I'm creating an iOS application for the iPhone the has push notification abilities. If a user has an Apple watch and has notification mirroring on, will the Watch get the notification automatically, or would I need to develop a watch app as well so that they can pop up on it? The latter seems to make more sense based off of other notification models, but the way Apple talks about the notification functionality being automatic in their docs is throwing me off a little.
The watch will show a push notification even if you don't have a watch app, but you will get the default design and functionality.
Related
How do you send Local Notifications from iPhone to an Apple Watch app when the Apple Watch app is in the background? And how do you check Local Notifications in the simulator, if possible?
The notifications shown at Apple Watch are the sames that appears in your iPhone.
If you have your iPhone locked, notifications go to the Apple Watch also.
You can not send a notification that only shows at Apple Watch.
As of Apple Docs:
Apple Watch takes full advantage of the existing interactive
notification support on iOS. If your iOS app supports notifications,
Apple Watch displays those notifications at appropriate times. When
one of your app’s local or remote notifications arrives on the user’s
iPhone, iOS decides whether to display that notification on the iPhone
or on the Apple Watch. For notifications sent to Apple Watch, the
system lets the user know subtly that a notification is available. If
the user chooses to view the notification, the system displays an
abbreviated version of the notification first, followed by a more
detailed version. The user can dismiss the detailed notification,
launch your Watch app, or act on the notification by tapping an
available action button.
Apps are not required to do anything to support notifications. The
system provides a default notification interface that displays the
alert message from the notification. However, apps can customize the
notification interface and include custom graphics, content, and
branding.
I'm trying to create a feature where certain UILocalNotifications trigger a sound despite the fact that they are displayed in an Apple Watch, or if that's not possible, are not routed at all to the Apple Watch and just to an iPhone where they can play a sound. Having the watch produce a sound is not ideal compared to the iPhone since I need it to overlay any music the user is playing on headphones.
Obviously the user can disable notifications on the Apple Watch for the app, but there are cases where it is useful to receive notifications on the Apple Watch and that is an all-or-nothing solution.
The Apple documentation states:
When one of your app’s local or remote notifications arrives on the user’s iPhone, iOS decides whether to display that notification on the iPhone or on the Apple Watch.
Is there any information on how iOS decides where to display a notification? Is there any programmatic way to disable notification forwarding to Apple Watch?
You can selectively disable notification in apple watch: http://www.imore.com/how-turn-alerts-apps-apple-watch
See the answer in below link for app’s local or remote notifications guide:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/33581623/2401116
Is it possible to send instant notifications to Apple Watch from an iPhone app? The Apple Watch guide says "Apple Watch displays those notifications at appropriate times". So looks like there is no guarantee that the notification will be instant. I'm developing an iOS app that provides navigational notifications so those have to be instant.
Unfortunately WatchKit doesn't support it at this time. Not only can you not guarantee when the notification will appear, you can't even guarantee it will show up on the Watch. The OS decides which device is active and routes the notification there.
You can schedule/fire a local user notification to make it shown on the Watch, with limitations:
Users may turn off notifications of your app on Watch.
Notifications are only sent to Watch when the paired iPhone is locked, and the watch is on the wrist.
I'm trying to display local notifications in Apple Watch.
The implementation is done but I don't know how to pass local notifications to Apple Watch. How can I do this?
If your iOS app supports local or remote notifications, Apple Watch displays those notifications at appropriate times.
iOS it self decide to pass the notification to Apple Watch or show on iPhone,
As you said the implementation is done so let the iOS handle it. and at this time you have to do nothing to pass it to Watch you can see the Apple documentation for more clarification.
You can see here
iOS takes care of notifications.
If your iPhone is unlocked, you get notifications on your iPhone, instead of your Apple Watch.
If your iPhone is locked or asleep, and your Apple Watch is unlocked and on your wrist, you get notifications on your Apple Watch.
Read this
https://support.apple.com/en-in/HT204791
I would like to support my iPhone's app Local Notifications in the Apple Watch from the very first moment the Watch is released, but I don't plan on building a Watch App yet.
From what I researched, it seems like iPhone's notifications will be automatically supported on the Watch, without needing any additional development or WatchKit implementation.
Apps are not required to do anything to support notifications. The system provides a default notification interface that displays the alert message from the notification. However, apps can customize the notification interface and include custom graphics, content, and branding.
Is this correct?
If so:
1. Will notifications on the Watch have action buttons just like configured for the iPhone app?
2. Is there any way I can test that on the simulator to be sure it works as expected?
If not:
3. Is there any way to support only notifications without creating a Watch app?
This is the more related question I found so far, but it's not really what I'm looking for. How to trigger notifications using WatchKit
I would like to support my iPhone's app Local Notifications in the Apple Watch from the very first moment the Watch is released
Yes notifications for your iOS application will work from day one on Apple Watch.
Will notifications on the Watch have action buttons just like
configured for the iPhone app?
If your iOS app already supports actionable notifications they will work with Apple Watch.
Is there any way I can test that on the simulator to be sure it works
as expected?
Good question actually, you can't test your current iOS app's notifications working on the simulator but you can test a custom notification interface from WatchKit.
You should file a feature request for this.
Is there any way to support only notifications without creating a Watch app?
No, you'll need to provide a sample Notification JSON payload as part of an WatchKit Bundle, which requires submitting an Apple Watch app.