigate and find things.

All of the existing functions are still available, however you can now also find and accept Promotions that had previously been send out via the Ape Apps mailing list. The new Promotions tab will only show up if you are subscribed to the mailing list, so please update your communications preferences.

The site also has a new email tester, where you can make sure your email address is still valid and can receive messages from the server. This is important, because I plan on allowing an optional two factor email authentication at some point.

Also, you can now change the email address associated with your account, right from within the accounts Portal.

Planned upcoming features are the ability to view and manage your Ape Apps Cloud Sync data, as well as all of your pictures posted via this website, Ape Chat, or Discussions. You will be able to view and manage your friends list, achievements, high scores, and more right from within the Accounts Portal too. I am also working out a way for users to be able to change their username, it's just going to take a bit of work because of the way certain apps were developed (My Colony 1 in particular), but I know it's been requested a lot so it will be coming eventually.

Generally, the Accounts Portal is going to need to gain a lot of the functions that you find in the drop-down menu on this website, since I am eventually going to be de-emphasizing this site and at some point locking out posting completely, since it has become a pretty big annoyance dealing with the constant spam.

So anyway, go ahead and check it out, and let me know what issues you find, because this one is sort of important to get working properly!

https://accounts.ape-apps.com/

#apeappsaccounts