[HN Gopher] Apple Design Resources
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Apple Design Resources
        
       Author : jlturner
       Score  : 245 points
       Date   : 2021-05-13 06:47 UTC (16 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (developer.apple.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (developer.apple.com)
        
       | tape_measure wrote:
       | They also have a case design guide with some interesting details
       | on the phone sensors.
       | https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https:/...
        
         | sizzle wrote:
         | This is the first time I've seen device schematics for Apple
         | products, super fascinating to say the least. Thanks for
         | sharing this gem!
        
         | srswtf123 wrote:
         | Without involving Google:
         | 
         | https://developer.apple.com/accessories/Accessory-Design-Gui...
        
           | saagarjha wrote:
           | I'm surprised this isn't behind MFI.
        
       | swyx wrote:
       | here's my collection of more design resources in case it helps
       | anyone https://github.com/sw-yx/spark-joy/
        
       | dbg31415 wrote:
       | About time!
       | 
       | This is great, saves every designer from doing a half-baked
       | version of this on their own.
       | 
       | Seems a bit odd to put it under developer.apple.com, but I guess
       | UX and visual design are part of the SDLC... Hope designers know
       | to look there.
        
         | HatchedLake721 wrote:
         | Available since 2017 as per earlier comments
         | 
         | https://web.archive.org/web/20170606171244/https://developer...
        
       | cblconfederate wrote:
       | I wish the design world will move away from apple's designs after
       | 15 years of religious adherence.
        
       | PetrBrzyBrzek wrote:
       | It's interesting that there is no Figma links.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | JusticeJuice wrote:
         | Making the company jump from sketch to figma is bit of a
         | mission (source - I've done it before). The way figma handles
         | frames, is much different to the way sketch handles artboards,
         | auto-import doesn't work as well as you'd hope.
         | 
         | They would have massive numbers of designers, all needing
         | visual assets. If you've got a library to provide consistency
         | to them, moving that library over to another tool is a big
         | mission, no matter how good it is.
         | 
         | I think you'd find figma gets healthy use at apple, like most
         | of the work of UI design is trying a bunch of different
         | solutions, collaboration and feedback, prototyping - I think
         | figma would crop up commonly for that type of work - the
         | 'shaping' phase.
         | 
         | The final step of 'ok make everything look apple' isn't that
         | big compared to everything you've done before that point,
         | jumping tools then isn't the end of the earth.
        
         | samat wrote:
         | Yes, that's my question, too. I remember when Sketch was all
         | the rage, Apple provided photoshop templates only -\\_(tsu)_/-
        
         | codeptualize wrote:
         | I was thinking the same. Maybe it's because Figma imports
         | Sketch files quite well.
         | 
         | I've done it before with the Apple Sketch files, did not have
         | any issue.
        
         | mattkevan wrote:
         | Probably because Sketch is a native Mac app, whereas Figma is
         | not.
        
           | spoonjim wrote:
           | To further clarify: Sketch is _only_ available on Mac, so it
           | 's clear why Apple loves it.
        
             | HugoDaniel wrote:
             | Please file a bug report if the Adobe XD links are not
             | working for you
        
           | azinman2 wrote:
           | Figma is cloud based, Sketch let's you work locally.
        
         | jstsch wrote:
         | Believe it or not, most graphic designers are still using Adobe
         | tools. Already hard to get them to move over to Sketch, but
         | it's becoming the norm for digital design. Figma is popular in
         | UI circles, but an exception outside of them.
        
           | sizzle wrote:
           | Adobe XD I'd surprisingly useable nowadays, caught up to
           | sketch with feature parity and is leaping ahead with their
           | army of seasoned Adobe developers.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | wincy wrote:
       | So as someone who doesn't do Apple development on a regular
       | basis, I feel like any time I do try to find some sort of
       | documentation the Google link to Apple's documentation is broken.
       | Anyone know what the deal is with that?
        
         | throwawaygh wrote:
         | I have the same issue -- Apple developer documentation, at
         | least what you find on Google, is really awful. Sometimes I
         | even have to watch youtube videos of random developers to
         | figure out how objects' protocols are supposed to work.
         | Developing for Apple is really a huge pain unless you're
         | immersed in that environment.
        
           | sharkjacobs wrote:
           | It's not just you, nobody is more upset about Apple's
           | documentation than the developers who are immersed in the
           | environment.[1][2][3][4]
           | 
           | [1]: https://www.caseyliss.com/2020/11/10/on-apples-pisspoor-
           | docu...
           | 
           | [2]:
           | https://www.hackingwithswift.com/articles/231/reimagining-
           | ap...
           | 
           | [3]: https://mjtsai.com/blog/2019/05/20/the-state-of-apples-
           | devel...
           | 
           | [4]: https://kean.blog/post/apple-documentation
        
             | simonbarker87 wrote:
             | It's one of the reasons I abandoned a v2 of my app that was
             | doing low-key quite well in the store. A handful of daily
             | paid app downloads for 0 marketing. I eventually hit a bug
             | in core data in the v2 that drove me to insanity as the
             | docs just didn't cover what I needed and nothing online
             | helped. I've come back as I can see I will eventually burn
             | out in the JS world and SwiftUI is legitimately great (so
             | far for simple stuff) but I know one day I'm going to be in
             | the same spot again - I just take HackingWithSwift as the
             | docs at this point
        
           | weaksauce wrote:
           | historically apple's docs were and are pretty awful...
           | apple's docs are going through a transition period right now
           | and it looks like they are breaking backwards compatibility
           | perhaps
        
           | duped wrote:
           | Apple doesn't care about developer experience.
           | Hardware/software dev at Apple is basically that strong/weak
           | doge meme.
           | 
           | The hardware dev is pushing up against the boundaries of what
           | is possible to manufacture, and they do it with shrinking
           | time scales each cycle.
           | 
           | Apple software gets shittier and harder to develop every
           | year. Some of the stuff I understand, like the onslaught of
           | permissions when everyone upgraded to Catalina. Others like
           | the state of XCode baffle me.
           | 
           | It gets harder and more expensive to target Apple platforms
           | every cycle, no matter how much better the hardware gets.
        
         | p_l wrote:
         | Google is littered with broken links to documentation that used
         | to be there and which also could be downloaded offline with
         | xcode.
         | 
         | after maybe 6 years of not looking at it, I looked again in
         | 2018 and was totally thrown away by the desolation. It seems
         | that some articles are kept in "archive" with lots of "beware
         | leopards"-like signs of deprecation, but there's nothing
         | findable anywhere else. Last year I wanted to write a small
         | menu bar icon app... but since I didn't want to use Swift, all
         | I could find was bare method signatures, and I ultimately got
         | discouraged before finding old enough data to get stuff
         | working.
        
       | petilon wrote:
       | Does license allow use of symbol font on the web version of my
       | app as well?
        
         | ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
         | Nope. SF Symbols is quite useful (for native apps). There are
         | libraries of things like ISO symbols, though. Here's one that I
         | have used: https://github.com/tabler/tabler-icons
        
         | saagarjha wrote:
         | Unfortunately not.
        
         | sirn wrote:
         | License agreements from the package:
         | 
         | > Your use of Symbols obtained from Apple's SF Font is limited
         | to creating mock-ups of user interfaces for software products
         | running on Apple's iOS, iPadOS, macOS and tvOS operating
         | systems and your use of Symbols obtained from Apple's SF
         | Compact Font is limited to creating mock-ups of user interfaces
         | for software products running on Apple's iOS, iPadOS, macOS,
         | tvOS and watchOS operating systems.
         | 
         | So likely not.
        
       | martini333 wrote:
       | XD templates xD
        
       | willswire wrote:
       | This is nice and all, but as an indie developer, I've never
       | needed to design my app layouts separately from my actual project
       | in Xcode. Maybe I'm going about this development thing all wrong
       | - but as a one-man-band, it would take too much time to design my
       | app layouts outside of the coding environment IMHO.
        
         | azinman2 wrote:
         | It's way faster to make changes in Sketch/Figma than it is in
         | code.
        
         | jamil7 wrote:
         | Neither. SwiftUI previews make it even faster (when they work).
         | I'm mostly using stock UI stuff though.
        
           | DelightOne wrote:
           | In case they work.. I've got two SPM modules besides two
           | projects inside a workspace and its impossible to make it
           | work. Complaining about files not being part of any build.
           | Files which are part of other packages which should not be
           | built in the first place!?!
        
           | snayebaziz wrote:
           | Me too. SwiftUI has made this a lot easier IMO and my overall
           | goal of making something look "Apple-like" is a lot more
           | reachable.
        
         | system16 wrote:
         | Not to be dismissive, but either your projects have very simple
         | UI or you don't iterate or experiment with different designs.
        
         | aplummer wrote:
         | If you design them outside of the coding environment, you may
         | find you actually save time overall.
        
       | camillomiller wrote:
       | Is this new, or was it already available for a while?
        
         | ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
         | I've been using components of these for ages. I haven't been
         | aware of the consolidated page, but I also never looked for it.
        
         | busymom0 wrote:
         | It's been available for a while. They update it every time a
         | new iOS releases. Archive shows the same page from September
         | 2020:
         | 
         | https://web.archive.org/web/20200930191859/https://developer...
        
         | gogopuppygogo wrote:
         | I have searched for these types of templates as little as a
         | year ago and didn't see this. I would expect pretty new.
        
           | wwalexander wrote:
           | The Internet Archive shows Photoshop, Sketch, and XD
           | templates going back to at least June 2017 [1]. I definitely
           | remember using the Photoshop icon templates in 2019.
           | 
           | [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20170606171244/https://develo
           | per...
        
         | isodev wrote:
         | It seems most Sketch and XD templates and libraries have been
         | recently updated (and extended) but the page has been available
         | for many years... featuring design resources for current OS and
         | product versions.
        
       | snayebaziz wrote:
       | Self-promo warning: I make an app that is a design tool
       | specifically for Apple platforms called DetailsPro:
       | https://detailspro.app/
       | 
       | The whole point of it is basically to make designing with SwiftUI
       | easier for more people by making it visual and block-based. You
       | can get the Apple look and use the real elements themselves,
       | rendered live on your device, without writing code.
       | 
       | Would love any feedback, especially from anyone who is getting a
       | lot of out these design resources or Sketch and Figma!
        
         | simonbarker87 wrote:
         | I really hate you're getting downvoted, yes it's self promotion
         | but let's not forget we are on the forum of a startup
         | accelerator designed in part to promote their businesses ...
         | and people who are interested in the topic will likely find
         | value on this app.
        
       | w0mbat wrote:
       | This is very timely as I downloaded that art bundle yesterday to
       | make an icon for a new Mac app.
       | 
       | Can someone tell me how to use that Apple Photoshop template for
       | app icons? I've been using Photoshop since version 1.0, I
       | understand layers etc, & I'm still baffled.
       | 
       | I get that when you save it generates all the sizes and puts them
       | in a folder. That part works fine. I don't get how you are
       | supposed to propagate your artwork from the 1024x1024 section to
       | the other areas of the template. I don't think you have to do it
       | manually.
       | 
       | I also don't see the ideal way to place your art inside the
       | template roundrect - I'm currently selecting it with the magic
       | wand and doing "paste into" which works, but doesn't seem ideal.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2021-05-13 23:02 UTC)