Apple Worldwide Developers Conference Kicks Off June 2 | Hacker News Reader

Apple Worldwide Developers Conference Kicks Off June 2

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70 pointsczr8068 comments

It seems to me the hint is in all the different sized squares. iOS is going variable screen resolution (which it already supports, only no-one really cares). Mac OS X is probably going to let you treat any display like a Retina display (this kind of capability is already everywhere, but only available in certain contexts, e.g. when mirroring to a different resolution display). Between TVs, cars, 4K, big iPhones, and so on, Apple has to bite the bullet and just support arbitrary screen sizes.

Incidentally, has anyone noticed that Apple's push towards simple geometric UI design in iOS7 has simultaneously reduced application sizes (less need for giant bitmaps), improved performance and battery life, and paved the way for more flexible screen resolutions.

This also likely means we're finally going to see the Apple TV as a games console. This similarly means that third party TV apps will probably appear (and thus we'll get CBS, Showtime, etc. on the Apple TV itself). (

Obviously Amazon has beaten Apple to the punch, but I suspect the Apple console might have quite a decent launch lineup.

What about pressure-sensitive touch? There was a patent filed recently using IR light to detect how hard someone is touching a screen:

http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=H...

If so, I predict a demo with an iPad and a Piano app (playing soft and hard notes).

accelerometer already does this surprisingly well on ipad garageband

whoa, I had no idea. that's cool.

It IS cool. My housemate was the engineer behind it. He's cool. Also, a genius.

I think you are drawing way too many conclusions from the rounded square (i.e., the app icon) motif used every year for WWDC since the iPhone.

Of course it's more than possible that I'm jumping to wishful conclusions! But in previous years they either showed app icons, or any difference in icon size could be attributed to distance (i.e. the implication being the icons were all the same size, but different distances away).

Anyway, we'll know soon enough.

That's the fun of Apple "Kremlinology", finding meaning in the smallest, stupidest details of their invitations. It's like when my friends and I would hang out in diners and try to prove the Discordian Law of Fives by finding relationships to the number 5 in the most mundane things.

Packet of sugar? "Sugar" has 5 letters.

Coca-Cola? Their slogan is "The Pause that Refreshes". Six syllables. Six is 2*3. 2+3 is 5.

It's like, so deep, man.

"Obviously Amazon has beaten Apple to the punch"

As for public skd, sure. But we've already been able to use AirPlay on games for a while. For years. It's obvious (for now) Apple's notion of a controller is the iOS device itself, vs. Amazon using a typical console controller.

I've been waiting for years (like a lot of people I suppose) for Apple to spring the ATV sdk on the public. Every year, every WWDC, disappointment. This year I'm not holding my breath.

> Apple's notion of a controller is the iOS device itself

Apple introduced standards for console style iOS game controllers last year. A handful of compliant controllers have been available for a while.

Airplay on games is total shit. The amount of time it takes for the screen to get encoded, sent to the atv, then displayed on the tv, is really unnerving.

Its like playing Counterstrike back in the 56k and >100ms ping days. Aka, not a twitch game. Might work for things like plants versus zombies or candy crush though. But things like infinity blade are not playable. I tried, and failed horribly and just ended up using the screen anyway.

Would be cool if they opened up the airplay sdk and atv as well though. I do like my appletv in general but playing games from my ipad or iphone is... at best frustrating.

Sony and Microsoft beat Amazon to the punch. Whatever that means.

I remember Apple being beaten to the punch on MP3 players.

Being first sometimes just tells the other guys what doesn't work.

> This similarly means that third party TV apps will probably appear (and thus we'll get CBS, Showtime, etc. on the Apple TV itself).

On this point, it seems like we're already there. Apple seems pretty willing to let anyone with original video content have access to the Apple TV APIs and will distribute their app. Look at all the stuff they've added lately, that has pretty small audiences.

The actual main obstacle is contracts that prevent the content providers from making their content available on set-top boxes at all, because it would compete directly with their existing distribution channels (broadcast affiliates.)

> Incidentally, has anyone noticed that Apple's push towards simple geometric UI design in iOS7 has simultaneously reduced application sizes (less need for giant bitmaps), improved performance and battery life, and paved the way for more flexible screen resolutions.

I have never seen numbers that indicate better battery life or performance on iOS 7, in fact the opposite has been measured on the iPhone 4:

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/03/ios-7-1-on-the-iphone-4...

Plus UIKit is still monkey-patched around fixed-height UITableViews everywhere. I have increased the font size in iOS 7.1 and see truncated text all around the OS (with no tooltips to save me), probably because implementing line breaks in lists is pretty painful.

I don't really disagree, maybe Apple wants to release a larger-sized iPhone with an all-new resolution. But I don't think that iOS 7 has made resolution-independent app development any easier. (Xcode 5 has made AutoLayout a lot more bearable, though.)

"The opportunity to buy tickets to WWDC 2014 will be offered by random selection. Register by Monday, April 7 at 10:00 a.m. PDT for your chance to attend. We will let you know your status by email on Monday, April 7 at 5:00 p.m. PDT."

(https://developer.apple.com/wwdc/tickets/)

This is a lot better than the conference selling out in 2 minutes like last year.

Seems like this one is going to make it to the frontpage. Recap of relevant links:

Press Release: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2014/04/03Apple-Worldwide-De...

Direct link to register page: https://developer.apple.com/wwdc/tickets/

Info for company account holders: it seems like every Apple ID associated with your company account can enter the lottery separately.

Confirmed: tickets can be transferred among team members. So if you have a company account it's time to promote everyone in your company to developer status ...

Quote from https://developer.apple.com/wwdc/more/: "Tickets may not be sold, resold, bartered, auctioned, or transferred in any way. As an exception to the foregoing, requests to transfer tickets among eligible team members may be submitted to Apple for consideration at wwdc@apple.com. Apple reserves the right to reject any transfer requests."

Not sure if it's too late for that; the notice said you needed to be a registered developer at the time of the WWDC announcement?

Incidentally (and off-topic; apologies), does anyone know if you can sign Mac apps, e.g. to distribute outside of the app store, with an iOS developer account? I'd like to sign up for one of the developer programmes and can't justify spending money on both right now. I'm not sure why Apple has two separate developer programmes anyway...

No, you can't sign Mac apps with an iOS account & vice versa

The biggest advantage seems to be in the iOS account. You can test and even distribute Mac programs with out being a member, but for iOS you can't even test on your own device with out an account. You don't need a Mac account unless you want to sell in the Mac App Store

From the horse's mouth:

"Only Mac Developer Program members are eligible to request Developer ID certificates and sign applications or installer packages using them."

Regarding the lottery, I wonder if you can enter once for every developer team you're on, or just once per individual regardless of teams.

My guess based on the screens I just saw is once per Apple ID.

And importantly the tickets are not transferable in any way.

If they're doing random selection maybe they could lower the price of the ticket a bit. Hard sell for an indie dev especially when flights are accommodation are factored in. Around £3000 total not including daily expenses (transport, food etc).

Yeah, it's a hard justification for us aussies these days. Minimum spend ends up being about 4,000

Honestly, a week in San Francisco with an expensive flight is going to be pricey and a hard sell even if the WWDC tickets are free.

Apple has done a pretty good job keeping the price constant since 2010 (and before that there was just an early bird discount, which they got rid of once it started selling out early.)

The upside is that you see far fewer people attending who aren't developers or aren't serious about Apple's platforms. Google I/O, for example, has had quality issues (with both the sessions and attendees) due to how inexpensive it was and the expectation of a giveaway to offset the price of admission.

That said, Apple's "return" compensation in terms of giveaway gifts and the like is a bit... stingy. Especially given how unbelievable Apple's profits have been of late.

WWDC giveaway: A $40 jacket that says "14" on it. Google I/O giveaway: $1449 Chromebook pixel.

So much for loyalty.

Your 'return' is hands on time with engineers and access to developer sessions. It's a developer conference, not a giveaway.

The entire idea is to not provide any "gifts" and "devices" to people attending, so the only reason they are attending is for quality 1:1 time with the Apple engineers plus the opportunity to socialize with your fellow Apple developers. The actual sessions are available on video, so you don't need to attend for those. Viewed from this perspective, lack of giveaways is a very deliberate and desirable feature of the WWDC.

That makes sense. I can certainly see how giving away freebies is not the way to attract serious developers, and can be distracting.

When you have to give your product away in order to help generate output from your developer community, that is an issue.

The lack of hardware freebies at Apple = developer opportunity essentially. Your "gift" is a healthy vibrant ecosystem, should you choose to accept it.

Why should they have to give anything special out? A bit of swag, sure, but pricey items? By your measure, they should be costing themselves at least $549/attendee (the difference between the Chromebook price and Google I/O admission cost). That's not including all the other costs that the admissions likely doesn't cover completely. Even for a profitable company that can afford it, other than the continued effort to drive everything to zero value, what's the point?

You make a developer event essentially free, and actually a net positive in material value, you end up with no developers attending. It's Comic Con for tech nerds. For a developer conference to have more value for the developers than the non-developers or they'll get pushed out because they're in the minority of interested parties.

> So much for loyalty.

Loyalty? Is buying attendance by giving away free stuff a way to show loyalty? Is buying users of software and players of games by giving it a way showing loyalty? It's a fucking PR stunt.

I think the value of (attending) WWDC has become far too overrated.

With all the sessions, resources, and keynotes being make available online almost immediately , while a fun week, is hard to justify from a business perspective.

I think you mean the value of attending WWDC is overrated.

The resources made available (for free, essentially) are underrated IMO.

Yep sorry that's exactly what I meant. The resources are excellent and definitely appreciate the amount of effort that goes into producing it all.

For me the value wasn't just the sessions, but really being immersed in this ecosystem for a few days without work distractions, and networking.

But now I can watch session videos online, and have found a lot of value in networking at local Cocoa groups instead. So in that sense, the value is diluted.

But the real gem of WWDC IMO is getting one-on-one time with Apple Engineers. If you are actually working on apps and are stuck somewhere, these can be a real boon.

Absolutely the Lab Time. Being able to watch a developer talk about something live is arguably the same live or later on video, but then being able to go and sit with them afterward and ask questions is invaluable. I gained more from 20 minutes with two different engineers last year than sitting through most of the sessions.

Absolutely.

I was building an enterprise app doing multiple simultaneous asynchronous HTTP calls, but was running into issues where certain connections would just die outright. The problem was that the dying connections seemed non-deterministic, which obviously made it very difficult to debug.

I spent most of the week before WWDC trying to debug the issue (to no avail), but since WWDC was coming up (and since I was already registered), I made sure to set aside some time to go to the Framework labs to see if I can get some help.

I went the first day it was open... and was able to talk to the Apple engineer who actually built the Foundation httpClient class. I sat down with him for about 20 min, where we actually went over my code, and he was able to explain what I was doing incorrectly.

20 minutes. And it was fixed.

I probably would've had to spend at least another week banging my head against a wall, and even then, it might not have gotten fixed correctly.

Given any reasonable hourly rate, that single one-on-one alone already paid for the entire conference.

IMO, if you're going to just hobnob and go to the keynote and sessions, then yes, your money is probably going to be better spent elsewhere, especially since all the sessions are available online, and because most of the after-parties and networking events all throughout SF/SOMA don't require you to register for WWDC.

But if you have projects you are actively working on and are encountering issues or anticipate that you will be encountering issues that will be time consuming to debug on your own, then if you spend some or most of your time in the labs, WWDC is absolutely invaluable.

>> "But if you have projects you are actively working on and are encountering issues or anticipate that you will be encountering issues that will be time consuming to debug on your own, then if you spend some or most of your time in the labs, WWDC is absolutely invaluable."

I don't disagree BUT for this to make sense you have to have a major bug in your app you're having trouble solving and have that happen at the same time WWDC takes place.

The hard part is finding time to watch the videos when you don't have a dedicated week for it.

There is often a subtle clue in the invite images as to what might be announced.

I see a bunch of Mac minis, apple TVs and airport expresses ;-)

Seeing people reading the tea leaves on this one will be entertainment for a few weeks.

Or maybe they just like pretty graphics.

What clues were in previous years exactly ? http://f.cl.ly/items/083S2g21292V1z403y31/image.jpg

None. It's always been the product announcements that have had the hints. WWDC usually was just colorful and playful.

http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/21/4852132/history-of-apple-...

The shape of app icons has been dominating WWDC invites for a long time. They were a central design element going back to 2009 (refer to supercoder’s comment for a picture).

First they showed actual icons of apps (2009, 2010, 2011), in the last two years and this year they showed more stylised app icons (2012, 2013, 2014). The goes back to even before Forestall was fired/left. It’s always differently coloured app icons. Last year they were overlaid and angled, the year before that they were also overlaid, angled and in different sizes. This year they are only in different sizes.

All you could glean from last years invite was a slight shift in design aesthetic, but that change has already happened (and this years invite is in the same style as last years) so there is no new information in this invite.

All this tells you is that WWDC will be all about apps. As it has been for at least half a decade now. I don’t think whoever designed this even know about the new iPhone hardware.

Exactly, it's usually only the press invites for Apple Special Events that have a glimpse of what might be unveiled.

Go on then, I'll have a go a reading too much into the artwork...

Looks like a flat version of the Apple TV intro video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFnlKtwIrFg

They cracked it.

It's about presence. The iWatch.

Enter your room, lights go on, leave, lights off. Get on your car, maps automatically on, iPhone goes hands free. Siri will be with you at all times, no need to take her out of your pocket.

But most importantly...

Payments, small purchases, worldwide. From gas stations, grocery shops, fast-food chains. One billion iWatches will be used for payments in the next five years.

Apple is betting the house on it.

How do I know it? The competition is ramping up their job listings for e-commerce specialists. Exactly where the money is, a strong competitor in the monopoly arena of credit cards.

I, for one, welcome our new payment overlords.

In my wrist.

Casey Liss predicted this last night on the live broadcast of ATP.

Now he's just going to look silly when the episode drops friday.

And so, for the third straight year, retina MBA or GTFO.

Last paragraph:

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world,

Never noticed their PR lines like that. A little extreme?

Looks like they've been using that line in press releases for years: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22best+personal+computers+i...

Yes, but their PR or brand message or whatever you want to call it has always been fairly extreme. I mean, just look at their 1984 super bowl ad... or really, any ad they've put out in the last decade or so (http://www.apple.com/designed-by-apple/)

Here's a good blog post on how that has changed over the years: http://www.512pixels.net/blog/2014/01/apple-boilerplate

And here's Microsoft's version:

"Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential."

No one is going to be humble in their own press releases.

If they don't unveil a larger iPhone, I'm going to buy a Galaxy the second that conference is over. They've been so far behind the curve with respects to screen size -- almost every other major contender is shipping larger screens. The norm has changed.

Should warm up the credit card then - hardware announcements haven't been made at WWDC for a long time. All iPhone announcements are in September.

The iPhone 4 was announced at WWDC, so I'm a little hopeful.

Four years ago. The only product announcement since was the Mac Pro last year, and it was a teaser. This isn't a consumer or device focused event, so big product announcements like that are unlikely, with exceptions being where they influence development. Obviously a bigger iPhone will require new development, but I wouldn't expect a full-fledged unveiling.

Even if they do intend on a changing the screen size, they're not going to let the cat out of the bag at WWDC.

When the iPhone 5 changed the screen size, we heard nothing from Apple besides a very oblique "we have AutoLayout now, use AutoLayout!", which wasn't anywhere close to conclusive about anything.

The push on AutoLayout since iPhone 5 probably also means even less chance Apple will be forced to admit anything during WWDC.

Fair enough. There's still a fair amount of AutoLayout magic I don't understand, but it has made my life a little easier. I also really didn't expect them to show anything, and it drives me nuts how blown out of proportion WWDC has become. It's a terrible day when developers can't get access to engineers and training because executives and the press want a front-row seat to the Keynote bail by Tuesday.

Let me break the news for you: Apple is gonna release the next iPhone(s) with iOS 8, which should be in beta 2-3 months before they release it to public. We don't have iOS 8 beta now, which means zero chance of them drop the public release in June.

It's unlikely that they'll announce a new iPhone at WWDC, since (as others have pointed out) it's been years since they've done new hardware announcements (apart from the Mac Pro in 2008 and again last year.)

However, it's entirely possible that they'll announce new capabilities in iOS 8 which make it easier for developers to create apps that adjust easily to different screen sizes... in which case, speculate away. :-)

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