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Metal IR reference
Hello! I'm developing a GPU (shader) language, where I aim to target multiple backends with a common frontend. I wanted to avoid having to round trip through Metal, and go straight to IR just like I have with SPIRV, in order to have a fast and efficient compilation process. I've been looking for a reference page where I can read about Metals IR, and as far as I'm aware, it exists, but I can't seem to find it anywhere. Furthermore, if such a reference is available, is there also a toolkit where I can run validation on the output IR, and perhaps even run optimizations, much like spv-tools for SPIRV? Any help would be appreciated! Thanks, Gustav
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302
Jul ’25
The delay issue of 4G TCP connection for iPhone 17 in China's mobile network
Reproduce Same SIM card with 4G, same testing location, connected to the same server, xcode debugging game applications, network/profile retrotransmitted, Avg round trip to view data iPhone17, Turn off 4G and turn on WiFi. All the above indicators are acceptable iPhone17, Turn on 4G, turn off WiFi, retry with retransmission and very high Avg round trip iPhone14-16, Turn on 4G and turn off WiFi. All the above indicators are acceptable App Unity3d project .netframe4.0 C# Socket Other Many developers in Chinese forums have provided feedback on this issue
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773
Oct ’25
RealityKit, Attachments - not working
The simplest realityView (content, attachments in ... causes Contextual closure expects 1 argument but 2 were used in closure body. I have checked every example and i cannot understand why i get this error regardless of any content. Note: i have added Attachment(id: "test") to the attachment closure and get Attachment not is scope. imported both realityKit and SwiftUI.
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305
Dec ’25
How to play Vorbis/OGG files with swift?
Does anyone have a working example on how to play OGG files with swift? I've been trying for over a year now. I was able to wrap the C Vorbis library in swift. I then used it to parse an OGG file successfully. Then I was required to use Obj-C\++ to fill the PCM because this method seems to only be available in C\++ and that part hangs my app for a good 40 seconds to several minutes depending on the audio file, it then plays for about 2 seconds and then crashes. I can't get the examples on the Vorbis site to work in objective-c and i tried every example on github I could find (most of which are for iOS - I want to play the files on mac) I also tried using Cricket Audio framework below. https://github.com/sjmerel/ck It has a swift example and it can play their proprietary soundbank format but it is also supposed to play OGG and it just doesn't do anything when trying to play OGG as you can see in the posted issue https://github.com/sjmerel/ck/issues/3 Right now I believe every player that can play OGGs on mac is written in Objective-C or C++. Anyway, any help/advice is appreciated. OGG format is very prevalent in the gaming community. I could use unity, which I believe plays oggs through the mono framework but I really really want to stay in swift.
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4.3k
Jul ’25
Walking an entity around an immersive space in visionOS like the window drag bar
I'm trying to understand how Apple handles dragging windows around in an immersive space. 3d Gestures seem to be only half of the solution in that they are great if you're standing still and want to move the window an exaggerated amount around the environment, but if you then start walking while dragging, the amplified gesture sends the entity flying off into the distance. It seems they quickly transition from one coordinate system to another depending on if the user is physically moving. If you drag a window and start walking the movement suddenly matches your speed. When you stop moving, you can push and pull the windows around again like a super hero. Am I missing something obvious in how to copy this behavior? Hello world, which uses the 3d gesture has the same problem. You can move the world around but if you walk with it, it flies off. Are they tracking the head movement and if it's moved more than a certain amount it uses that offset instead? Is there anything out of the box that can do this before I try and hack my own solution?
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1.2k
Dec ’25
Metal 4: When is it ok to dealloc a MTLBuffer's memory
I have something like this drawing in an MTKView (see at bottom). I am finding it difficult to figure out when can the Swift-land resources used in making the MTLBuffer(s) be released? Below, for example, is it ok if args goes out of scope (or is otherwise deallocated) at point 1, 2, or 3? Or perhaps even earlier, as soon as argsBuffer has been created? I have been reading through various articles such as Setting resource storage modes Choosing a resource storage mode for Apple GPUs Copying data to a private resource but it's a lot to absorb and I haven't been really able to find an authoritative description of the required lifetime of the resources in CPU land. I should mention that this is Metal 4 code. In previous versions of Metal, the MTLCommandBuffer had the ability to add a completion handler to be called by the GPU after it has finished running the commands in the buffer but in Metal 4 there is no such thing (it it were even needed for the purpose I am interested in). Any advice and/or pointers to the definitive literature will be appreciated. guard let argsBuffer = device.makeBuffer(bytes: &args,... argumentTable.setAddress(argsBuffer.gpuAddress, ... encoder.setArgumentTable(argumentTable, stages: .vertex) // encode drawing renderEncoder.draw... ... encoder.endEncoding() // 1 commandBuffer.endCommandBuffer() // 2 commandQueue.waitForDrawable(drawable) commandQueue.commit([commandBuffer]) // 3 commandQueue.signalDrawable(drawable) drawable.present()
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195
Jan ’26
Game Center SignIn alert appears on macOS 26 (Tahoe) without capability or entitlement
Hello, On macOS 26 (Tahoe), when building a OSX app that includes GameKit code, calling GKLocalPlayer.local.authenticateHandler shows the "Sign In to Game Center" alert (e.g. didShowFullscreenSignIn) — even if the app does not have the Game Center capability enabled or any related entitlement (com.apple.developer.game-center). This alert only appears when the user is not signed in to Game Center in system settings. However, when testing the same code path on iOS app built with macOS 26 (Tahoe), the alert does not appear unless the proper capability and entitlement are included. This behavior is different from macOS 15 (Sequoia) + Xcode 15.x. Prior to the update, Game Center features did not work at all even with the OSX app without Capability and Entitlements. Steps to Reproduce Create a new OSX app target (App Sandbox enabled, no Game Center capability). Add minimal GameKit code: GKLocalPlayer.local.authenticateHandler = { _, _, _ in } Build OSX app and run on macOS 26 (Tahoe). Ensure Game Center is signed out in System Settings. Observe: “Sign In to Game Center” alert appears automatically. Expected Behavior When Game Center capability and entitlement are not present, authenticateHandler should fail silently, and no signIn alert should appear. Actual Behavior On OSX app, the Game Center signIn UI appears even without any Game Center capability or entitlement. On iOS app, this alert does not appear. *Build Configuration: built with the same condition. (macOS 26 + Xcode 26) Question Could you please confirm whether this behavior is an intentional change in macOS 26 or a bug only for OSX apps in the GameKit authentication flow? Thank you.
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463
Oct ’25
Metal: Non-uniform thread groups unsupported in Simulator? Is it?
My app is running Compute Shaders that use non-uniform thread groups. When I run the app in the debugger with a simulator target the app crashes on encoder.dispatchThreads and the error message is: Dispatch Threads with Non-Uniform Threadgroup Size is not supported on this device. Previously the log output states that: Metal Shader Validation is unsupported for Simulator. However: When I stop the debugger and just run the app in the simulator without the debugger attached, the app just runs fine and does not crash. The SwiftUI Preview that also triggers the Compute Shader when preparing data also just runs fine without a crash. I can run and debug on a real device no problem - I just don't have all sizes available. Is there anything I need to check in my lldb/simulator configuration? It obviously does work, just the debugger cannot really deal with it? Any input would be nice as this really slows my down as I have to be extremely careful when debugging on the simulator.
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602
Mar ’25
Game Center Authentication Crashing - Unity 6, Gamekit 3.0.2
When testing my development build for gamecenter authentication, the game crashes. I've breadcrumbed it to the "await GKLocalPlayer.Authenticate();" call. Can't find any documentation on this issue and have been looking through the forums! I've already done all of the usual stuff like verifying bundle identifiers match, ensuring game center is enabled for the app, setting up app store connect, using a sandbox account, etc... Please point me to some resources if you know any. Any help is appreciated, I'm starting to lose hope here!
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190
Apr ’25
Black Screen in GPTK – DX 12.1 / Shader Model 6.5 Issue?
Hey everyone, I’m trying to run Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 using the Game Porting Toolkit, but I’m encountering a black screen when launching the game. From what I know about the game’s requirements, it might be using Shader Model 6.5, which supports advanced features like DirectX Raytracing (DXR) Tier 1.1. This leads me to suspect that the issue could be related to missing support for DirectX 12.1 Features or Shader Model 6.5 in GPTK. Does anyone know if these features are currently supported by GPTK? If not, are there any plans to implement them in future updates? Alternatively, is there any workaround for games that rely on Shader Model 6.5 and ray tracing? Thanks a lot for your help!
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692
Feb ’25
WWDC25 Metal & game technologies group lab
Hello, Thank you for attending today’s Metal & game technologies group lab at WWDC25! We were delighted to answer many questions from developers and energized by the community engagement. We hope you enjoyed it and welcome your feedback. We invite you to carry on the conversation here, particularly if your question appeared in Slido and we were unable to answer it during the lab. If your question received feedback let us know if you need clarification. You may want to ask your question again in a different lab e.g. visionOS tomorrow. (We realize that this can be confusing when frameworks interoperate) We have a lot to learn from each other so let’s get to Q&A and make the best of WWDC25! 😃 Looking forward to your questions posted in new threads.
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415
Jul ’25
Validation error, when I try to upload a game to Testflight
Hello everyone and thank you for you're time! I got an issue with uploading several icons to testflight. I'm using Game Maker Studio as my engine for the game. This is the error that I'm getting, even when I try to use the old icons for the game, that worked in the past. I tried to transform the icons, using this site "https://makeappicon.com/", but I still got the same validation error. Can you help me fixing the issue - thank you so much!
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589
Oct ’25
RealityKit migration
Hey there, I’m currently planning to use RealityKit in a new multiplatform app I’m building. Unfortunately, I noticed that WatchOS is not supported for RealityKit, while SceneKit is getting deprecated. However, I’d like to maintain the same codebase across platforms. What are my options?
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456
Oct ’25
Testing Achievements - Apple Documentation out of Date
New to achievements. I added them in App Store Connect and want to test them. Apple Documentation says this: "Before you begin testing your GameKit configuration, you need to enable Debug Mode. In Xcode, choose Product > Scheme > Edit Scheme. From the Run configuration, select Options and toggle Enable Debug Mode. To begin testing your achievement configuration, open the game Progress Manager. In Xcode, choose Debug > GameKit > Manage Game Progress." Sounds easy enough, but there is no "GameKit" under Debug in Xcode 16.2.
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144
May ’25
Can't link metal-cpp to Modern Rendering With Metal sample
There is a sample project from Apple here. It has a scene of a city at night and you can move in it. It basically has 2 parts: application code written in what looks like Objective-C (I am more familiar with C++), which inherits from things like NSObject, MTKView, NSViewController and so on - it processes input and all app-related and window-related stuff. rendering code that also looks like Objective-C. Btw both parts are mostly in .mm files (Obj-C++ AFAIK). The application part directly uses only one class from the rendering part - AAPLRenderer. I want to move the rendering part to C++ using metal-cpp. For that I need to link metal-cpp to the project. I did it successfully with blank projects several times before using this tutorial. But with this sample project Xcode can't find Foundation/Foundation.hpp (and other metal-cpp headers). The error says this: Did not find header 'Foundation.hpp' in framework 'Foundation' (loaded from '/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX15.0.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks') Pls help
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888
Feb ’25
Metal-CPP Errors
After following the instructions here: https://developer.apple.com/metal/cpp/ I attempted building my project and Xcode presented several errors. In essence it's complaining about some redeclarations in the Metal-CPP headers. NSBundle.hpp and NSError.hpp are included in the metal-cpp/foundation directory from the metal-cpp download. Any help in getting these issues resolved is appreciated. Thanks!
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603
Feb ’25
Morphing Animation Not Playing in an Xcode VisionOS App
I have a 3D model with morphing animation that works correctly in Blender. I exported this model as a USDZ file and tried to display it in an Xcode-developed visionOS app, but the morphing animation does not play. What I Have Tried: Morphing animation works correctly in Blender. After exporting to USDZ, the morphing animation does not play in the Xcode app. Linear motion animations (such as object movement) work fine. Behavior in Reality Converter: GLB files do not display. USDZ files load, but morphing animations do not play. What I Want to Know: Is there a way to play morphing animations in an Xcode-developed app? Does RealityKit support morphing animations? Can morphing animations be played in an Xcode-developed app? If RealityKit does not support morphing animations, what alternative methods can be used to play them? I am looking for a way to use the existing animations without recreating them. Additional Information: I have both the Blender file (where animations work) and the USDZ file (where animations do not play). I am developing a visionOS app using Xcode. Any advice or solutions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance!
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525
Feb ’25
How do I test a new leaderboard added to a Published app with prior leaderboard?
Hi I have attempted to find a fix for my issue via documentation online and one phone support ( not code level support ) call to no end. I could continue to try various things but would like to see if someone else has encountered this issue and a fix for it. Background: My Game app is live on App Store and has 1 classic leaderboard . I am now getting ready to submit an update to the app and it also entails adding a new recurring leaderboard. I added the leaderboard in App Store. I however have NOT uploaded my new build yet. I have also not added my leaderboards ( currently live and not live ) to any set. When I try to submit scores using GKLeaderboard.submitScore(_:context:player:leaderboardIDs:completionHandler:) to the new non-live leaderboard it works ( gives me no error ) When I try to load the scores from the new non-live leaderboard GKLeaderboard.loadLeaderboards(IDs:completionHandler:) loadEntries(for:timeScope:range:completionHandler:) it fails. Error: "leaderboardID not found" I could try ( and will ) uploading the new build to AppStore connect and associating the new leaderboard to it before testing again. try associating each leaderboard to a set Is there anything else that I should be aware of ? Thanks in advance
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153
Jul ’25
Metal HUD Display Value Range
Can't seem to get the Metal HUD to display value range's (pre 26 Tahoe). The documented environment variable MTL_HUD_SHOW_VALUE_RANGE doesn't seem to work. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/xcode/monitoring-your-metal-apps-graphics-performance#Display-the-value-range-of-metrics Anyone having any luck?
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334
Sep ’25