Stacktrace

John gets back into game development, Rambo builds a custom Bluetooth packet parser for AirBuddy, and the two embark on another technical deep dive — this time into the big topic of performance tuning.

What it’s been like for John to upgrade from the iPhone X to the iPhone 13 Pro, Rambo’s continued adventures into the depths of Bluetooth LE, and opinions on the final production versions of iOS 15 and iPadOS 15.

After discussing various refactoring strategies and app extensions for iOS apps running on the Mac, John and Rambo dive into the latest App Store news, how Apple TV+ compares to its competitors, and how to switch networking environments within a beta app.

John and Rambo share their first impressions of the products announced at Apple’s “California Streaming” event — including the iPhone 13 lineup, the new iPad "Classic" and iPad mini, and the Apple Watch Series 7.

After a few brief discussions about distributed systems and preparing code bases for Apple’s new operating systems, John and Rambo place their bets as to what Apple might announce during their upcoming “California Streaming” event. Will we see the iPhone 13, an Apple Watch Series 7, or perhaps something brand new?

John and Rambo discuss the iOS 15 beta process, the latest round of App Store debates, Swift concurrency backward compatibility, and whether Apple should embrace a more continuous delivery process for new APIs and system features.

On this 150th episode of the show, John and Rambo go on a series of accidental deep dives into universal links, how Catalyst and AppKit can be integrated, and more. Also, what does being a technical leader entail, and what’s the current state of Swift Evolution?

Prompted by recent rumors around a redesigned Apple Watch, John and Rambo discuss the state of the Watch as a platform, both as users, and from a development perspective. Also, managing an app’s colors, getting started with freelancing, and NSOperations.

John’s new iPad development setup, Rambo’s widget layout challenges, and Apple’s (lack of a strong) home device strategy. Also, managing deadlines, maintaining SwiftUI views across multiple system versions, and continuous integration.

Rambo’s initial impressions of the Playdate developer tools, John’s process for keeping articles and sample code up to date, Google’s new Tensor chip, and designer/developer collaboration.

After an accidental deep dive into Git branching strategies and a discussion about app-wide data models, John and Rambo talk about the recent news that Netflix is getting into gaming, and what that could mean both content-wise and technically.

John and Rambo discuss some of the most recent Apple hardware rumors, how they’ve been John and Rambo discuss how they use unit testing to verify their code, and how automatic testing fits into their overall workflows. Also, more details about Rambo’s new app, and strategies for adding new features to existing code bases.

John and Rambo discuss some of the most recent Apple hardware rumors, how they’ve been changing their style of programming since the introduction of SwiftUI and Combine, and whether Swift package manifests could one day replace Xcode project files. Also, why does John always call Rambo by his last name?

John and Rambo discuss the recent announcement of GitHub Copilot and the implications that such a tool could have on the world of software development. Also, deciding between SwiftUI and UIKit on a component level, and the power of relaxation.

It’s the Stacktrace App Store special! What could happen if Apple were to enable sideloading on iOS, and what other changes could Apple make to improve the App Store and its relationship to third-party developers? Also, connecting Combine with async/await, using design tools, alternatives to using analytics SDKs, and much more.

John’s new daily writing challenge, Rambo’s continued deep dives into Bluetooth and local networking, and initial impressions of Apple Music Spatial Audio. Also, what might the future of technologies like Objective-C and Combine look like, given this year’s WWDC announcements?

John and Rambo dive much deeper into some of the key new APIs and system features that were announced at WWDC21, including SharePlay, ShazamKit, Swift’s new concurrency system, and what’s new in Xcode 13. Also, debugging low-level crashes, and tips for getting started with app development.

John and Rambo discuss some of the major new announcements from Apple’s WWDC21 keynote, and how they might impact developers building apps for Apple’s platforms.

It’s time for another game of Stacktrace Keynote Poker! This time, John and Rambo place their bets on what Apple might announce at WWDC21, either during the main keynote, or as part of the more developer-focused State of the Union.

WWDC preparations, the challenge of building features that rely on wireless communication between devices, Apple’s latest accessibility announcements, and another semi-deep dive into Swift’s Result Builders feature.

After narrowly avoiding an accidental web development deep dive, John and Rambo discuss the challenges of open source maintenance, AirBuddy’s upcoming battery notifications feature, the latest Mac-related rumors, and the new Apple Music hi-fi update.

John and Rambo go on a deep dive into Plot’s new SwiftUI-like API for building HTML pages, and discuss 3D printing, API evolution and documentation, whether Apple ever considered letting third party developers ship apps outside of the iOS App Store, and how to pick what projects to pursue.

After checking in on the progress of Rambo HQ 2.0 and a visit to John’s Static Site Generation Corner, John and Rambo briefly discuss the ongoing trial between Apple and Epic Games, and then dive into topics like project planning and how to pick what server-side framework to use for a new project.

Organizing Combine-based code, the security of smart home devices, whether the Apple TV is gaining eARC support, and how to use compiler directives and launch arguments to customize an app at both compile time and runtime.

John and Rambo discuss all of the major announcements from Apple’s “Spring Loaded” event, including the new iMac, AirTags, the M1-powered iPad Pro, and the updated Apple TV. Also, the key factors that can help make a code base easier to navigate, and the benefits of going all-in on HomeKit.

It’s finally time for another round of Apple Event Keynote Poker, with John and Rambo placing their bets as to what Apple might announce during their “Spring Loaded” event on April 20th. Also, the power of HTTP, SwiftUI for AR, Swift’s Result Builders feature, and more.

John and Rambo talk about Kara Swisher’s recent interview with Tim Cook, Apple’s upcoming App Tracking Transparency initiative and the new additions to Apple Arcade, and classic vs modern UIKit. Also, behind the scenes of this year’s April Fools’ jokes, and a somewhat unique #askStacktrace segment.

John is excited about SwiftUI animations, Rambo updates the unofficial WWDC app, Xiaomi resurrects AirPower, and Apple announces WWDC21. Also, the latest Apple TV rumors, and what’s good to keep in mind when hosting a Hackathon.

Rambo launches a new app, John has thoughts about SwiftUI’s heavy usage of Swift’s type system, and it turns out that there might be more to the HomePod mini than meets the eye.

Optimizing the performance of SwiftUI views, mixing client work with indie development, Apple’s recent discontinuation of the original HomePod, and what it takes to provide really good feedback and bug reports when testing an app.

Rambo picks up Android development, John is continuing to turn into a Mac developer, and the two discuss the recent discontinuation of the iMac Pro and how developers can improve the way they communicate with other team members.

Localizing an indie app, the stability of SwiftUI previews, various ways of storing and handling app data, and whether Apple might be building a general-purpose cloud computing platform.

App Clip analytics, building macOS apps using SwiftUI, Apple’s initial response to the latest App Store scams, speculation about what a potential Apple March event might include, and getting started with unit testing.

After a deep dive into various ways of making Swift interact with C++ code, as well as the latest AirBuddy and humidifier hack updates, John and Rambo discuss the recent discontinuation of Swift for TensorFlow, and whether open sourcing commercial projects is a good idea.

Rambo hacks a humidifier, John is excited about linting and continuous integration, and the two discuss the most recent set of exposed App Store scams and what Apple could do to improve the situation. Also, SwiftUI jobs and minimum deployment targets.

John and Rambo discuss some of the key new features that are being introduced in iOS 14.5 and Xcode 12.5, as well as their preferred debugging workflows, and how to deal with tech debt and refactoring in a pragmatic and sustainable way.

The joy of writing apps using SwiftUI and modern UIKit, a review of the AirPods Max, will FaceID come to the iMac anytime soon, and what sort of things are good to consider when working with third party SDKs and frameworks?

John and Rambo react to the latest Mac and iPhone rumors, design a new feature for AirBuddy, talk about Swift Evolution and not-quite-public language features, and discuss various ways of using frameworks and libraries on Apple’s platforms.

Rambo goes indie, John realizes once again how important breaks are, and the two discuss the latest rumors around Apple’s AR glasses in great detail, all the way down to the API design level. It’s Stacktrace, after all.

On the final holiday special for this year (or, last year?), John and Rambo discuss their expectations for 2021, and what products and new developer tools that they hope to see from Apple during this new year.

On this second Stacktrace holiday special, John and Rambo look back at the past year and what some of the highlights were among the hectic, strange rollercoaster ride that 2020 has been.

On the first ever completely non-technical episode of Stacktrace, John and Rambo answer #askstacktrace questions about everything from local holiday traditions to what their favorite airplanes are.

An accidental deep dive into how the AirPods’ transparency mode is activated over Bluetooth, the launch of Swift by Sundell 3.0, running macOS code in the cloud, multiple headphone reviews and a comparison between the iPhone 12 Pro and 12 mini.

More on using the M1 Macs as development machines, thoughts on the newly announced AirPods Max and its pricing, the importance of maintaining URLs as stable identifiers, and how AirBuddy is made aware of new audio devices.

On this slightly more code-focused episode of the show, John and Rambo discuss cross-platform SwiftUI development and techniques for integrating SwiftUI with UIKit and AppKit. Also, how the original HomePod can now be jailbroken, using the M1 Mac mini for gaming, and much more.

John reviews the M1 Mac mini, and Rambo reviews the iPhone 12 mini. Two “mini products” that turn out to be not very mini in terms of performance. What’s it like using an M1 Mac for tasks like iOS development, and does the iPhone 12 mini feel like a proper flagship phone in 2020?

Apple’s lower App Store commission, the future of Swift by Sundell, shipping AirBuddy 2, M1 Mac benchmarks, SwiftUI’s potential as a cross-platform technology, and a review of the Xbox Series X. Yes, all of that in one episode — let’s dive in!

The first round of Apple Silicon Macs is finally here, and John and Rambo have lots of thoughts on them. Also, adventures into Multipeer Connectivity and Bluetooth, and mixing development work with design.

It’s time for John and Rambo to place their bets on what Apple might announce at their upcoming “One More Thing” event. Will we see the first Apple Silicon-powered Macs, and if so, which ones, and what features will they have? Also, artisanal, hand-crafted JSON from Brazil, and computer-generated CSS from Poland.

The story and implementation behind Swift by Sundell Discover, how and why AirBuddy 2 will have an onboarding process, thoughts and comments on the new Apple Silicon-powered iMac rumors, home screen customization hacks, and a deep dive into balancing code-level details with shipping great products.