Test without publishing

Mobile apps talk to your octokan backend over HTTPS with your app key. Nothing about that needs a store release, a signing certificate or a developer account.

1. From your terminal, with no app at all

node scripts/native-smoke.mjs https://YOUR-BACKEND app_xxxxxxxxxxxx ios

# leave the test chat in your inbox so you can reply to it
node scripts/native-smoke.mjs https://YOUR-BACKEND app_xxxxxxxxxxxx ios --keep

It plays a visitor: it starts a chat, sends a message, polls for it and cleans up. Your dashboard flips to Connected and the message appears in the inbox.

2. On a simulator, emulator or your own phone

iOS Simulator (no paid account), Android emulator or a USB-debugging phone, Expo Go on your phone, or flutter run. Debug builds use the same app key as release builds.

3. Keep test chats out of your real inbox

Add a second app in the dashboard, for example "My app (dev)", and use its key in debug builds.

Reaching a backend on your own computer

The Railway https URL works from everywhere and is the easiest. For a local backend: the iOS Simulator can use http://localhost:4000 with an App Transport Security exception, the Android emulator uses http://10.0.2.2:4000 with cleartext traffic allowed, and a physical phone needs your computer's network address.