WWDC 2015
As WWDC’s go 2015 is one of my favorites ever. I know 2014’s is supposed to be everyone’s favorite because of how shocking it was (Swift, extensions, keyboards, Metal, etc.). But what I love about this year’s is how it wasn’t another massive dump of new APIs. Last year felt overwhelming. This year makes me feel empowered to do more:
Swift has been revved to 2.0, and Objective-C frameworks like UIKit have been updated with nullability qualifiers and and parameterized collections. I feel comfortable using Swift in production code for the first time.
Split View multitasking on iPad brings size classes and AutoLayout from the bleeding-edge of UI development into the center of the picture. AutoLayout may not yet be mandatory, but the essential role of size classes and trait collections (in order to support iPad multitasking app size changes) signals that these new(ish) APIs are here to stay.
Swift is going open source! I am thrilled by this news. Imagine how cool it will be to build shared libraries between clients and servers, all backed by Swift’s safety features and written in the same IDE. The only thing I’m not excited about is the inevitable showdown between thirty-eight sloppy open-source ports of Foundation into Swift. Prepare for some Wild West shit.