Imagine you had an iPhone 15 now.. would you let Siri access all of your contacts, messages, emails, notes, calendar, app data etc so that it could help you perform tasks on your device?
Hey, it's Chris here. Did you hear what Apple announced at WWDC this year?
I want to share the 7 biggest ones with you (in my opinion) plus my 3 takeaways on how it affects developers and app entrepreneurs.
First of all, the 7 biggest announcements in my opinion:
1. Siri is getting personal. It accesses and indexes all of your data and experiences on your device so that you can ask it to perform tasks like an executive assistant. Siri knows everything in your email, calendar, notes, contacts, messages etc.
2. Siri uses ChatGPT 4o so you can ask it questions and get intelligent answers.
3. Writing tools like generating text and grammar correction are available anywhere you interact with text on your device (such as writing an email or taking notes).
4. Image generation is everywhere you need an image on your device.
5. All of the AI is done locally and privately on the device unless it canāt, then it will use Private Compute Cloud.
6. Xcode 16 has predictive code completion and context of your project. It can anticipate what you want to type, suggest it and you can just accept the prediction.
7. Xcode 16 has an AI code assistant called Swift Assist. Using natural language, you can ask coding questions, ask it to write code for you or for it to modify your code.
This isnāt an itemized list of everything they announced but these 7 weigh heaviest in my mind.
How does this affect us as developers and app entrepreneurs?
Letās see analyze this together:
iOS18 makes generative AI (generating text and images) and general AI (performing tasks) more accessible for everyday users.
That means that:
Key Takeaway #1:
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The general population of Apple device users will get more familiar with using AI to write emails, chat, sort photos, book events, find information and other everyday tasks.
What it means for us developers: Users will come to expect AI features in our app.
For example, if youāre asking users to fill out a form and they canāt use AI to pull in information to do it automatically, theyāll have a negative experience because theyāve come to expect it to be that easy.
Key Takeaway #2:
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Siri can use data across apps and perform tasks across apps too.
What it means for us developers: Weāll have to expose the app data to Siri and expose the ability for Siri to perform tasks within our app. This is done through Siri Kit and App Intents.
For example, your app is a To-Do app and the user asks Siri to mark one of the To Do items as āCompleteā.
If Siri canāt read the data or doesnāt have the ability to mark it complete, then the user will have a negative experience and theyāll find a different ToDo app that WILL allow them to use Siri to interact with it.
Key Takeaway #3:
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Swift and SwiftUI coding is more accessible in Xcode 16.
What that means for us developers: Less emphasis on knowing how to code, Swift syntax and knowing frameworks etc And more emphasis on knowing how things are put together.
Additionally it means more people will be able to build apps, which means more competition in the App Store.
We have to go more broadly. Itās less about the implementation details and more about the bigger picture.
I think that success in the App Store as an indie developer is going to be a bigger of a test of skills in product development and marketing rather than a test of engineering skills.
To sum it up:
I think itās quite a unique opportunity for Apple developers because our phones are such intimate devices.
Most of us have our entire lives on our phones: conversations, memories, personal files, our email inboxes can weave a trail of everything we bought, every place weāve gone, meals weāve had, our business dealings and more.
I donāt think thereās another web based AI tool that has access to all of that data.
With ChatGPT, for example, it may have access to some files that you uploaded and gave it access to, but it doesnāt have access to everything combined: your calendar, contacts, message history, email and so on.
But Siri does.
So I think itās going to open up some really cool user experiences and tasks that you can ask the AI to perform.
We as Apple developers donāt have access to all that data either, but we have the opportunity to build apps that can be a part of this new AI driven user experience.
And since Xcode 16 makes coding and building apps more accessible than ever, thereās no excuse not to launch your first app š
If youād like to get your coding foundation set so that you can take advantage of Xcode 16 when it releases, make sure you check out our WWDC sale (codewithchris.com/plus).
Going through our Launch Your First App program will put you in a great position to capitalize on this new opportunity.
It's an exciting time to be an iOS app developer!
Hey CodeCrew, the iOS community is anticipating Apple to make some big announcements regarding AI this Monday, June 10 at WWDC (Worldwide Developers Conference).
Even Apple has hinted that itās going to be āAbsolutely Incredibleā and seeing as how WWDC is a developer centric conference, I think it's safe to say that AI will be integrated into Xcode in some capacity.
I'm looking forward to seeing how Apple will integrate generative AI into existing Xcode features and how well their large language model will accelerate writing code. Seeing how there is so much buzz around AI and how it will change how we develop apps, I often get the question:
āIs it still worth it to learn how to code?ā
Yes, in my opinion for 3 reasons:
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1. Learning to code right now is the easiest that it's ever been.
A chatbot tool like ChatGPT is a great coding buddy/teacher.
It can give you feedback on how to improve your code, find errors in your code, help you debug crashes, explain concepts to you, show you how to use things that you've never touched before, suggest potential solutions for the feature you want to build, show you how to build a UI that you're unsure of how to put together... the list goes on.
All of that is just a chat prompt away.
If gaining relevant coding skills is what you really want, I believe your chances are the highest it's ever been.
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2. AI is the new "gold rush". Take advantage of it!
Similar to how the Internet created a ton of opportunities for new ideas and products, AI has done the same.
There are still so many ways to apply AI to our lives that haven't been thought of yet.
But it's hard to capitalize on this opportunity if you don't have at least a basic understanding of code and where AI can fit and improve.
At the moment, AI can't generate an entire finished product for you end to end.
It works best when you give it smaller pieces and then you take the output and integrate the product yourself.
Which means that...
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3. You can't take full advantage of AI code generation if you don't know basic coding
Itās important to take a little time to get to a basic level where you can really start to benefit from using something like ChatGPT to learn iOS development.
Imagine:
You have the next great app idea, but you don't know how to start.
You ask ChatGPT "How do I build a better app than Uber with the following enhanced features (X,Y,Z)?"
The output will be as cryptic and high level as your question, with a response you probably wonāt know what to do with. Which brings me to the following point:
The quality of AI output is only as good as its inputs.
As you probably have seen with Google Geminiās questionable responses about eating rocks and putting glue on pizza. š«£
The more specific and detailed your question is, the better output you will get from AI. You will also be able to dive deeper by asking AI about the frameworks and classes that it chose to use.
But none of that would make sense, if you donāt know the basics of code. AI can assist you in solving problems faster, only if you have strategy and know-how in the first place.
AI will change our role where we spend less time coding and more time innovating, problem solving and integrating.
One thing I do know is, AI will change HOW we code, but we still need to UNDERSTAND the code itself.
What do you think?
Happy Tuesday! WWDC announcements are just 6 days away. What are you hoping Apple will announce?
(Photo: Me working on some challenges for courses. Yes, those are juggling balls on my desk.. i used to be able to do it.. trying to relearn during breaks.)
Ok, i'm done with the YouTube API app and the video lessons will start releasing on this channel soon.
It's time to start building the next one which should use Firestore database.
In the poll last month, I suggested a Shared Todo app... but now it sounds kind of boring to me haha
Can y'all give me some better ideas for the next app series to do which uses Firestore DB?
(Don't make it too complex... I don't want it to be a 30 lesson series lol)
So earlier this week, I asked yāall if you thought that this app was built in SwiftUI.
There were answers across the board but the real answer is 100% SwiftUI!
I spoke with the app author, Thomas, and he explained how it took him 2 years in his spare time to bring this game to life. (apps.apple.com/au/app/quiz-word/id6450402895)
The cool thing is that I saw the first version of this game back in 2019 when it was a simple quiz app.
Now itās a crossword game with solo mode, real time battles, daily puzzles and leaderboards.
I played a few games (real time crossword battles are intense!) and I was really surprised to learn from Thomas that it was all SwiftUI.
Over the next few weeks, Iāll share Thomasā story of building this app, applying for funding, finding partners and more.
If you have any specific questions about the app or how certain things were done in the app, let me know and I'll bring it up with him.
Do you think this game was built with SwiftUI?
Comment below and I'll reveal the answer on Thursday š
If you want a closer look: apps.apple.com/au/app/quiz-word/id6450402895
Hey, itās Chris here with your weekly update from the car.
New Releases:
This week we released a tutorial for the SwiftUI Color Picker component. I honestly didnāt realize how easy it is to show a full fledged Photoshop level color picker in your app. That video is coming out on YT tomorrow.
Next, we released a blog article on the SwiftUI GroupBox. To think that I used to created rounded rectangles as backgrounds. No need to do that anymore with this handy GroupBox. Learn how easy to use it is here: codewithchris.com/swiftui-groupbox/
Pop Quiz:
For this weekās poll, I asked a fun question to see how many people are paying attention:
āWhatās lazy about a LazyVGrid?ā.
If you think you know the answer, vote here
youtube.com/post/UgkxpsUFUqsau86LCPev9G1GI91rd_8X_ā¦
Poll: Do you use UIKit?
Last week we also asked the audience if they use UIKit. 20% of people didnāt even know what it was š but the rest was an even split between Yes / No.
Most of the Yeses were people using it in a workplace that still relies on UIKit or people who need to incorporate a few UIKit only components into a SwiftUI project.
Very interestingā¦ Letās see if WWDC this year can tip those scales more in favor of SwiftUI!
New Foundations Challenges:
In CWC+ news, weāve released some new challenges into the Foundations course with more to come! Next week, Iām going to finish the hand-in assignment so that students can start doing it to earn their Foundations course certificates :)
Job Ready Course Name Needed:
The Job Ready (name TBD) course is also about half way done.. In the meantime, do you have a catchy name idea?
Launch Your First App is our first program which takes you from zero to publishing an app.
The āJob Readyā course is the next step, intended to help you develop your resume, portfolio, technical and soft skills and to start applying for positions.
Whatās a memorable and catchy name for this second program? Let us know your idea by commenting below. If we end up using the name you came up with, I'll give you free access :)
Pop quiz! What is lazy about a LazyVGrid in SwiftUI?
Hey CodeCrew,
Just want to give you another behind the scenes update on what the team and I have been working on!
Last week I showed you a preview of the YouTube app that I was planning to start recording videos for this week.
Thatās underway and weāve still managed to do some releases this week!
Weāre experimenting with some shorter videos focusing on how to accomplish specific things.
The idea is that sometimes you donāt need a full length, end to end video with lots of explanations and variations. You just want the answer!
If these types of videos are well received, then we plan to do a mixture of shorter tutorials focused on specific tasks, longer in-depth tutorials focused on a topic and series based videos (like building the YT app).
Oh! And weāre planning a refresh for our CodeCrew community. (Psst! Maybe app challenges are making a come back?)
Thanks for reading this weeks update and please enjoy this random photo of my keyboard :)
(The model of the keyboard is Dolice and the keycaps are GMK Oblivion)
Welcome to the largest dedicated iOS tutorial channel on YouTube! Learn how to make an app with Swift, SwiftUI and Xcode. With over 17 million video views and 7 years of teaching online, let me help you turn your app idea into a reality! We answer every single comment so don't hesitate to leave your question and either myself or someone from my team will get back to you!