Pending an Apple Release

watchOS series

Last night I woke up bleary eyed at 3am to put in my order for a pair of Apple Watches. I got a 42mm Sport in Underscore Blue for me and a 38mm Sport in Pink for my Wife.

Nearly coincident with getting my orders submitted I got notification that all my WatchKit apps were approved. They are now in the “Pending an Apple Release” state waiting until sometime closer to April 24th to be released to the App Store.

I thought this would be a good point to take a look back at this As I Learn WatchKit series. In the five months since I started the series I have posted 34 posts chronicling my progress and understanding of the platform.

Back when I first started the series I said my hope was to “trick myself into writing more”. On that score the series has been a wild success. It is the most I’ve written in a long time. Giving myself permission to just post whatever seemed interesting at the moment and worry less about it being “perfect” was a powerful motivator.

The feedback the series has received as been genuinely amazing. So many folks have reach out to me to say how helpful it was in getting them up and running with the Watch. I’m expecting to continue the series going forward. In the very near term likely slowing down a bit, but probably ramping back up in June if we see Watch announcements at WWDC.

Last week I submitted 8 WatchKit apps to the App Store. I’ll cover the details of these more as we get closer to the launch from a marketing perspective. They included:

  • 5 updates to existing apps (Feed Wrangler, Pod Wrangler, Audiobooks, My Recipe Book, Pedometer++)
  • 1 new utility app
  • 2 new games

It has been a lot of fun…now I just can’t wait until April 24.

David Smith