This week on AppStories, we are joined by MacStories editor and senior developer Alex Guyot to conclude our WWDC wish list series with a look at tvOS and watchOS.
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I’ve long considered HomeRun by Aaron Pearce a must-have app if you’re into HomeKit automation. With version 2, which is available for the iPhone and iPad and is out today, HomeRun adds all-new ways to access HomeKit scenes with in-app grids and Home Screen widgets, along with an updated Apple Watch complication editor. Although the initial setup process can be a bit laborious, investing some time in a setup on multiple devices pays off, allowing you to trigger scenes in many more ways than is possible with the Home app.
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For the first time, Apple has announced the finalists in the running for its annual Apple Design Awards. The awards ceremony revealing the winners will be held during WWDC at 2:00 pm Pacific on June 10th.
The finalists have been divided into six categories that include six finalists each:
Inclusivity
Delight and Fun
Interaction
Social Impact
Visuals and Graphics
Innovation
The selections include a lot of games and entertainment apps, including several Apple Arcade titles, and a mix of apps from smaller developers like CARROT Weather, Craft, Nova, and Pok Pok Playroom as well as bigger publishers. Panic’s Nova also stands out from the rest of the finalists as the sole app that is not available in one of Apple’s stores.
I like that Apple has announced the finalists in advance. Winning an ADA is a big achievement for any developer, but it’s also nice to know who the finalists are because it, too, is quite an honor among the many apps that could be chosen.
Apple has announced the winners of its annual WWDC Swift Student Challenge. This year, the group includes 350 students from 35 countries and regions.
Susan Prescott, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations and Enterprise and Education Marketing said of this year’s participants:
Every year, we are inspired by the talent and ingenuity that we see from our Swift Student Challenge applicants. This year, we are incredibly proud that more young women applied and won than ever before, and we are committed to doing everything we can to nurture this progress and reach true gender parity.
Of the many winners this year, Apple chose three sets of winners to spotlight in its press release:
- Sisters Gianna and Shannon Yan, whose app Feed Fleet matches volunteers with at-risk people for free grocery during the pandemic
- 15-year-old Abinaya Dinesh, whose app Gastro at Home helps people with gastrointestinal disorders, access information and resources about their conditions
- Damilola Awofisayo, who created TecHacks, a non-profit with the mission of “creating a supportive environment for girls everywhere to create, problem-solve, and showcase their talents alongside like-minded females to compete and work with.” Awofisayo is also working on an American Sign Language app
Apple’s WWDC Student Challenge has changed over the years, most recently focusing on the Swift programming language, but it’s been a mainstay of the conference for years now. The competition is one of my favorite parts of the conference, too, having had one of my own kids participate in it in 2013 and seeing how it inspired him to pursue a career as a developer. Since then, I’ve had the chance to meet many past winners and cover their apps on MacStories, which has made it clear to me just how big an impact the program has had in many students’ lives.
This week, Federico and John are joined by MacStories editor and senior developer Alex Guyot to conclude their WWDC wish list series with a look at tvOS and watchOS.
On AppStories+, we welcome Alex Guyot to the show to talk about how he started writing at MacStories as a high school senior and his favorite feature of Calliope, the web app he built to run Club MacStories and AppStories+.
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With WWDC just around the corner, I wanted to share what would make this year an exciting one for me. We’ve shared a lot of specific wishes over the past several weeks on AppStories, so today, I want to zoom out a little to focus on the big picture items and themes. I don’t...
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This week, Federico and John look back at Federico’s exclusive tour of the Via del Corso Apple store in Rome, iOS and iPadOS 14.6, WWDC news, an Apple TV 4K review, and the evolution of the iMac, plus movie and TV show Unwind picks.
- MacStories Weekly
- Federico’s lossless music streaming experiments continue with a new DAC
- John considers the impact of Apple’s unclear home entertainment message on his AV setup
- A tip on scanning to your Mac from an iPhone or iPad
- A preview of next week’s MacStories Unplugged episode
Unwind
- Federico’s Pick:
- John’s Pick:
It was only last week that I wrote about my external DAC setup for iPhone and iPad in preparation for Apple Music’s upcoming lossless and high-resolution tiers, which I’m going to test out of personal interest despite my switch to Spotify last year. As I teased in the story, I had already been keeping...
Federico and I lamented the Files app’s lack of features in comparison to the Finder in our iOS 15 Wishes and iPadOS Wishes episodes of AppStories, which got me thinking again about all the power packed into the Finder. Day-to-day, when you’re opening files and dragging them from one spot to another, it’s easy...
Federico
