When a fully functionnal Android

[F6]

When will the Android app updated to allow port forwarding ?

It isn't professional at all: why a BASIC feature available on IOS isn't on Android ?

Are Android user under-customers ?

Hey, wake up ! You aren't the center of the world, there are other similar solutions (i.e. Symantec)

To long to wait, enough is enough.

[FormerMember]

Yeah I would also like answers to these questions.

[FS_Simo]

Hi,

Thank you for voicing your feedback.

It seems that for us getting things running at sufficient quality and confidence takes more time on Android than it does on iOS. There are many reasons for this, but one of the bigger challenges is that there are thousands of android devices and many of them have custom implementations in areas like WIFI handling (smart network switching on on some Samsung phones, as an example). Sometimes we have to work around or choose a different technology altogether if one popular phone has major issues even if the rest would be working fine

This is one of the reasons why developing software that has to deal with hardware interoperability on Android can be more difficult and time consuming than iOS, where the platform is relatively uniform. This is also a big contributor to the reasons why the Android application is behind in some core features.

Our primary goal was to get SENSE out to customers as soon as possible without compromising the overall quality. This also means we also had to make some difficult choices regarding features but with a plan to release those as soon as we can afterwards.

We understand your frustration and rest assured Android port forwarding is being worked on right now. When the feature is in any workable state and we feel it brings value to you we will make it available as an open beta through google play. 

This way you can try it out and give us feedback in case there are some issues. 

Again, thank you for being an early customer and I hope that you trust us to improve the product as time goes by.

Best Regards:

Simo / SENSE QA Lead

[Laksh]

Hi F6,

Thanks for sharing your feedback with us. Our SENSE team is working on the Port Forwarding feature with priority as mentioned in other posts like here and here.

We understand your concern but rest assured this feedback has been passed on the SENSE team and they're working on it.

Edited: @FS_Simo was quite faster than me to reply.

[FormerMember]

So we android users are your beta testers or rather I think all of the sense preorderers and nonpreorderers are your beta testers, since you released this product before it was ready for what it is designed for.

I think the wishlist which basically appeared immediately says it all.

It is not really nice to see that "free" months and sense's warranty time to run, when we are still beta testing your product so we are basically losing money even when you said that you will release the product when it is ready.

I am personally thinking of returning this device and maybe ordering it when I can read from here that is has the basic home router capabilities.

[F6]

After 3 weeks, still no port forwarding on device controlled by Android:


- What is the advantage taken by managing the device only with mobile apps ? Don't you know how to manage them with web interfaces ?

Security reasons ? No way: I use for daily work Fortinet (well-know company), and Stormshield (Airbus Defense & Space) devices, with heavy exposition to attacks. All are web-administrated; do you think they are not concerned with security considerations ?

- You say developping on Android is difficult ? First, use web management instead mobile app !

And I don't undestand why adding simple combo boxes on the bottom of a screen is difficult: you have made the most difficult with the pairing of the app with the device.

The basic for having the security points applied by user: first of all, don't annoy the user !

[Laksh]

Hi F6,

Sorry for the delay, the port forwarding for Android is in progress. The holiday season is affecting this a bit but we are working on it. Please bear with us for a short while still before we can release it.

The app based management interface will allow us to create a more interactive system in the long run.

In addition, for Android, the end-point protection and the router management functions are conveniently built into the same app. This will also allow us to build integrated functions that no web-based systems support.

The app based management interface was a design choice we made already a while back. We communicated this in the Technical details sections on the sense.f-secure.com page early on.

We are really sorry if this was not clear upfront.

[F6]

Can't read this, sorry.

You delayed the product more than 15 months, and it seems that you have never asked users what was the minimum features to provide (or the one you choosed have very, very low needs)

Port forwarding is a very basic feature, not providing this after all this time is a major fault.

And now, the holidays ? But you're joking !

[1sknew]

I agree totally that this device was really launched way too early.

I think we would like to know what was the reason for the long 15months or so delay on the launch?

If it was android app, I cannot really express myself about it.

And I think many would like to know why did you think that these features are enough for the launch?

The sense is basically missing all basic home router features (see feature request/wishlist), and you even use closed dd-wrt so the features are there but as we speculate/get the idea from your answers, the issues are in implementing them into the mobile apps.

Also always wondered that why did you launch the device in the summer when whole Finland is in holiday season, which now affects all of us and mainly android users, who make at least the half of your userbase. Of course not all use such features like port fowarding, but I bet many that buy a Sense as a product are the more advanced users with more advanced needs like again you can read from the feature request list.