Category: Apple Developer News

Ariel Vardi’s road to launching Facer started a long way away. Mars, specifically.

In 2015 he released the official Apple Watch game The Martian, based on the film starring Matt Damon. “You played directly from your wrist, interacting in real time with Damon’s character,” says Vardi.

His game studio, Little Labs, started by developing watch games before moving over to Vardi’s other Apple Watch interest: design. Facer is now among the world’s largest open marketplaces for watch-face creators, with more than 30,000 of them sharing their wares — joined by traditional watch brands like Mr. Jones, AVI-8, and Maurice Lacroix.

We spoke to Vardi from his L.A. home base to talk about bringing watch design to everyone and how to tell if an idea is truly original.

Who is Facer for?

Facer was always intended to be an open marketplace; we would make tools to allow non-devs to create watch faces without writing a single line of code. Anyone with a bit of design sense can create a watch face in literally 30 seconds. The bulk of faces today are coming from indie designers. But fairly early on we partnered with brands like Star Trek, Tetris, and Garfield.

What has this meant for the watch-design community?

The traditional watch world has always been very closed. There’s a group, mostly coming out of Switzerland and a few other parts of the world, that have historically had the privilege to design watches. A lot of people have dreamed of designing watches themselves but couldn’t. The smartwatch and watch-face worlds have opened up that opportunity.

How do you handle customer feedback for a community of Facer’s size?

We don’t have a separate customer support team. I’m part of the customer support team! But we do have around a hundred designers in the watch-face community we chat with every day. If something’s broken, someone will hear about it.

What’s your approach to creating new features?

We try to resist the inclination to start building because something feels cool. What feels cool to an engineer is not necessarily what feels cool to regular users, and those are the people you’re building apps for. For any new product or feature, we sit down, write out what it is, and come up with proof for why it’s going to succeed.

What advice do you have for developers who are just starting out?

If a product makes sense to you, you’ve probably already got competitors. Smart people tend to have the same ideas; if you’re really the first, there’s a good chance you don’t have the right one. So think hard about what makes you truly different. It’s easy to say, “Oh, my product is going to be better,” but you need to find that specific differentiating point. If you’re not confident about it, think some more or find another idea.

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Download Watch Faces by Facer from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

November 29, 2021

Connect with Apple experts to learn how to create best-in-class apps through office hours and live sessions with Q&As until December 17. The final set of Tech Talks activities have been released, so register today if you’re a member of the Apple Developer Program or Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

Learn more

It’s time for our fourth and final Tech Talks digest, and we’ve got one last round of sessions and office hours for you to peruse and enjoy. Tech Talks events are running through December 17 — don’t miss your chance to learn more about Object Capture or HealthKit, get your questions answered, and more.

Explore the schedule

You can currently browse and register for all Tech Talks activities taking place through December 17.

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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.

One last time: Don’t miss a conversation with SwiftUI engineering

The SwiftUI engineering team is hosting one last chat before the end of Tech Talks on December 14: Join members of the team for a full hour of live Q&A, dedicated to answering your queries and questions around all things SwiftUI.

What sorts of questions can the team answer? Well, during November’s chat, we highlighted a SwiftUI debugging tool that helps track down rendering or high cpu usage issues: Check it out yourself by calling Self._printChanges() inside the body of a view to print out the changes that have triggered the view update.

This session will be presented in English live from Cupertino on December 14.

A conversation with SwiftUI Engineering

Don’t miss: Simplify 3D content creation with Object Capture

On December 6, learn how you can best use the Object Capture API to create lifelike 3D models of real-world objects. The team will cover best practices with object selection and image capture to help you create 3D models, and share a peek at several top-notch content creation apps that use Object Capture to bring their assets to life.

This session will be presented in English live from Cupertino and London on December 6 and December 13.

Simplify 3D content creation with Object Capture

Simplify 3D content creation with Object Capture

Don’t forget: Explore the future of Photos access in your app

Discover how PHPicker and the Limited Photos Library can provide your app with secure, private, and modern access to the Photos library. The session explores how you can integrate directly with someone’s image library while ensuring privacy and giving people direct control over which pictures your app can access. Presenters will take you through recent improvements to PHPicker, the simplest and most secure integration for your app, and explore how to use the Limited Photos Library for experiences that need a deeper integration. And lastly, learn best practices for migrating off the deprecated ALAssetsLibrary APIs so that your app can continue to deliver a great, integrated experience with the Photos library.

This session will be presented in English live from London and Cupertino on December 7 and 13.

Explore the future of Photos access in your app

Explore the future of Photos access in your app

Share your thoughts

Thank you for checking out Tech Talks 2021! Whether you attended a session, office hour appointment, or followed along through these digests, we’d love to know what you thought.

Share your feedback on Tech Talks

Isharna Walsh was several years into a long-term relationship when she had a life-changing realization.

“We’d hit that point where the sex sort of decreases,” Walsh says, “and I realized I had no idea how to consistently create intimacy, talk about sex, or navigate the things I was experiencing.”

She started looking for resources and quickly discovered she was hardly alone — lots of people needed such help. “I had this light-bulb moment,” she says. “Improving this part of our lives flows into everything else; it’s foundational to our health and happiness.”

Walsh partnered with a who’s-who of intimacy experts — including psychologists, therapists, educators, and researchers — to create Coral. The app uses science-based lessons, conversations, and guided meditations and exercises to help users deepen their intimacy. Walsh hopes that, on a bigger scale, Coral can help normalize sex and remove some of the baggage many people have around it.

We caught up with the Los Angeles–based founder to chat about the advantages of being a first-time app creator and the challenges of being a groundbreaker.

Coral tackles a subject that’s sensitive for a lot of people. How do you design for that?

There’s a lot of nuance around sexuality and intimacy. It’s a very taboo topic, and there’s a deep vulnerability in opening up to someone intimately. But there’s also excitement and fun. In the design, we want to make you feel very safe, like this is a place where you’re going to be respected and seen. At the same time we want to make you feel curious. That’s a hard needle to thread.

How do you ensure the app speaks to everyone?

Personalization is one of our core guiding principles. Are you seeing content tailored toward people with vulvas or people with penises? Or toward people who are in relationships? We also have content versioned around what we learn about you. If you identify yourself as having experienced trauma, you’re going to see something a little different.

Does your mission expand beyond intimacy?

I’ve been really interested in mental health for years, and I see this as the biggest opportunity to drive change in the space. Sleep, nutrition, exercise, sex, and intimacy — they impact the way we feel on a daily basis. From a more holistic perspective, we’re trying to unpack a lot of the shame and baggage around a very natural and healthy aspect of our being.

What’s been your biggest challenge?

We’re trying to create something brand new. There’s no, “OK, here’s what a sexual self-improvement practice is.” We’re figuring all of that out. And there are issues around advertising policies: Are we a sex product, or are we mindfulness and psychology? Being a female founder in this context has its own challenges too. But we have a deep belief in the changes we’re making and the inevitability of our success. Maybe our path isn’t going to be as clear as some others, but I just know that this needs to exist.

Where does the name come from?

I love to scuba dive, and the first time I went diving I thought, “There’s a whole world here, but we never see it.” Sexuality is similar. It exists but is often hidden. You don’t really know what’s there until you go take a look.

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Download Coral: Relationship self-care from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

When Ania Wysocka started having panic attacks as a university student, she turned to the first resource she thought of. “My instinct was to look for an app that could explain what was happening to me,” she says.

But when the hypnosis and therapy apps she downloaded didn’t have what she was seeking, she decided to create Rootd, whose lo-fi vibe matches its simple mission: to demystify panic attacks and bring on-the-spot relief.

Rootd offers a primer in the biology of anxiety, as well as breathing tools, journal prompts, and guided visualizations narrated by Wysocka herself. “The whole concept of Rootd is to befriend your fear and face it head-on,” says the British Columbia–based creator.

We caught up with her to discuss her own history, the power of perseverance, and how she learned to build an app from scratch.

What’s your personal experience with panic attacks?

I was in my fourth year of university and hanging out at a friend’s house when I experienced my first one. My heart started racing and I felt overcome with feelings of doom. As a young, relatively healthy person, it was terrifying and confusing. My doctor said everything was OK with me. I said, “Then how do you explain what happened?” They were quick to move on to the next patient.

What did you do to track down the explanation?

I looked in academic journals, but they were all written in medical jargon and not very helpful. I ended up seeing a counselor and reading the work of Claire Weekes. She was one of the first doctors to say that panic disorder does exist, that in a panic attack you enter a cycle of fear in which you’re constantly expecting it to happen again. That resonated.

How did you figure out how to turn that insight into an app?

It was years after my first panic attack, when I’d collected enough information and started feeling much better, that I went for it. I’d thought through the wireframes, design, and marketing, but I definitely didn’t know the techie stuff. I worked with a developer I’d known from a former job; he knew the nuts and bolts of building an app. It took a lot of trial and error. It required a lot of perseverance. Things kept falling apart, and we needed to just rebuild.

After you launched Rootd, how did you get the word out?

You don’t actually need to spend millions of dollars putting ads on buses. My main marketing strategy early on was App Store optimization via keyword optimization, which I learned about by reading articles online. The keywords that go into the body of the product description are like gold. You want to make sure you’re using all the space you can as strategically as possible.

What was your intention behind the app’s relatively simple design?

When you’re in a state of distress, you don’t need flair. You need focused and simple. The big red button is called the Rooter. You know how a huge oak tree in a storm will barely move, while a plant in the ground can topple over? Our goal is to get you to be the oak tree, so you feel confident you can withstand everything coming at you.

Download Rootd from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

Originally published on the App Store

Self-professed “photo nerds,” Ben Sandofsky and Sebastiaan de With built Halide to mimic the tactile feel of a professional-grade camera — and that meant focusing on every detail, right down to fonts that simulate the classic etched-in-metal look of traditional cameras.

“We didn’t see any apps that did exactly what we wanted, like letting you dial in settings as you would with a DSLR or film camera,” says de With. “We wanted something more pro and elegantly designed.”

Alongside iOS developer Rebecca Slatkin, the pair have turned Halide into one of the App Store’s most popular pro camera apps, bringing histograms, waveforms, color zebras, and RAW+JPEG capture to all. Spectre Camera, the team’s remarkable long-exposure app, was named 2019 iPhone App of the Year.

We spoke with Sandofsky, Slatkin, and de With about overnight success and the challenge of being popular.

When did you decide to create Halide?

de With: Ben slid into my Twitter DMs back in 2016. We interacted about photo gear and tech, then decided to make an app as a pure passion project. When we launched, I remember my mother saying, “There are a lot of camera apps out there.” But Ben and I had to scratch this itch.

What’s been your greatest challenge so far?

Sandofsky: When Halide started getting popular. People liked it so much more than we could have guessed. That got us to realize it could be a real business — and that we needed help. At the start, we’d have never imagined hiring someone else to help us with Halide and then Spectre. To have Rebecca on our team is a dream scenario.

What did you have to learn to launch Halide?

Slatkin: I didn’t know a ton about photography, so I faced a steep learning curve. But my dad was a professional photographer, and we had detailed, technical conversations about what he’s dedicated his life to. It’s been great to connect on that.

de With: Rebecca made our app appeal to more than just hardcore photo nerds. She brings the perspective of someone who loves taking photos but hasn’t been shooting with a Leica M8 for a decade. We needed that. We’re making a pro-level app, but we want to be sure we’re still approachable for people as they grow as photographers.

Can you share one of your most rewarding moments?

Sandofsky: Sebastiaan curates photos submitted to us by users, and at the end of the year he makes a calendar just for the three of us. Looking through that calendar is wildly inspiring. To see people using what you made with friends to express themselves is one of the coolest things you can experience.

What advice would you give to aspiring app developers?

Slatkin: Trust yourself. Every time you feel overwhelmed or intimidated, know that things are within your reach. When I feel that way, I break things down into small problems.

Sandofsky: Don’t get caught up in measuring yourself against others. Sometimes it’s luck, but people usually reach success after a lot of hard work. People who look like overnight successes have actually been working on their craft for 10 years. Everyone’s journey is different, and setbacks will happen. Just stay focused on what you want to do and why you want to do it.

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Download Halide Mark II – Pro Camera from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

November 15, 2021

Connect with Apple experts to learn how to create best-in-class apps. Tech Talks 2021 features office hours and live sessions with Q&As, so you can get your questions answered. We’ve updated the schedule with the third set of new content (including new office hours for App Store business and marketing), and the last set will be released in two weeks. Register today if you’re a member of the Apple Developer Program or Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

Learn more

It’s time once again for the Tech Talks Digest. We’ve got new sessions and office hours for you to explore, recaps for the events you missed, and a few tips on making the most of your office hours appointment.

Check out the latest activities, which run through December 3. These sessions and office hours are designed to help you learn more about our latest technologies, get your questions answered, and receive one-on-one guidance.

We’ll publish the final digest on November 29, highlighting updates to the sessions schedule, office hours signups, and more — so stay tuned!

Explore the schedule

You can browse and register for all Tech Talks activities taking place through December 3. We release new sessions and appointments for one-on-one office hours every two weeks, so check back on November 29 for the final round of activities through December 17.

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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.

Get the most out of office hours

Each Thursday, we offer office hours: 25-minute one-on-one appointments with a member of Apple’s Evangelism, App Review, Developer Technical Support, App Store Connect, or App Store Business teams. We encourage anyone who works on an app to apply for an appointment — especially if you’re a newer designer or developer. Each conversation is unique and tailored for you and your app, and all questions are welcome.

We’ve put together a short guide to help you decide which kind of appointment is right for you. If you don’t receive an appointment, please consider requesting another one in the future and providing more detail in your request. Since we have a limited number of spots, we prioritize requests based on where we can be most helpful.

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Technology & Design Evangelism
What can you do to make your app not just good, but great? Whether you need advice on designing or developing for Apple platforms, exploring a new native framework or technology, or want advice on a specific experience within your app, the Apple Evangelism team has extensive expertise designing for or developing on Apple platforms and wants to help take your app to the next level.

Apply if… You’re an engineer or designer and want advice and feedback on improving your app, or want a fresh take on your app’s experience.

Prepare by… Including as much detail as possible in your request. Do you want feedback on specific technologies or areas within your app? Do you have general questions about adding a new framework or exploring a new design idea? If you’re asking about an existing app, make sure to include a link (or TestFlight invitation) to your app — this helps us explore your app in advance and make the most of our time together. If you’d like to share content during your appointment, make sure you’ve set up your computer for screen sharing.

Learn how to set up your Mac for screen sharing

Learn how to share your screen in a meeting

During the appointment… We’ll discuss your goals, provide feedback, and answer any follow-up questions. Be prepared to show device screens or comps if needed.

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Developer Technical Support
Want help implementing SharePlay or chasing down a pesky error? DTS can help you with direct, personalized technical guidance on resolving a crash in your app, fixing a bug, or understanding a specific framework in more detail.

Apply if… You have code-level questions or an open Technical Support Incident (TSI) and want in-person guidance on resolving your problem.

Prepare by… Providing a clear, detailed description of your issue or question in your request. If you have an open TSI, be sure to include your follow-up number to continue the conversation. If you plan to show an Xcode project, set the theme to Presentation Mode in the Xcode Font & Colors preferences.

During the appointment… We’ll take a look at your issue and provide support to help find a resolution.

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App Review
Our App Review specialists are here to chat about the App Store Guidelines, preparing your app for review, or reasons for common rejections.

Apply if… You want to know how your app can best align with the guidelines, how to get ready to submit your app, or what to expect during review.

Prepare by… Letting us know what you’d like to discuss in as much detail as possible, so we can assign your request to the right specialist. You may also want to take a look at the App Review page on the Apple Developer website.

Learn more about App Review

During the appointment… We’ll go over your questions and provide advice on how to help the review process go more smoothly.

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App Store Connect
Whether you’re getting your app on the App Store for the first time or configuring a new feature like in-app events, you can request an appointment with the App Store Connect team for help with uploading, submitting, managing, or monitoring your apps.

Apply if… You need insight into any feature of App Store Connect, such as configuring in-app purchases, beta testing with TestFlight, monitoring performance with App Analytics, and much more.

Prepare by… Writing a descriptive request that helps us understand what you’d like to do in App Store Connect or what issues you’re running into. You may also want to take a look at App Store Connect Help on the Apple website.

Learn more about App Store Connect

During the appointment… We’ll go over your questions and provide support so you can move forward with distributing great apps and content.

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App Store Business & Marketing
Are you looking to explore different business models, marketing options, and opportunities? Would you want to learn how to increase engagement in your app? The App Store Business & Marketing team is here to help.

Apply if… You want to learn more about marketing, engagement, subscription models, or expanding to different international markets.

Prepare by… Giving a thorough description of what you’d like to learn about so we can connect you with the right person. If you have an existing app, include a link (or TestFlight invitation) to help us explore your app in advance and make the most of our time together.

During the appointment… We’ll review your goals and possible options — and provide guidance on how to choose what’s best for your app.

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Recap: Build smart app experiences with audio recognition and classification

We had a bit of fun on November 8 when we hosted a miniature audio challenge, asking developers to recognize the audio signature of a song using Siri or Shazam. This challenge — which most of our audience successfully completed! — was part of a session that explored the technologies you can use to “listen” to the world. Afterward, evangelists and the Shazam engineering team hosted over an hour of Q&A about implementation, recognition, and great experiences with audio.

If you missed this session, we’re presenting it again live from London on November 22. And for more information on using audio classification models, check out “Train custom Core ML models within your app” on November 29.

Build smart app experiences with audio recognition and classification

Train custom Core ML models within your app

Don’t miss: Explore the ingredients of a great AR experience

Whether you have an app that uses augmented reality (AR) already on the App Store or you’re just starting to explore potential AR opportunities, this session can help you understand some of the key ingredients for creating a great experience on Apple platforms. First we’ll show you how to craft an immersive onboarding flow, then we’ll go over techniques that can help you blend digital content effectively with reality for compelling and persuasive interactions.

Explore the ingredients of a great AR experience

Explore the ingredients of a great AR experience (Japanese)

Share your thoughts

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

Share your feedback on Tech Talks

There are many, many magical parts of being a parent. Assigning chores isn’t one of them.

S’moresUp can help. The app democratizes household tasks by establishing an easy, simple-to-follow calendar for the whole family that makes it clear who does what and when — and lets parents offer rewards for going above and beyond.

In the four-plus years since its launch, the app has helped more than 130,000 families spread the chores around — and not just to kids, according to founder Priya Rajendran.

“The first feedback we got was ‘Why can’t I assign chores to my husband or partner? Why is it only for kids?’” laughs Rajendran. “We made changes to open it up to families of all kinds.”

We caught up with Rajendran and cofounder Reeves Xavier to discuss the story behind S’MoresUp and why things seem to go wrong on birthdays.

How did you get the idea for S’moresUp?

Rajendran: I was a divorced single mother with a daughter in seventh grade. I needed to figure out how to manage her time between two houses and how to bring consistency into her life. I thought, “Well, there’s an app for everything, I’ll look there.” I found a lot of apps that did one thing very well, but I never found one that did everything.

What was the early feedback like?

Rajendran: We had kids telling us, “We hate you! You’re making me do chores every day!” [Laughs.]

What features of the app have you seen resonate?

Xavier: For older kids, the financial-education side is gaining popularity. Kids can cash out their accounts, so they learn how to save toward a goal and how to spend smart.

How has S’moresUp evolved since launch?

Xavier: The family setup in the past 20 years has changed drastically, and we got constant feedback on that: “How do we bring in more people — a grandparent or a nanny? How do I make sure my son’s chores transfer to a parent in another home?” Also, we no longer ask for a name; all we need is a nickname and age so we can give you age-appropriate chores.

What’s been your biggest challenge?

Rajendran: The past two years, we’ve had a major production outage on the day before my birthday. It’s as if someone knew! Last year I was on the road, so I pulled over to call my team in India and troubleshoot on the fly. My team wished me happy birthday and then went back to sleep. We’re a small operation — when things go bad, you just have to roll up your sleeves and get to it.

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Download S’moresUp – Best Chores App from the App Store

Learn more about the App Store Small Business Program

November 8, 2021

This year, we’re pleased to continue accepting submissions in App Store Connect throughout the upcoming holidays. Make sure your apps are up to date and ready for the busiest season on the App Store. Due to anticipated high volume, plan to send time-sensitive submissions early. Please note that reviews may take longer to complete from November 24 to 28 and December 23 to 27.

Learn about submitting apps