Unable to publish build to external group of testers on TestFlight

[ederbond]

I'm trying to upload an *.ipa file generated by AzureDevOps to an External Group of user that I've created on Apple's TestFlight and then, it first asked me to set a release notes file which I just did as you can see in the image bellow, but now the build fails with the following error message: ##[warning]You specified releaseNotes - so you need to provide fastlane session, app specific password only won't work.

BTW despite of showing the my release as error on Azure DevOps Release Pipeline is actually uploading my ipa file to apple store but to the wrong group of testers. The ipa is being uploaded to the "Internal Group" of testers called "App Store Connect Users" instead of the "External Groups" that I've created called "DEV DB"

Does anybody knows how could I make this Azure DevOps task to upload my ipa file to my External Group of testers on TestFlight ?

FYI my service connection is configured using a Token Based Authentication as you can see bellow:

Originally posted by @ederbond in https://github.com/microsoft/app-store-vsts-extension/issues/215#issuecomment-857932927

[max-zaytsev]

@ederbond Could you please share pipeline logs in debug mode?

[ederbond]

Do you think it could be the role I've choosed when I've created my api key on apple developer portal?

[max-zaytsev]

@ederbond yes. Some fastlane commands require app manager permissions

[ederbond]

I've just generated a new API Key with apple but I'm still getting error

[max-zaytsev]

@ederbond,

looks like wrong encoding of the api key:

2021-06-10T15:28:54.0971950Z /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/2.7.0/gems/fastlane-2.183.2/spaceship/lib/spaceship/connect_api/token.rb:62:in initialize': [!] invalid curve name (OpenSSL::PKey::ECError)

You need to encode the content of .p8 file to base64 to use it in the task. You can try this tool or the following powershell snippet:

$api_key_content = '-----BEGIN PRIVATE KEY-----
YourPrivateKeyMIGAMBMGByqKxW3ZWKlSZEQ9EeLajuO6VE7MO26rwDoHUcD
Be6zkyp2SAUU99QS/3TPiKlOQ6agCgYIKoZIzj0DAQehRANCAAQTymeZ9NqX8rO
+ax7gdRMBMGByqKxW3ZWKlSZEMBMGByqKxW3ZWKlSZEMBMGByqKxW3ZW
-----END PRIVATE KEY-----'

[System.Convert]::ToBase64String([System.Text.Encoding]::UTF8.GetBytes($api_key_content))

[ederbond]

Thank you so much for the help @max-zaytsev , after generating the App Store Connect API Key with the role "App Manager" and encoding it's content to base64 as you mentioned it worked just fine. Now my release builds are correctly being uploaded to my external group of testers on TestFlight. Thank U!