Testing on device with Defold takes a long time for me. Just starting the app takes around a minute, and once the app has started some events take 10-30 seconds (unloading/loading collections). Using the same WiFi network with the Gideros engine is virtually instant, with the exception of uploading any new files, which happens once.
Is there a way to speed up Defold on device testing, or maybe my configuration is wrong in some way and the slow speeds are unusual?
Starting the app itself should be nearly instant.
Are you talking about setting as the target device, and then choosing “Build and run”?
Yes!
That’s really interesting. There must be an issue somewhere then. Would love to test faster on device. I recorded videos of the timings, printing when each collection is getting initiated.
Locally from the ide:
On device:
I think we have a ticket for that in our backlog Issue- 4116
I mean, starting the dev app, on the phone, the time from when you press the icon, to that the Defold logo is shown, should be very fast. So fast that regular launch images basically just flicker past.
This is when you Use the “Sign iOS app”, which is the vanilla engine, signed with your certificate.
If you’re talking about, you own custom built app (I assume you use native extensions?), how long does it take to launch on your phone, when you tap the icon?
As for the connect to target, I do believe that we have some issues in how things are sent over to the engine, from the editor. And, I guess this is where the most time is consumed.
Not that it’s the same on the desktop, if you have it running as a target, and then choose build and run.
As Alexey mentioned, we have a ticket for this.
Are you using hot reload at all? That can speed up development, since we don’t send all the data at startup.
I remember I had a similar issue, with collections taking a long time to switch too.
Not sure what caused it but since moving to Catalina the issue is gone, same project.
It’s super quick. It’s “Build” when “Target” is the device that takes time. I use a fair bit of extensions in this app.
I hadn’t tested this. You’re right, running on desktop is also slow if specifically set as a target.
No, I haven’t read up on how that works yet. Maybe that’s the best option, for now?
You’re connecting over wifi right? What if you connect via USB instead? (Running the development app on device)
It doesn’t seem to make any difference if I connect over USB, althought I may not be doing it right - if I disable WiFi on both computer and device, I’m not able to connect, regardless of USB.
Is it supposed to work with just USB, without a WiFi connection?
Edit: When keeping WiFi enabled on the computer and disabled on the device it works! And it’s MUCH faster. Around five seconds to start the app vs. 60 seconds over WiFi. Thanks @britzl for pointing me in the right direction, this is going to save me a lot of time.
It’s a workaround. It should be fast using wifi as well.
A small update on this; I installed a WiFi boosting system today, and now even over WiFi testing is virtually instant. Happy days.
Hardware to boost wifi signal or something else?
Yes, hardware over electric wiring. Google Nest WiFi, to be precise.