Twitter API: a client for Android attempts to circumvent restrictions

Are the restrictions imposed by Twitter to external clients being exceeded? It would seem that Falcon Pro, a popular application on Android, has found a way to get rid of the limit of 100,000 tokens (tokens) maximum imposed by the social network.

Because of this limitation, the application was forced to refuse new users, and had to withdraw from the Google Play Store. Two problems arose however Joaquim yards, the developer: how to continue to accept new users, and how to allow for updates for existing users?

Update-externally via a website

For the second question, the solution came from the withdrawal of Google Play Store, precisely. Now, the Falcon Pro updates will be distributed via a dedicated website. Sober enough, the site allows to simply download the latest version of the client - currently the 2.04, in the form of APK, the format of the applications on Android containers.

Manual installation required, so with transfer of the APK on the storage of the phone (either by a direct download or by transfer from a computer), and obliged to allow installing applications from sources other than the Store Play on the phone.

Not a priori concern, since the Publisher is known, but this may annoy some users who prefer a-update transparently and automatically. "The requirement to install it is to already hold a token," still says the developer. "In this way, existing users can make their updates and I violate any rules of Twitter."

Of false applications registered

The other problem is a little more complicated to solve.On post Google + where he explains the changes, Joaquim yards is mysterious. "I want to try a little experiment with this version of the application. If you don't have a token, there is always a way to register... But you will need to find it."

It only took only two hours to a user to find the solution, and the post comment on Google +. Hidden and somewhat tedious - handling must tap several times the corners of the application in a specific order and then shake the phone - allows to show a "custom login" dialog box.

Falcon Pro solution? Prompt the user to save a non-existing application on the Twitter site dedicated to developers, and then copy the API key in the application itself. For the time being, explains The Verge, Twitter has not responded, but there are chances that this circumvention of its limits quickly prohibited by the social network.

Twitter is however difficult to make a public case of these workarounds, these being the result of its own restrictive policy, which limits to 100,000 users an application through the tokens. Falcon Pro, one of the best clients on Twitter, is that using the rules to bypass. Until these rules be strengthened...