General

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Full right-to-left language support.

  • Added support for Arabic and Hebrew.

  • Added support in UIKit.

  • Added support in TVMLKit, including a new API for easily adapting the layout direction of the user interface.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - TVML support in Web Inspector.

  • Added visual debugging of TVMLKit DOM including run-time manipulation.

  • Display TVMLKit XHR requests to the Network tab.

  • Display TVMLKit local session storage key-value pairs in the Storage tab.

• Added support for debugging focus-related interactions.

  • Added runtime debugging in lldb using the UIFocusDebugger class.

  • Added logging of live focus updates by enabling the UIFocusLoggingEnabled launch argument.

App Frameworks

• Enhanced image layering.

  • Updated adjustsImageWhenAncestorFocused to work for single-layer images with non-opaque alpha channels .

  • Added overlayContentView for adding layered content to UIImageView.

  • Added the masksFocusEffectToContents property to UIImageView to enable using the alpha channel of the image to create a floating focussed appearance.

• Enhanced developer customization of focus events.

  • Added addCoordinatedFocusingAnimations(_:completion:) and addCoordinatedUnfocusingAnimations(_:completion:) to UIFocusAnimationCoordinator for adding targeted coordinated animations.

  • Added playing a custom sound and not playing a sound for a focus movement change.

  • Added plain, a focusable button with no background blur.

  • Added UIFocusDidUpdate, a notification for changes in focus element.

  • Added UIFocusMovementDidFail, a notification that the user tried to change focus in a direction with no focusable element.

  • Improved Swift support by adding extensions to UIFocusItem and UIFocusEnvironment.

• Improved Dynamic Type support.

  • Added UIFontMetrics, an object for creating custom fonts that scale based on the currently selected text size.

  • Updated Auto Layout to dynamically adjust spacing based on the font sizes when a baseline anchor is part of a constraint that uses the system spacing.

  • Added an attribute to preserve vector data for PDF assets to enable smooth scaling. You can use this attribute to show a larger version of bar items and segmented control items, as well as to adjust image sizes to match the user's text size. To enable scaling in the PDF, in the asset catalog Attributes inspector, select "Preserve vector data" for the PDF to enable scaling.

  • Added UIAccessibilityContentSizeCategoryImageAdjusting, a protocol for scaling images for accessibility text sizes.

• Added preferredUserInterfaceStyle, a property for specifying the appearance of view controllers that overrides the system setting.

• Improved Auto Layout support for Dynamic Type.

  • Updated NSLayoutXAxisAnchor and NSLayoutYAxisAnchor to provide factory methods that create constraints using the system spacing between two anchors. Previously the only way to create such a constraint was with the dash (-) in the Visual Format Language.

  • Added an option to NSLayoutFormatOptions for creating a Visual Format Language string that uses baseline-to-baseline spacing.

  • Updated UIStackView to enable system spacing and customized spacing.

• Updated text content to work with App Password autofill.

  • Added username and password properties to UITextContentType.

• Added primaryEdge, a property of UISplitViewController for setting the side for the master view controller.

• Added sectionInsetReference, a new enum property for UICollectionViewFlowLayout, that specifies the boundary used for relative section insets.

• Added blurOverFullScreen, a value for UIModalPresentationStyle for progressive blurring of the screen behind a view controller.

• Updated keyboard extensions.

  • Added selectedText, a property of UITextDocumentProxy that returns the currently selected text in the document.

  • Added documentIdentifier, a property of UITextDocumentProxy that specifies whether the user is navigating to a new text widget.

  • Added hasFullAccess, a case of UIInputViewController that checks keyboard permissions.

  • Added needsInputModeSwitchKey, a property of UIInputViewController to control the display of the input-mode switch key.

  • Added new system permissions in Settings for app access to included keyboard extensions.

Graphics and Games

• New in tvOS 11.0 - SceneKit and SpriteKit focus support.

  • Use the UIKit focus-related APIs to control animations, play custom sounds, and receive focus update notifications for SceneKit and SpriteKit nodes.

  • Added SCNNode.focusBehavior and SKNode.focusBehavior to enable focus for node.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - High performance image analysis.

  • Added the Vision framework for detecting faces, bar codes, text, image horizon, and rectangular regions.

  • Provided support for integrating the Vision framework with Core ML to run custom models on images.

  • Added object-tracking in video.

  • Added support for image registration.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Ability to write custom image blending kernels for Core Image.

  • Added CIBlendKernel, a special type of CIColorKernel to blend two images (supported by CIRenderDestination and CIImageAccumulator).

  • Added init(functionName:fromMetalLibraryData:) to CIKernel for writing kernels using Metal to benefit from the improved language features and the reduced compile time.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Lightweight render destination.

  • Added CIRenderDestination, an object for creating renderers that return to the caller after the work has been issued. You can specify all the destination attributes of the renderer for different destinations, including a surface (IOSurface), Core Video pixel buffer (CVPixelBuffer), GL textures, Metal textures, and memory.

• Added new Core Image filters CITextImageGenerator, CIColorCurves, CILabDeltaE, CIBokehBlur, CIMinMaxRed, and CIBicubicScaleTransform.

• Extended the ReplayKit framework.

  • Updated RPScreenRecorder for screen capture and back camera support.

Metal 2

Metal 2 contains significant additions and updates to Metal, the Metal Shading Language, and the Metal Performance Shaders framework. Items below indicate where the updates occur:

  – MTL: An update in the Metal framework.

  – MSL: An update in the Metal Shading Language.

  – MPS: An update in the Metal Performance Shaders framework.

• MPS: New in Metal 2 - Cross-platform Metal Performance Shaders support.

  • All Metal Performance Shaders functionality is available in iOS 11.0, tvOS 11.0, and macOS 10.13.

• MPS: New in tvOS 11.0 - Neural network support.

  • Added support for neural networks to the Metal Performance Shaders framework.

  • Added graphs to offer a higher level API for simplifying the creation of neural networks, including objects that allow state to be transferred between nodes in a neural network.

  • Added convolutional neural networks (CNN) to support implementing and running deep learning using previously obtained training data.

  • Added recurrent neural networks for implementing inference on images and matrices.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Argument Buffers. Group your resources into an argument buffer (AB) to reduce CPU overhead.

  • MSL: Added the [[id(n)]] attribute qualifier to identify resources in an AB structure.

  • MTL: Added the MTLArgumentEncoder protocol to encode resources into an AB.

• MTL: New in tvOS 11.0 - Programmable sample positions. Configure the position of samples when rendering to a multisampled render target.

  • Updated the MTLRenderPassDescriptor class to set and get sample positions for a render pass.

• MSL: New in tvOS 11.0 - Uniform type.

  • Added the uniform type to declare variables that are uniform for all threads that execute the graphics or compute function of a draw or dispatch call.

• MTL: New in tvOS 11.0 - BGR10A2 pixel format.

  • Added the bgr10A2Unorm pixel format to present wide color content on P3 displays.

• MPS: Added new filters.

  • Added filters for image statistics, such as computing the mean and variance for an image region.

  • Added filters for combining two images together, such as an element-wise sum.

  • Added filters for matrix decomposition and solving, such as decomposition using Cholesky or LU (lower upper) factorization.

• MSL: Extended function specialization. Members of a structure used in a graphics, compute, or user function can be used with function constants.

  • Extended [[color(n)]] and [[raster_order_group(index)]] attribute qualifiers to work with function constants.

• MTL: Extended vertex formats.

  • Added new MTLVertexFormat values for small formats such as char, short, and half.

• Added dual-source blending support to tvOS. Output two source colors to a single render target in a fixed-function blending operation.

  • MSL: Added a new [[index(i)]] attribute qualifier to the [[color(n)]] attribute qualifier to output a second source color.

  • MTL: Updated MTLBlendFactor to operate on a second source color.

App Services

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Support for machine learning models.

  • Added the Core ML framework for easily integrating machine learning models into apps.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Promoting in-app purchases on the App Store.

  • Developers can promote up to 20 in-app purchases on their App Store product page. Customers can start their purchase on the App Store, and then be taken to the app to complete the transaction.

  • Added paymentQueue(_:shouldAddStore:for:), a new method of SKPaymentTransactionObserver for promoted in-app purchases. Apps need to support this delegate for promoted in-app purchases to display on the product page.

• Updated the User Notification background execution APIs to support tvOS including waking the app in the background for silent notifications.

• Added TVContentItemImageTrait, a structure used in new methods that provide URLs to light and dark images for Top Shelf.

• Enhanced triggers for HomeKit.

  • Enhanced time-based conditions for triggers. HMSignificantTimeEvent specifies an offset from sunrise and sunset. HMCalendarEvent specifies a date and time. HMDurationEvent specifies a time interval.

  • Added HMCharacteristicThresholdRangeEvent for representing devices that report their state as a number range, such as blinds that report a position from 0 to 1.

  • Added HMPresenceEvent for adding a condition based on the presence of users.

  • Updated HMEventTrigger to enable multiple occurrences of a trigger.

• Added home:didUpdateHomeHubState: to support receiving updates of the home hub state.

• Updated MapKit for clearer display of developer data.

  • Added mutedStandard, a new map display mode that emphasizes developer data.

  • Added MKMarkerAnnotationView, a view that has the look and feel of markers in modern maps. Developers can configure several elements including the background color, the displayed text or glyph, and the color of the text or glyph.

  • Added properties to customize how annotations behave when collisions occur. Developers use a combination of displayPriority, collisionMode, and clusteringIdentifier to influence which annotations remain on the map.

Media and Web

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Support for High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) is a new standard for video encoding that offers substantially better compression than H.264 at the same level of visual quality.

  • Added support for using AV Foundation to play back movies containing HEVC-encoded tracks, and to export videos.

  • Added support for using VideoToolbox clients to can encode and decode HEVC video bitstreams.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - Support for High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF). High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF) is a new standard of image compression that nearly doubles current data compression ratios for the same level of image quality.

  • Added functionality to the Photos and Core Image frameworks to display, encode, and export HEIF images.

• New in tvOS 11.0 - TVML templates.

  • Added prototypes, TVML templates for reducing the runtime size of the DOM for creating efficient apps and improving performance.

  • Added data binding to TVML templates to associate templates with backing data.

  • Added paging to TVML templates needs more for efficient display of large catalogs of content.

  • To learn more about TVML templates and data binding, see the TVML Programming Guide

• New in tvOS 11.0 - AirPlay 2.

  • Improved AirPlay reliability for some audio playback interfaces in AV Foundation. To take advantage of the increased reliability, play audio using AVPlayer or the new AVSampleBufferAudioRenderer object.

  • Added multiple speaker support to AirPlay for long-form audio such as music and podcasts. To mark your application as presenting long-form audio, invoke the AVAudioSession method setCategory(_:mode:routeSharingPolicy:options:) and use AVAudioSessionRouteSharingPolicyLongForm as the parameter value.

  • Added AVRoutePickerView to the AVKit framework and AVRouteDetector to the AVFoundation framework for enabling users to choose the route for playing content when multiple routes are available. Use AVRouteDetector to determine if multiple routes are available when route detection is enabled. If multiple routes are available, use AVRoutePickerView to present an interface for the user to choose the routes.

• Added FairPlay streaming key management.

  • Improved the functionality of AVContentKeySession. Use AVContentKeySession to initiate content key requests independent of playback or downloading of media assets. Objects conforming to the AVContentKeyRecipient protocol, such as AVURLAsset, can be added as a recipient to AVContentKeySession to obtain access to existing content keys and initiate new content key requests

• Added more Live Photo adjustments.

  • Added a collection of Live Photo adjustments, called effects, that render the live photo as Loop, Bounce, or Long Exposure. Unlike regular live photos, Loop and Bounce videos will play in a continuous loop.

  • Added a playbackStyle, a new property that identifies how to present the PHAsset to the user.

System

• Updated the APIs in the Core Bluetooth framework to match across iOS, tvOS, watchOS, and macOS, and marked the platform availability of each API.

• APFS is now the default filesystem.

  • Added normalization-insensitive support for a case sensitive filesystem.