News

Apple launches coding app Swift Playgrounds on Mac

Apple wants to make it easier for children and adults alike to learn the basics of coding after launching its iPad-exclusive app Swift Playgrounds on Mac.

The app is part of the company’s Catalyst app initiative, which aims to give a mix of tools to developers and the general public to help them create a single app for a range of Apple devices.

Swift Playgrounds, an app that first debuted on iPad back in 2016, focuses specifically on the powerful and intuitive Swift programming language used for apps on iOS, macOS, tvOS, watchOS and iPadOS.

In addition to making coding more intuitive, the launch of Swift Playgrounds on Mac will also streamline the process of publishing Swift apps as iPads don’t currently support the Xcode development environment needed for Apple software.



In the app description, Apple says that the code written in Swift Playgrounds now syncs between iPad and Mac.

It adds: β€œSwift Playgrounds requires no coding knowledge, so it’s perfect for students just starting out, from twelve to one-hundred-and-twelve.”

The app makes coding simple by using drag-and-drop functionality and short snippets of commonly used code.

For several years now, Apple has been working on new ways to empower everyone from experienced developers to novices to design and engineer apps capable of running on Mac, iPhone and iPad.

It officially launched Project Catalyst at the WWDC event last year and plans to release updates for the Catalyst SDK for at least the next 18 months.

Apple also recently made the move to bring iOS and macOS apps together through a universal purchase option, which is set to go live sometime in March.

Developers can now build apps from the ground up for both iOS and macOS, with experts believing that the change should give a much-needed boost to macOS development in general.

Before you go

After spending over 20 years working with Macs, both old and new, theres a tool I think would be useful to every Mac owner who is experiencing performance issues.

CleanMyMac is highest rated all-round cleaning app for the Mac, it can quickly diagnose and solve a whole plethora of common (but sometimes tedious to fix) issues at the click of a button. It also just happens to resolve many of the issues covered in the speed up section of this site, so Download CleanMyMac to get your Mac back up to speed today.

mac-pc

Tags

About the author

Chris

I've been a passionate evangelist for Apple and the Macintosh throughout my working life, my first love was a Quadra 605 working with a small creative agency in the south of Norfolk UK in the mid 1990's, I later progressed to other roles in other Macintosh dominated industries, first as a Senior graphic designer at a small printing company and then a production manager at Guardian Media Group. As the publishing and printing sector wained I moved into Internet Marketing and in 2006 co-founded blurtit.com which grew to become one the top 200 visited sites in the US (according to Quantcast), at its peak receiving over 15 million visits per month. For the last ten years I have worked as an Affiliate and Consultant to many different business and start ups, my key skill set being online marketing, on page monetisation, landing page optimisation and traffic generation, if you would like to hire me or discuss your current project please reach out to me here.

You can also follow me on: and

Add Comment

Click here to post a comment

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.