Thanks to Apple, we got the invaluable opportunity to chat with 3 brilliant groups of individuals at Apple Park, and here’s what went down.
L – R: Subhransu Behera, Tim Shim, Melvin Tan
In Conversation with Melvin Tan, Tim Shim & Subhransu Behera – iOS Dev Scout
We met with Melvin Tan, a Lead Software Engineer with GovTech who is working on the Singpass app under the National Digital Identity. Known as an Industry Expert for Mobile Applications Development for WorldSkills Singapore – a national skills competition held biennially to identify the best youth talents in Singapore, Melvin is also no stranger to developing iOS apps. Alongside Melvin, we also chatted with Tim Shim and Subhransu Behera – his friends from the Singapore iOS Community – iOS Dev Scout.
“The Singapore iOS Community is all about a space where knowledge can be shared and everyone who is interested in the subject matter can help people to get started and learn from each other”, quipped Subhransu, when asked about what the community is all about.
Tim jumped in to share that being a part of a community like that is really important to inspire others, and be inspired at the same time – all while sharing a love and passion for the same thing.
Following the exciting updates at WWDC23, Melvin shared some interesting stuff in the pipeline for the group – as July would see them organising a ‘Beyond WWDC’ event both in person and online at the Apple office, where ‘people will get together to discuss what happened at WWDC and share experiences with each other to share knowledge’, Melvin shared.
There are also plans to hold a panel discussion to talk about the new APIs, potential users, and how developers can leverage all the new updates – where according to Subhransu, people can already come up with their own work-in-progress prototypes and get feedback and learnings from other fellow developers.
L – R: Don Chia and Carl Voller
In Conversation with Don Chia & Carl Voller – Swift Student Challenge winners
Meet Don Chia and Carl Voller, two young aspiring developers, who coincidentally both won the Swift Student Challenge in 2022, with Don having won the SSC once before in 2021 too.
Don started developing an interest in coding and developing his own stuff since he was in primary school, and in JC, he was introduced to Swift through his H2 Computing curriculum. He continued to develop this keen interest by collaborating with different people online and eventually spent some of his time during NS staying true to his passion – by crafting the code for his submission for WWDC SSC22 on pen and paper while in camp, and transcribing everything on his Mac on weekends. He eventually went on to win that year, with his submission being a combination of HTML tags and CSS properties that people can experience early 20th art movements through software and coding.
Carl started programming at the keen age of 13, and in 2018, his school exposed him to Swift – and he got really intrigued by how everything moves quickly and from there, developed an even stronger bond and love for the craft. He went on to win the WWDC SSC22 as well.
Speaking to both Don and Carl, they were both really excited to be at WWDC23 and Carl in particular, was very interested in the updates surrounding SharePlay and ShareKit, as he has a passion for collaborative technology.
Don is currently still going through NS and will ORD in November – but he has never stopped developing, and working on passion projects on the side.
It’s no doubt that these 2 young individuals will go forth into uncharted territories with the constantly updated iOS landscape, and develop amazing apps that will one day, change the world.
Jakob Lykkegard with stitch.’s Apple Design Award 2023
In Conversation with Lykke Studios – an Apple Design Award 2023 Winner
Lykke Studios’ casual embroidery puzzle game, stitch. Is a winner of the Apple Design Award 2023 for Inclusivity, and as Jakob Lykkegard, the founder of Lykke Studios shared – it’s their first win in 15 years of developing games and apps.
With cross-generational appeal, stitch., an Apple Arcade title, brings the calming, meditative art of embroidery to its users. As the game progresses, designs increase in difficulty while background music lulls players into a state of tranquility. With support for multiple languages and custom accessibility options for those with colour blindness, low vision, and motion sensitivities, everyone can join in on the fun.
Lykkegard shared that the inspiration for stitch. came from an artist online, and what Lykke Studios usually do is to study the material and fabric that they’d want to simulate within their games, before they engineer the gameplay and mechanics – a little different from how others do it.
stitch. Is Lykke Studios’ first game that allows users to have access to any hoop they want to play and are not required to complete the gameplay in a sequential manner – according players the flexibility that other games may not be able to.
With a strategic and intentional lean core working team at Lykke Studios, Lykkegard runs a tight ship, keeping the team motivated and hungry to develop new games and apps.
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Having had the opportunity to speak to a select few unique and amazing developers at WWDC23 gave us a little peek into the developers’ playground – and there is no doubt that the upcoming months will be extremely exciting.
