

64-bit and iOS 8 Requirements for New Apps - derpenxyne
https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=10202014a

======
verelo
64 bit is already a requirement, right? We submitted an update a few weeks
back and it wouldn't pass verification without us adding 64 bit support (which
took a few days of work - it added a few issues but nothing major, they were
just tricky to track down)

We're working on moving over to the iOS 8 SDK already. What a massive pain in
the backside that is proving to be.

~~~
apike
We also hit this - it was a bug, and was fixed within a couple days. They are
now rolling this out intentionally on Feb 1.

This is a challenge for us because we use a large 3rd party library (WebRTC)
that has a bunch of armv7 assembly in it, but Feb 1 should be enough time to
get it sorted.

~~~
verelo
Ah nice, now that is frustrating. We just ended up fixing it, where did you
find it was a bug? I find the communication between Apple and the general
developer community is pretty difficult to come by (even after millions of
installs of our app)

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jibberia
Ah, it finally happened. My company has a legacy-ish SDK that all our products
are built on, and because of bad decisions in the past (like extensive use of
C macros) it essentially cannot be ported to 64-bit. Luckily we're already
building the replacement, but this is going to accelerate the requirement of
having to migrate data from the old system to the new one.

~~~
mackey
At least it sounds like this only applies to new apps, not apps updates for
apps that are already published. It would be great to get clarification on
that though.

~~~
jibberia
Yes -- the language is ambiguous.

~~~
mackey
According to a post in
[https://devforums.apple.com/message/1062807#1062807](https://devforums.apple.com/message/1062807#1062807)
this applies to app updates as well.

------
tiffanyricks
This makes sense to me and easier to maintain the code. I won't have to
support older versions. And my app can take advantage of the 64bit
architecture.

~~~
bradleyland
I'm not sure why you'd say that. There's a lot of misinterpretation going on
here. Read the text carefully (emphasis mine):

> new iOS apps uploaded to the App Store must _include_ 64-bit support and be
> built with the iOS 8 SDK

You must _include_ support for these items. There is no suggestion or
requirement that a developer not support iOS7 (or iOS 6 for that matter).

This also only affects _new_ apps. So basically:

* This only applies to new apps [1].

* This only requires that new apps include support for iOS 8 [2] and 64-bit.

* Developers can still support older versions of iOS.

That's just the basic breakdown of Apple's expectations. Your customers might
still demand support for older iOS versions, so this isn't much of a change as
far as legacy support goes.

1: I suppose it is open to interpretation whether "new iOS apps uploaded to
the App Store" includes updated versions of older apps. It doesn't sound like
that to me though.

2: Just because you use the iOS 8 SDK doesn't mean you can't/don't support
earlier iOS versions. Quite the opposite actually, as iOS SDKs have specific
provisions for supporting older versions (note, I'm not an iOS dev, but this
is what I hear).

~~~
0x0
Building with a new SDK makes the app opt in to new behaviors even when
targeting older iOS versions. This can be quite a hassle. Your perfectly
working app - even when deployed on an iOS 8 device - will suddenly break in
many fun ways merely from recompiling with a newer SDK: touch handling
differs, margins may be weird, table headers vanish because various new
methods aren't implemented, screen rotation suddenly gets enabled where you
didn't expect, new keyboard metrics mess up your layout, etcetc. This happens
because when the runtime detects that an app is built with an older SDK, it
enables a bunch of compability behaviors that newly built apps cannot opt in
to.

------
wvenable
Does this mean no new iOS apps for those people who choose not to upgrade to
iOS 8?

~~~
reverend_gonzo
Did you read the link?

New apps must include 64-bit support. That's it. It says nothing about not
allow backwards compatibility as well.

~~~
wvenable
I read the link, I was focusing on the "built with the iOS 8 SDK" part. I'm
asking the question whether or not building with the iOS 8 SDK would preclude
that code from running on iOS 7 or is that only if that code uses iOS 8
features.

I'm not sure why this is news otherwise.

~~~
Osmium
> I'm not sure why this is news otherwise.

One reason is that, I believe, currently if even a single 32-bit app is loaded
on a newer iOS device, all the standard 32-bit libraries have to be loaded
into memory as well which causes increased memory pressure. This is a problem
given that current iOS devices only have 1 GB of RAM. Getting older apps
migrated to 64-bit is therefore a big deal for this reason alone.

~~~
wvenable
I think HN has trained me to be very pessimistic about technology news. When I
see a link posted like this without much commentary voted to the front page my
first reaction is that it must be bad news.

~~~
bradleyland
If you pick up anything from HN, _please_ don't let it be the pessimism :)

