The series starts off with some questions and ambiguity in the overall architecture. Then mentions development tips and debugging tips I learned along the way. Hope you can enjoy it.
If you don’t know how the regular APNs architecture works. Then stop reading this series. Instead read the following first:
I recently went on a quest for Live Activities. There’s a ton of gotchas or subtle notes that aren’t clearly mentioned. Think of the series as an unofficial rfc.
Intro Example app - wwdc code - docs confusion points I saw Apple’s videos and docs on ActivityKit. They do a decent job of showing you 80% of the API and how Live Activity works. The remaining 20% is an enigma though....
Live Activities Part 2 - The missing doc
How do I begin development for Live Activities? Follow Apple’s docs:
Add a new† (widget) target to your app. Make sure you select ‘Live Activities’. Add the necessary plist items. Add push notification capability. Only needed if you want to start / update from server. If everything is done from within the app then you don’t need this. Example ‘Clock’ App on iPhone adds timers to your phone without any server interaction....
Live Activities Part 3 - Development
Development How can I share classes between widget and app? Models must be shared across targets.
App needs the model to manage its lifecycle (start, update, end, handling dismissed / stale activities). Widget needs the model to be able to present it. Each View should only get added to targets that needs them.
Your widget must create views based on the models for all Live Activity presentations. Your app may need views if it has an in-app view related to the live activity....
Live Activities Part 4 - Debugging
Debugging Notification delivery issues Can you send Live Activity notifications to simulator? Yes. The token created by the simulator works. Just don’t use the simulator for testing application lifecycle behavior or background tasks as a may not properly simulate OS restrictions.
Can you drag and drop payloads into the simulator? That didn’t work for me.
Timing of ‘Token Registration’ vs ‘Payload Sending’ Make sure the tokens are stored in your servers before sending the payload....
Live Activities Part 5 - The Update Token Problem
So your infrastructure and all is in place. But you have one problem. The OS isn’t issuing the ‘update token’ to you. This post walks you through when the problem occurs and when it doesn’t occur. Attempts I made to fix the issue, how I failed, how different use cases of Live Activity can have different out comes in terms of Completion Rate and final take.
Problem WHEN
When a Live Activity is started from the server, the OS doesn’t issue an update token until user locks the screen and then hits Allow....
