WWDC – aka Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference – takes place every year in June, and it will happen again in June 2020. But this year it will be different.
On 13 March Apple announced: “The current health situation has required that we create a new WWDC 2020 format that delivers a full program with an online keynote and sessions, offering a great learning experience for our entire developer community, all around the world. We will be sharing all of the details in the weeks ahead.”
WWDC normally takes place at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California, and Apple typically charges $1,599 for a ticket to attend, but this year’s event will not have a cost associated with it. Apple normally holds WWDC early in June, but this year’s event is later in the month to give Apple additional time to prepare the digital format.
It’s not always just a software event, though; in the past we have seen hardware announcements too. At WWDC 2017 Apple launched the iMac Pro, a new MacBook and MacBook Pro, a new iPad Pro and the HomePod, for example. If you go further back Apple would actually unveil new iPhones at WWDC – such as in 2010 when it revealed the iPhone 4 – but that kind of thing would be a huge surprise these days.
The most exciting thing this year is the first global Student Swift Challenge.
Apple have published on their site:
“Students are an integral part of the Apple developer community, and last year WWDC saw attendance from more than 350 student developers spanning 37 different countries,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “As we look forward to WWDC20, although our gathering will be virtual this year, we want to recognize and celebrate the creative contributions of our young developers from around the world. We can’t wait to see this next generation of innovative thinkers turn their ideas into a reality through the Swift Student Challenge.”Swift Playgrounds is a revolutionary app for iPad and Mac that makes learning the Swift programming language interactive and fun. Now through 11:59 p.m. PDT on May 17, student developers from all over the world can submit to the Swift Student Challenge by creating an interactive scene in a Swift playground that can be experienced within three minutes. Winners will receive an exclusive WWDC20 jacket and pin set.
Apple Press Release Team: Alex Kirschner, Katie Clark Alsadder
Applications here show the requirements and the conditions are:
Requirements:
- Your submission must be a Swift playground created by you as an individual or a template modified by you as an individual. Group work or Xcode projects will not be considered. You may include third-party open source licensed code and/or public domain images and sounds, with credit and an explanation of why it was used.
- Your Swift playground must be built with and run on Swift Playgrounds 3.3 on iPadOS 13.4.1, Swift Playgrounds 3.3 on macOS 10.15.4, or Xcode 11.4.1 on macOS 10.15.4. If it runs on iPadOS, it must be optimized to display properly on all models of iPad Pro.
- All content should be in English.
- Your .zip file size should not be more than 25 MB.
- Submissions will be judged offline. Your Swift playground should not rely on a network connection and any resources used in your Swift playground should be included locally in your .zip file.
But be aware, the terms and conditions (especially with Apple) are always worth reading. As a massive Apple disciple, they’re not ones I’d want to be on the wrong side of.
Some of the essential application conditions are:
Reasons for Disqualification
Your submission may not be considered for the Challenge if it does not satisfy all eligibility and submission requirements or if it meets any of the conditions listed below:
- Your Swift playground does not function during the judging process.
- Your submitted Swift playground was not built by you or was built by more than one person. Group work will not be considered. Plagiarized work will not be considered and may disqualify you from future challenge or scholarship opportunities.
- Your Swift playground requires sign in.
- You track and/or insert analytics code in your Swift playground meant to identify or track any usage of the judges.
- You submit the same Swift playground that you submitted previously, with minimal or no changes.
If you’re over 18, you can submit your CV or Resume – a reassuringly lovely fact because it suggests they’ll use the pool of talent to select desirable employees!
Posie Lombardi Rodriguez 