Wearable Insights

With the impending release of the Apple Watch in the next few months, there will be a new market for apps that use the hardware. I plan to document my learning progress in this blog post. Swift, the new programming language for Apple Products Being entirely new to iOS development, I plan to start with Swift instead of Objective-C because the newer language seems smarter and easier to learn. Swift Tutorial: A Quick Start  by Ray Wenderlich and continue with the subsequent tutorials which demonstrate how to make a tip calculator for iOS  and so on. Ray's blog tutorial series is wonderfully thorough; it is replete with screenshots and has great notes and comments in the code that explain how Swift functions. Although many of the notes address Objective-C developers, most of the notes are helpful even for a complete n00b like me. At several milestones, he even provides down to the project at that stage in the development process which is a great feature for anyone that wan...

In the last 2 years, wearable devices have grown significantly, however, none has had a lasting, substantial effect. Fitbits famously lose their appeal after just a few weeks once the users understand their basic patterns. Google Wear devices or Google Glass have made lasting, substantial effects but have only been adopted by bleeding edge enthusiasts and Android developers. Apple, however, reaches a broader spectrum of consumers and is trusted by it's loyalists to release polished products. Apple Watch will succeed where others fell short for the following reasons: 1. Loyal Apple Customers The top reason Apple Watch will go where other wearables have not...because people will buy Apple products. Apple creates a "walled garden" where users' data is kept in a beautiful form, but it can't leave. 2. Design With so many possible combinations of bands and finishes, the customer can truly personalize the device. Additionally, Apple's design lang...