Category: Apple Developer News

iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 introduced the Record App Activity feature, allowing people to save a summary of sensor, data, and internet access from apps on their device. This activity can be exported in JSON format by tapping Save App Activity. For an overview of recorded app activity, watch the WWDC21 session “Apple’s privacy pillars in focus”.

In iOS 15.2 beta and iPadOS 15.2 beta, this activity will be presented in a new UI called App Privacy Report. This is a great opportunity to review your app’s sensor, data, and internet usage. To view your app’s activity in the report, install the beta releases, then go to Settings > Privacy > App Privacy Report > Turn On App Privacy Report. Activity will show once you use your app.

Learn about inspecting app activity data

Learn about indicating the source of network activity

Built in collaboration with a team of child-development experts, OK Play’s interactive stories do more than entertain, says the app’s chief scientist, Colleen Russo Johnson: They give kids a space to express what they want and need.

To do so, the inventive app makes children the stars. As they discover pirate treasure and encounter planet-size smoothies, they’ll record their own dialogue, color in scenery, and snap selfies to make each story character as unique as they are.

We spoke with Russo Johnson and founder Travis Chen about the importance of emotional learning, why building a responsive development team is key, and how the app has helped families through difficult times.

How is OK Play different from other education apps for children?

Russo Johnson: Starting with social-emotional learning was very intentional for us. As parents, we saw something missing in the apps our kids use. There’s a lot of ABCs and 123s and not a lot of focus on social-emotional learning. The way OK Play uses interactive technology lets kids place themselves in the stories — not just read about what it feels like to be mad or sad or happy, but actually act it out. They can see themselves making those faces.

What learning curve did you have to overcome to launch the app?

Chen: Well, Colleen wasn’t part of the group back when we first had the idea for OK Play. We all had our superpowers across product and play design, the business side and fundraising, but we didn’t have the skill set on the science of how kids build confidence, empathy, kindness. As soon as we met Colleen, there was no question that she was the superhero we were missing: someone who’d devoted their entire life — academically, professionally, and personally — to child development.

What’s been the most rewarding feedback from OK Play’s audience?

Russo Johnson: In our very early days of beta testing, a mother of two brought us to tears sharing what OK Play did for her children. This pandemic has been hard on all of us, and our stories were helping her daughters understand it’s OK to feel emotions in very real ways. She also shared how their faces light up when they see themselves as the stars of our stories, since, as an African American family, they rarely see characters who look like them onscreen.

What’s a technical achievement that you’re particularly proud of?

Chen: We’ve built our team and technical infrastructure to be able to update the app really quickly. In one story, a character falls down a well, and we got feedback from a parent that their kid was very scared when that happened. We updated the story so the character pops back up out of the hole, and we pushed it live within the day. To be able to respond so quickly and make our stories as inclusive as possible is something I’m really proud of.

Any advice for fellow app developers?

Chen: I think you need two very important things. One is to create ways to listen to and interact with your users, specifically to aid the development of your app. You don’t want it to be totally open-ended, because you could get flooded with feedback that can be hard to make sense of. Then second, you need a team and fundamental technical infrastructure that allows you to quickly adapt. These two go hand in hand. Once you get that user feedback, you need to move quick.

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Download OK Play from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

Apple Entrepreneur Camp supports underrepresented founders and developers as they build the next generation of cutting-edge apps and helps form a global network that encourages the pipeline and longevity of these entrepreneurs in technology.

Apply now for one of three newly announced online cohorts for Black, Hispanic/Latinx, or female founders starting late January 2022. Attendees receive code-level guidance, mentorship, and inspiration with unprecedented access to Apple engineers and leaders. Applications close on November 28, 2021.

Learn more

Starting next week, your in-app events can be discovered right on the App Store, giving you a whole new way to showcase your events and expand their reach. You can now create in-app events in App Store Connect and schedule them to appear on the App Store. These timely events, such as game competitions, movie premieres, and livestreamed experiences, can encourage people to try your app, provide existing users with new ways to enjoy your app, and give former users reasons to return. Events will appear on the App Store on iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 starting October 27, 2021.

Learn about in-app events

Welcome to the Tech Talks Digest, where you can find everything you might want to know about our latest developer event. Tech Talks runs from October 25 to December 17, and features live sessions and one-to-one conversations where you can learn more about our latest technologies, ask questions, and get guidance from Apple experts.

We’re excited to kick off Tech Talks with you on October 25. In the meantime, check out an overview of the event, learn how to register for sessions and office hours, and check out a few upcoming sessions that you won’t want to miss. We’ll publish a new digest every two weeks with the latest updates — stay tuned!

Explore the schedule

You can currently browse and register for all Tech Talks activities taking place October 25 to November 5. We release new sessions and appointments for one-to-one office hours every two weeks, so check back on November 1 for the next round of activities.

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Note: To register for sessions or request office hour appointments, you must be a current member of the Apple Developer Program or Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

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Get notified about new activities and your appointment requests by opting in to push notifications in the Apple Developer app or signing up for email notifications. To enable push notifications, visit the Account tab in the Apple Developer app. To enable email notifications, sign in to your developer account, open the top-right menu, and click Email Settings.

Explore Tech Talks sessions

Whether you want to know more about a technology released at WWDC or chat with the teams responsible for your favorite features, our live sessions can help you connect with Apple experts worldwide to get your questions answered. All Tech Talks sessions feature a live presentation to help you integrate the latest technologies into your apps followed by a Q&A or a roundtable. Note that sessions have limited capacity to make sure we can provide a great experience for live attendees and answer as many questions as possible.

In addition to offering activities in English broadcast live from Cupertino, we’re also offering certain sessions in English, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Brazilian Portuguese, and Spanish in local time zones.

Apply for office hour appointments

With office hours, we’re opening our virtual doors to connect with you for a one-on-one conversation. You can request appointments by topic, depending on your needs. Connect with our Design Evangelism team for UI reviews and design considerations, talk with a member of our Technology Evangelism about APIs and implementation, discuss your app with our App Review team, troubleshoot with Developer Technical Support, get help with app distribution from the App Store Connect team, or simply connect with us to provide feedback.

Don’t miss: A conversation with SwiftUI engineering

Hang out with some of the minds behind SwiftUI and learn how your bug reports can help improve Apple frameworks and APIs. Technology evangelist Betsy Langowski joins members of the SwiftUI engineering team to showcase some of the latest improvements to SwiftUI, explore the life cycle of a bug report, and answer your questions.

This session will be presented in English live from Cupertino on October 25 at 1 p.m. PDT.

Session spotlight: Get started with in-app events

You’ll soon be able to publish your in-app events on the App Store: Learn more about this feature and how to make the most of it in a session delivered by members of the App Store team. Discover recommendations, tips, and best practices for helping people discover content or events within your app.

This session will be presented in English live from Cupertino multiple times starting November 2 at 9 a.m. PDT.

Share your thoughts

Have thoughts about Tech Talks? We’d love to know what’s on your mind.

Share your feedback on Tech Talks

October 20, 2021

Join us for over 100 live online sessions and connect with Apple experts at office hours to help you create your best apps yet. Tech Talks kicks off on October 25 and runs through December 17. Registration is now open to current members of the Apple Developer Program and Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

Learn more

According to Caribu cofounder Maxeme Tuchman, her app was inspired by one powerful image: a photo of a soldier reading to his child online while awkwardly holding up a picture book to the camera.

So she set out to make it easy for children to read — and learn — with parents, grandparents, and friends from afar. With Caribu, a 2020 App Store Trend of the Year winner, kids can turn the pages of a Thomas the Tank Engine book, invite aunts and uncles to help with a math worksheet, or play a word game with cousins — all while interacting face-to-face over video.

We caught up with Tuchman to talk about how Caribu has thrived without venture capital investment and why every founder should build a diverse team from day one.

How did your background lead to creating a learning app like Caribu?
I’m the daughter of Cuban immigrants and the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors. It has been ingrained in me that the only thing you can take with you in the middle of the night when you’re fleeing your home is what’s in your head. To me, education is the biggest lever for change.

What was the biggest challenge you faced when launching Caribu?
Fundraising. Fewer than 2 percent of all VC dollars go to women and people of color. That’s an industry problem. We had a lot of people say, “If you don’t move to Silicon Valley, we’re not going to fund you.” But we’ve run through walls — we’ve figured it out through grants, angels, and corporate investment.

What’s been essential to your success?
The ability to see a problem and believe I could solve it. Throughout my career, I’ve constantly been pushed to go into new environments, learn new languages — the government uses a different language than MBAs, for example. That’s been the greatest gift. I’m excited to wake up every morning and think, “I don’t know what is going to happen.”

What advice would you give to other entrepreneurs?
Build a diverse team from the beginning. It’s the best business decision you will make. Don’t have a bunch of dudes making an app that may be used by 94 percent women. Don’t build a team that’s 95 percent men or white people and then think, “Oh, we should diversify.” Have your team reflect the people you serve. We have customers in 200-plus countries and territories. You have to have that empathy.

How did you arrive at the name Caribu? Alvaro noticed many kids’ apps had animal-based names, so he looked at migratory animals and learned about the caribou — the Canadian reindeer. We spell it in Spanish because he’s from Spain and I’m Cuban. Also, it was easier to get the Twitter handle!

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Download Caribu: Playtime Is Calling from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

The most powerful MacBook Pro ever is here. With the blazing-fast M1 Pro or M1 Max chip your apps can take advantage of groundbreaking performance and amazing battery life. And along with a powerful Neural Engine for supercharged machine learning and upgraded media engines with ProRes support, the new MacBook Pro allows your apps to do things they never could before. Get your apps ready for the new supercharged MacBook Pro today.

Build Universal apps with Xcode 13.1. To take advantage of the incredible performance of Macs with M1, M1 Pro, and M1 Max, use Xcode 13.1 to build your Mac app as a Universal app. Xcode automatically creates a binary slice optimized for Apple silicon Macs and another for Intel-based Macs, then puts them together as a single app bundle thats ready to distribute or submit to the Mac App Store.

Optimize for the new MacBook Pro display. The new MacBook Pro introduces a Liquid Retina XDR display that expands the active area of the display up around the new 1080p FaceTime HD camera. If your app delivers a full-screen experience and uses the default system menus, macOS Monterey automatically accounts for the area around the camera. If your app provides a custom full-screen experience or draws content over the menu bar, you may need to make a few adjustments to provide the best experience on this incredible new display. Learn about running your app in compatibility mode.

Download Xcode 13.1 RC

macOS Monterey offers powerful features and technologies that help you deliver elevated user experiences. Take advantage of SwiftUI, new and improved APIs for apps built with Mac Catalyst, an unparalleled suite of advanced GPU debugging tools and new features in Metal, the power of Shortcuts on Mac, the new StoreKit In-App Purchase API, and ShazamKit.

Build Universal apps with Xcode 13.1. To take advantage of the incredible performance of Macs with M1, M1 Pro, and M1 Max, use Xcode 13.1 to build your Mac app as a Universal app. Xcode automatically creates a binary slice optimized for Apple silicon Macs and another for Intel-based Macs, then puts them together as a single app bundle that’s ready to submit to the Mac App Store. Update your product pages and submit your apps for review.

Please note that if you’re updating to macOS Monterey, you’ll also need to update to Xcode 13 (compatible with macOS Big Sur 11.3 or later).

Learn about submitting Mac apps

App Analytics in App Store Connect helps you see how people discover and engage with your app. Now you can view powerful new transaction metrics, including redownloads, total downloads, proceeds, pre-orders, and updates. Each metric can be displayed by territory, source type, device, and more, helping you understand what drives your app’s growth and success.

In addition, as of September 20, 2021, all sales metrics include data from Apple School Manager and Apple Business Manager, and from devices running iOS 7, macOS 10.14, tvOS 8, and earlier.

Learn about App Analytics