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New GameSave API fails, "Couldn’t communicate with a helper application."
I've been playing with the new GameSave API and cannot get it to work. I followed the 3-step instructions from the Developer video. Step 2, "Next, login to your Apple developer account and include this entitlement in the provisioning profile for your game." seems to be unnecessary, as Xcode set this for you when you do step 1 "First add the iCloud entitlement to your game." Running the app on my device and tapping "Load" starts the sync, then fails with the error "Couldn’t communicate with a helper application." I have no idea how to troubleshoot this. Every other time I've used CloudKit it has Just Worked™. Halp‽ Here is my example app: import Foundation import SwiftUI import GameSave @main struct GameSaveTestApp: App { var body: some Scene { WindowGroup { GameView() } } } struct GameView: View { @State private var loader = GameLoader() var body: some View { List { Button("Load") { loader.load() } Button("Finish sync") { Task { try? await loader.finish() } } } } } @Observable class GameLoader { var directory: GameSaveSyncedDirectory? func stateChanged() { let newState = withObservationTracking { directory?.state } onChange: { Task { @MainActor [weak self] in self?.stateChanged() } } print("State changed to \(newState?.description ?? "nil")") switch newState { case .error(let error): print("ERROR: \(error.localizedDescription)") default: _ = 0 // NOOP } } func load() { print("Opening gamesave directory") directory = GameSaveSyncedDirectory.openDirectory() stateChanged() } func finish() async throws { print("finishing syncing") await directory?.finishSyncing() } }
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378
Sep ’25
ReplayKit Issue on iOS 26
When previewing the recording of gameplay the buttons to exit or save are unclickable behind the top bar clock and Wi-Fi/5G status bar. Which means that you have to quit the game in order to continue. Tested on multiple devices. Does anyone have a solution to this? At the moment we have disabled it altogether for iOS 26 users.
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2w
Will metal-cpp-extensions headers for Appkit and MetalKit be maintained?
Hi, The metal-cpp distribution appears to only contain headers for Foundation and Quartzcore. The LearnMetalCPP download [1] provides a ZIP with an metal-cpp-extensions directory containing AppKit.hpp and MetalKit.hpp headers. First question: Are these headers distributed anywhere else more publicly? Without these headers only the renderer can be fully written in C++ as far as I can tell, i.e. no complete C++ NSApplication. Second question: Will these headers, if needed, be maintained (e.g. updated and/or extended) by Apple along side metal-cpp? [1] https://developer.apple.com/metal/cpp/ Thank you and regards.
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2k
Feb ’25
Utilizing Point Cloud data from `ObjectCaptureSession` in WWDC23
I am currently developing a mobile and server-side application using the new ObjectCaptureSession on iOS and PhotogrammetrySession on MacOS. I have two questions regarding the newly updated APIs. From WWDC23 session: "Meet Object Capture for iOS", I know that the Object Capture API uses Point Cloud data captured from iPhone LiDAR sensor. I want to know how to use the Point Cloud data captured on iPhone ObjectCaptureSession and use it to create 3D models on PhotogrammetrySession on MacOS. From the example code from WWDC21, I know that the PhotogrammetrySession utilizes depth map from captured photo images by embedding it into the HEIC image and use those data to create a 3D asset on PhotogrammetrySession on MacOS. I would like to know if Point Cloud data is also embedded into the image to be used during 3D reconstruction and if not, how else the Point Cloud data is inserted to be used during reconstruction. Another question is, I know that Point Cloud data is returned as a result from request to the PhtogrammetrySession.Request. I would like to know if this PointCloud data is the same set of data captured during ObjectCaptureSession from WWDC23 that is used to create ObjectCapturePointCloudView. Thank you to everyone for the help in advance. It's a real pleasure to be developing with all the updates to RealityKit and the Object Capture API.
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2.2k
Jul ’25
OpenGL ES support on Apple Silicon Simulators
Hey folks, I have a legacy game that is running OpenGL ES - and it no longer works on the simulators that are running Apple Silicon, ie iPhone 15 Pro, or the 13" iPads. And yes, i'm also running on Apple Silicon (M1 Max). The apps work fine on the actual devices, but the simulator crashes on any glDrawElements with a stack that looks like the following: I have not yet seen an announcement about this not working but i've seen mention in other apps of stopping to support GL (https://github.com/maplibre/maplibre-native/issues/2351) Can anyone shed some light? I'm obviously going to try to fix it, or find a recent sample app from which to start to see what might be up. Or move to metal, but i hadn't bargained for that level of effort atm ;) Any suggestions appreciated!
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2.5k
Mar ’25
CADisplayLink wrongly capping at 90hz on iPhone 15 Pro
I have a game for iOS where I use CADisplayLink to animate a simulation, and for some reason the animation is not getting the full 120hz on capable devices (like iPhone 15 Pro). When I enable a 120hz refresh target, the animation is capped at only 90hz. This looks terrible because the animation works best when doubled (30, 60, 120, 240, etc). The really bizarre thing is that when I turn on Screen Recording, my frame rate instantly jumps to 120, and everything looks perfectly smooth. My game has never looked better on iPhone! When recording is stopped, the animation drops back down to 90 fps. What in the world is going on? [displayLink setPreferredFrameRateRange:CAFrameRateRangeMake(100,240,120)]; //Min. Max, Preferred [displayLink addToRunLoop:[NSRunLoop currentRunLoop] forMode:NSDefaultRunLoopMode]; (Also, CADisableMinimumFrameDurationOnPhone is set to True in info.plist)
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947
Oct ’24
vImageConverter_CreateWithCGImageFormat Fails with kvImageInvalidImageFormat When Trying to Convert CMYK to RGB
So I get JPEG data in my app. Previously I was using the higher level NSBitmapImageRep API and just feeding the JPEG data to it. But now I've noticed on Sonoma If I get a JPEG in the CMYK color space the NSBitmapImageRep renders mostly black and is corrupted. So I'm trying to drop down to the lower level APIs. Specifically I grab a CGImageRef and and trying to use the Accelerate API to convert it to another format (to hopefully workaround the issue... CGImageRef sourceCGImage = `CGImageCreateWithJPEGDataProvider(jpegDataProvider,` NULL, shouldInterpolate, kCGRenderingIntentDefault); Now I use vImageConverter_CreateWithCGImageFormat... with the following values for source and destination formats: Source format: (derived from sourceCGImage) bitsPerComponent = 8 bitsPerPixel = 32 colorSpace = (kCGColorSpaceICCBased; kCGColorSpaceModelCMYK; Generic CMYK Profile) bitmapInfo = kCGBitmapByteOrderDefault version = 0 decode = 0x000060000147f780 renderingIntent = kCGRenderingIntentDefault Destination format: bitsPerComponent = 8 bitsPerPixel = 24 colorSpace = (DeviceRBG) bitmapInfo = 8197 version = 0 decode = 0x0000000000000000 renderingIntent = kCGRenderingIntentDefault But vImageConverter_CreateWithCGImageFormat fails with kvImageInvalidImageFormat. Now if I change the destination format to use 32 bitsPerpixel and use alpha in the bitmap info the vImageConverter_CreateWithCGImageFormat does not return an error but I get a black image just like NSBitmapImageRep
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1.3k
Aug ’25
Mac crashing
Hi, everytime I try to run Minecraft Launcher theres a bunch of code that comes up? It ran fine about a month ago but now I cant even open the app, it wont let me copy all of the code but it does say this ""PC register does not match crashing frame (0x0 vs 0x10B338024)"". My Mac is fully up to date, I have deleted and reinstalled Minecraft numerous times ut it continues to display a large amount of code with nothing to fix it. Could someone help me fix it or recommend anything I can do to fix it?
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599
Oct ’24
Remove iphone-performance-gaming-tier
Hello, I've been experimenting with the iphone-performance-gaming-tier Device Capability using TestFlight. I've decided I don't want the restriction and I've just submitted a new build (new version number) without the value but the build metadata still includes it. How do i remove it? I don't want to the restriction. Cheers
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520
Oct ’24
Resolution for Games
Hi, When using a High Definition Display, is there a way to render at exactly the target resolution on the physical screen? My understanding is that the default behavior is to render to a backing store with a resolution (in pixels) which can be twice the size of the logical resolution (in points). Then we let the OS handle the down-scaling to the actual target resolution on the screen. This is all nice for non-graphics intensive apps, but it means that my game will render at a higher resolution than needed, which seems like an obvious loss of performance. My expectation is that, for graphics intensive application such as games, we should be able to query and render to the final resolution on the display. Can it / should it be done? Thank you for your help :) FYI I did find a document which explains how to setup your CAMetalLayer to render at a custom resolution. I suspect that this may be what I have to do?
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729
Oct ’24
How to receive keyboard/mouse on VisionOS?
I tried using the GameController APIs for this, but they didn't seem to work. Is that the recommended API for handling keyboard/mouse? The notifications for mouse and keyboard connect/disconnect don't seem to be defined for visionOS. The visionOS 2.0 touts keyboard and mouse support. The simulator can even forward keyboard/mouse to the app. But there don't seem to be any sample code of how to programatically receive either of these. The game controller works fine (on device, not on Simulator).
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516
Nov ’24
NSScreen frame location with multiple monitors
I have a Mac Studio 2023 M2 Max Running Sonoma 14.6.1 Developing in XCode 16.1 It seems that the NSScreen frame settings may be incorrect. The frame settings received from NSScreen.screens don't seem to match up with the Desktop arrangement settings in the Settings. Apologies in advance for this long post! for screen in NSScreen.screens { let name = screen.localizedName Globals.logger.debug("Globals initializeScreens - screen \(i) '\(name, privacy: .public)'") Globals.logger.debug("Globals initializeScreens - '\(screen.debugDescription, privacy: .public)'") } This is what I receive in the log: Globals initializeScreens - '<NSScreen: 0x600000ef4240; name="PHL 346E2C"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{0, 0}, {3440, 1440}}; visibleFrame={{0, 0}, {3440, 1415}}>' Globals initializeScreens - screen 2 'Blackmagic (1)' Globals initializeScreens - '<NSScreen: 0x600000ef42a0; name="Blackmagic (1)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{-3840, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{-3840, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' Globals initializeScreens - screen 3 'Blackmagic (4)' Globals initializeScreens - '<NSScreen: 0x600000ef4360; name="Blackmagic (4)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{-1920, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{-1920, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' Globals initializeScreens - screen 4 'Blackmagic (2)' Globals initializeScreens - '<NSScreen: 0x600000ef43c0; name="Blackmagic (2)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{5360, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{5360, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' Globals initializeScreens - screen 5 'Blackmagic (3)' Globals initializeScreens - '<NSScreen: 0x600000ef4420; name="Blackmagic (3)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{3440, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{3440, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' It looks like the frame settings for Blackmagic (2) and Blackmagic (4) are switched. The setup has five monitors. Four are using the USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapters. The output for these are streamed into a rack of A/V equipment using BlackMagic Design mini converters and monitors. My Swift application allows users to open four movies, one for each of the AV Adapters. The movies can then be played back in sync for later processing by the A/V equipment. Here are some screen captures that show my display settings. Blackmagic (1) and Blackmagic (2) are to the left of the main screen. Blackmagic (3) and Blackmagic(4) are to the right of the main screen. The desktop is hard to see but is correct. The wallpaper settings are all correct. The wallpaper is correctly ordered when displayed on the monitors. After opening the movies and using the NSScreen frame settings, the displays are incorrectly ordered. Test B and Test D are switched, which is what I would expect given the NSScreen frame values. Any ideas? I've tried re-arranging the desktops, rebooting, etc. but no luck. The code that changes the screen location is similar to this post on Stack Overflow public func setDisplay( screen: NSScreen ) { Globals.logger.log("MovieWindowController - setDisplay = \(screen.localizedName, privacy: .public)") Globals.logger.debug("MovieWindowController - setDisplay - '\(screen.debugDescription, privacy: .public)'") let dx = CGFloat(Constants.midX) let dy = CGFloat(Constants.midY) var pos = NSPoint() pos.x = screen.visibleFrame.midX - dx pos.y = screen.visibleFrame.midY - dy Globals.logger.debug("MovieWindowController - setDisplay - x = '\(pos.x, privacy: .public)', y = '\(pos.y, privacy: .public)'") window?.setFrameOrigin(pos) } The log show just what I would expect given the incorrect frame values. MovieWindowController - setDisplay = Blackmagic (1) MovieWindowController - setDisplay - '<NSScreen: 0x6000018e8420; name="Blackmagic (1)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{-3840, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{-3840, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' MovieWindowController - setDisplay - x = '-3840.000000', y = '-12.500000' MovieWindowController - setDisplay = Blackmagic (2) MovieWindowController - setDisplay - '<NSScreen: 0x6000018a10e0; name="Blackmagic (2)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{5360, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{5360, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' MovieWindowController - setDisplay - x = '5360.000000', y = '-12.500000' MovieWindowController - setDisplay = Blackmagic (3) MovieWindowController - setDisplay - '<NSScreen: 0x6000018cc8a0; name="Blackmagic (3)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{3440, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{3440, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' MovieWindowController - setDisplay - x = '3440.000000', y = '-12.500000' MovieWindowController - setDisplay = Blackmagic (4) MovieWindowController - setDisplay - '<NSScreen: 0x6000018c9ce0; name="Blackmagic (4)"; backingScaleFactor=1.000000; frame={{-1920, 0}, {1920, 1080}}; visibleFrame={{-1920, 0}, {1920, 1055}}>' MovieWindowController - setDisplay - x = '-1920.000000', y = '-12.500000' Am I correct? I think this is driving me crazy! Thanks in advance! Edit: The mouse behavior is correct in moving across the displays!
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613
Jan ’25
Is there any frameworks/API to deal with app's precise performance tuning for iOS platform?
There is a Android Dynamic Performance Framework, https://developer.android.com/games/optimize/adpf which allows you to monitor device's thermal state and send performance hints to the OS, describing current workload. This helps to consume resources effectively, while having target performance. As I can see from tracing and profiling, hints help OS scheduler to switch tasks between cores more effectively - this helps to reach performance stability between multiple runs. I wonder, is there anything similar for iOS platform?
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655
Dec ’24
Changing Cursor Image
I am making a SpriteKit game and I am trying to change the cursor image from the default pointer to a png image that I have imported into the project, but it’s not really working. when I run the project I can see the cursor image change for a brief second and then return to the default image. Here is my code: print(NSCursor.current) if let image = NSImage(named: customImage) {      print("The image exists")      cursor = NSCursor(image: image, hotSpot: .zero)      cursor.push()      print(cursor) } print(NSCursor.current) The above code is all contained in the didMove(:) function in GameScene. From the print statements I can see that the memory address of the NSCursor.current changes to that of cursor. HOWEVER, in the mouseMoved(:) call back function I print out the mouse location and the current cursor. I can see from these print stamens that the cursor memory address has again changed and no longer matches the custom cursor address… so I am not sure what is going on… Also, fyi the cursor is a global property within game scene so it should persist. Also, image is not nil. This is verified by the print statements I see Thanks
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638
Dec ’24
Safe Places to Find Dependable App Developers
Hello! Brand new to the Apple developer community, so, hello everyone! I'm a game developer, we just launched our first game on PC and I'm looking to port it to ios. Time is something I'm kind of short on, and I hear it takes some jumping through hoops to get the know-how to port something to mobile. Any good sites you'd recommend for finding programmers to port your game? It's fairly simple - just a visual novel. Any and all suggestions welcome! All the best! Elijah
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586
Dec ’24
Converting JPG to JP2 using ImageMagicK library on iOS
I am trying to convert a JPG image to a JP2 (JPEG 2000) format using the ImageMagick library on iOS. However, although the file extension is changing to .jp2, the format of the image does not seem to be changing. The output image is still being treated as a JPG file, and not as a true JP2 format. Here is the code (IBAction)convertButtonClicked:(id)sender { NSString *jpgPath = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"Example" ofType:@"jpg"]; NSString *tempFilePath = [NSTemporaryDirectory() stringByAppendingPathComponent:@"Converted.jp2"]; MagickWand *wand = NewMagickWand(); if (MagickReadImage(wand, [jpgPath UTF8String]) == MagickFalse) { char *description; ExceptionType severity; description = MagickGetException(wand, &severity); NSLog(@"Error reading image: %s", description); MagickRelinquishMemory(description); return; } if (MagickSetFormat(wand, "JP2") == MagickFalse) { char *description; ExceptionType severity; description = MagickGetException(wand, &severity); NSLog(@"Error setting image format to JP2: %s", description); MagickRelinquishMemory(description); } if (MagickWriteImage(wand, [tempFilePath UTF8String]) == MagickFalse) { NSLog(@"Error writing JP2 image"); return; } NSLog(@"Image successfully converted."); } @end
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414
Jan ’25
How to create CGContext with 10 bits per component?
I’m trying to create a CGContext that matches my screen using the following code let context = CGContext( data: pixelBuffer, width: pixelWidth, // 3456 height: pixelHeight, // 2234 bitsPerComponent: 10, // PixelEncoding = "--RRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGBBBBBBBBBB" bytesPerRow: bytesPerRow, // 13824 space: CGColorSpace(name: CGColorSpace.extendedSRGB)!, bitmapInfo: CGImageAlphaInfo.none.rawValue | CGImagePixelFormatInfo.RGBCIF10.rawValue | CGImageByteOrderInfo.order16Little.rawValue ) But it fails with an error CGBitmapContextCreate: unsupported parameter combination: RGB 10 bits/component, integer 13824 bytes/row kCGImageAlphaNone kCGImageByteOrder16Little kCGImagePixelFormatRGBCIF10 Valid parameters for RGB color space model are: 16 bits per pixel, 5 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipFirst 32 bits per pixel, 8 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipFirst 32 bits per pixel, 8 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast 32 bits per pixel, 8 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaPremultipliedFirst 32 bits per pixel, 8 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaPremultipliedLast 32 bits per pixel, 10 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNone|kCGImagePixelFormatRGBCIF10|kCGImageByteOrder16Little 64 bits per pixel, 16 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaPremultipliedLast 64 bits per pixel, 16 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast 64 bits per pixel, 16 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaPremultipliedLast|kCGBitmapFloatComponents|kCGImageByteOrder16Little 64 bits per pixel, 16 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast|kCGBitmapFloatComponents|kCGImageByteOrder16Little 128 bits per pixel, 32 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaPremultipliedLast|kCGBitmapFloatComponents 128 bits per pixel, 32 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast|kCGBitmapFloatComponents See Quartz 2D Programming Guide (available online) for more information. Why is it unsupported if it matches the 6th option? (32 bits per pixel, 10 bits per component, kCGImageAlphaNone|kCGImagePixelFormatRGBCIF10|kCGImageByteOrder16Little)
3
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665
Jan ’25