Apple is among the top leading IT companies that has completely revolutionized the touchscreen industry. With applications being its cornerstone, any major update and tweak made in the iOS impacts the application performance.
Now, when the iOS 8 has been revealed and all the issues have been resolved with the currently active version iOS 8.1 version. It is worth pondering into the all new offerings of Apple. This will help iOS developers to integrate the features appropriately and create an ultimate application that will surely facilitate their users with a richer experience.
It has been observed that the adaption of the latest version is quite high among iOS users as compared to the other users. Thus, to ensure that your app will run perfectly on the latest iOS 8.1, it is essential to make it support the updated features that are crucial to the app performance.
Moreover, there is a great probability that the Apple App Store will impose some platform specific condition like it does after the release of iOS 7 (it had restricted the submission of applications that are not built with the iOS 7 SDK).
All these reasons are sufficient to represent that how significant it is for an iOS developer must be aware of the eminent features while updating or creating an iOS 8 application.
The iOS 8 has come up with several new capabilities; without any further ado, let’s have a glimpse over a few of them.
New And Improved Kits Available On The Board: While further enhancing the features of the platform, iOS 8 is incorporated with numerous beneficial kits. It includes -
• HomeKit – This kit features program that seamlessly combines a variety of home automation devices and application.
◦ Thus, it offers you a challenge to create a next generation device that can be managed via mobile device.
• HealthKit – This kit is aimed to unite all the data from the connected health and fitness apps and devices to the Apple’s Health application.
◦ You may create a compatible feature-rich application that helps comprehend user’s health or fitness details.
• Controllers, SpriteKit and SceneKit – These two kits are designed to augment gaming applications.
◦ You may choose to create an interesting gaming application by implementing the latest features of these new kits.
• Document Picker or Storage Provider – This feature broadens up an enhanced ecosystem to offer improved info sharing.
◦ Reap the benefits of this fabulous feature while ensuring security and absolute user experience in your application.
• PhotoKit And Enhanced APIs For The Camera – A new photo framework has been created that allows developers to facilitate the access to all the image and video files that are managed by Photos app via their application. And, the latest Camera APIs offer access to the camera’s settings.
Apple Pay, Now Available for NFC Devices Apple Watch (in US only) – However, this feature is made available to only US users, but you can garner great businesses by developing an application that implements this amazing feature. There are more than 50 million iOS users in the US, thus, developing an app implementing this feature would be completely worthy. Moreover, this feature is expected to be soon available to other users as well.
If your existing iOS application needs any kind of logins or facilitates purchases, it is advisable to consider the latest security tools offered by iOS 8, and appropriately upgrade the app with the improved capabilities.
Substantially Increased Screen Real Estate – From iPhone 4s (3.5”) to iPhone 5 (4”), and from iPhone 5 (4”) to iPhone 6 (4.7”) and iPhone 6Plus (5.5”), you probably have observed that the existing applications are executable on the improved iOS, but without taking the advantages of greater screen real estate.
This issue can be easily resolved by reconsidering the design and development of an application by simply setting the display logic for the application as auto layout. This tweak will facilitate your app with a real time and logical layout while considering several associated constraints. However, to ensure absolute benefits of additional real estate, it is recommended to rather go for recreation of app.
Extensions and Widgets Further Added Flexibility To The iOS Ecosystem – Now, you will be able to enhance your application with better content and functionality by simply adding a suitable app extension. This will ensure custom functionality to your users. It offers several extension points including, Share, Action, Storage Provider, Photo Editing, Custom Keyboard and Action.
It is advisable to review the core functionality of your application. If the rigid rules have hindered its performance, upgrade it to the more flexible and secure iOS ecosystem. Moreover, you can also integrate suitable widgets in your application to efficiently deliver alerts or notifications to the app users.
With these latest improvements in the recently released iOS 8, developers have gotten greater opportunities to deliver remarkable services to their clients and outstanding results to the users. As, these advanced features have open the space for more innovative ideas and superior technicalities, developers can create a valuable app and device by appropriately integrating these iOS 8 offerings.