Apple announced on Friday to all its developers that starting on June 1; all new watchOS titles that they will submit to the App Store, should be native apps built with Apple's watch OS 2 software development kit.
This new requirement was published in the developer's website of the tech giant and represents the latest effort by the company to promote the platform of its wearables and answer launch complaints about slow-moving third-party apps.
The computer company launched watch OS 2 in June 2016 after the gadget enjoyed wide distribution. With their access to watch OS 2 SDKs, third-party app developers were encouraged to build their own customized watch faces and also access the different hardware elements of Apple Watch.
These elements include Taptic Engine, loudspeaker and microphone, and the Digital Crown. The tech giant also added software support for HealthKit, which is the company's biometric data repository. This was added so that apps can perform high-quality functions such as writing workout data back to the Activity App, and reading accelerometer data.
The fact that Apple is laying down this rule, some believe, should be beneficial to those using Apple wearables during a workout or an outside run wherein carrying a mobile phone would be a hassle.
If such rule is strictly enforced, it will ultimately result in higher quality apps that will enable the full use of Apple watches instead of just being a gadget that is supposed to run on an OLED screen.
Apple watch users need to value its capability of allowing software to run on it, without the need to transfer data back and forth from an iPhone host. This makes for a faster user experience.
The recent requirement of the tech giant will also mean that users won't encounter software with slow load times any more.
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