radianttap

Radiant iOS 7 future

Given my previous two blog posts about iOS 7, one would be forgiven to think I will rebel against it.

But, there is really no choice here. This is the future of iOS and since this is my bread and butter, I will transition all my apps to it, doing my own thing. Over the years, I have tried various stuff as I learned this craft - to those who don’t know, before iPhone I did web and programmed in Javascript and classic ASP only. I now have a sense of how I want my apps to look, how they should behave, what personality they should have.

I checked my most popular app - Try Couch to 5k - it looks great on the iOS 7, with not much changes required. I’ll remove the custom navigation bar and tab bar graphics as well as custom graphics I use for the bar button backgrounds. And that would be it. Adjust the look of UI here and there but it’s more or less just as I ever wanted it to be.

There is room to make more substantial changes to the UI, which will be needed as I add more long-requested features in upcoming version 3.0. However, given that I’m only now transitioning it to iOS6-only app, the running apps will probably not be iOS7 only. I don’t see the need for it, at the moment.

Banca looks amazing with the grey theme. Most likely I will fold that theme to be the default and remove the rest, they are barely used anyway, by anyone. Gill Sans looks perfect there and with few possible improvements to the UI I’m thinking about, it will be awesome, the best currency converter on the store.

However, this is just a stop gap. The real challenge would be to update my oldest apps to this brave new world. I had plans for few of them to make dramatic return as iOS 6 only apps (after being neglected for years), but that’s meaningless now - they will be pure iOS 7 apps, build from ground-up for it. One in particular is soooo fitting for all the wonderful changes in UIKit frameworks that I can’t wait to start working on it.

I also have ideas for few more simple and efficient apps, but will keep it hush for now. There is plenty to do with existing stuff than to worry about that now.

With that, I’m essentially stopping all consulting work until iOS 7 has shipped - I removed the Consulting page from Radiant Tap web site. I have two client projects to complete, but that should not interfere much with iOS 7 plans.

So, get rich or die trying approach. There is this buzz in the iOS dev community that I have not seen since 2008. Everyone I follow on Twitter/App.net is pumped up and ready to try their best and attack the established and entrenched players in various fields, with exception of games.

Looking forward to the Fall.