Report Suggested Apple May Not Launch Cross-Platform App Feature This Year

New report from well-known Apple journalist John Gruber claims that Apple may not launch cross-platform app support this year, which means the feature would come with macOS 10.15 and iOS 12, although it's indeed in the works at Apple.

Bloomberg's Mark Gurman first suggested Apple will allow developers to create universal apps that work across iPhone, iPad, and Mac this year. With the universal binaries, developers will be able to combine code and user interface assets for both their iOS apps, macOS-optimized apps into a single download.

However, Gruber in his blog post says he is "nearly certain" it will be a 2019 project for macOS 10.15 and iOS 13 rather than this year's iOS 12 & macOS 10.14. "I would set your expectations accordingly for this year's WWDC," he wrote last evening.

Furthermore, the report explains that Apple appears to be working on declarative control APIs for iOS and macOS, means that developers would not have to write classic procedural code, make it easier for developers to create interfaces.

There's nothing inherently cross-platform about a declarative control API. But it makes sense that if Apple believes that (a) iOS and MacOS should have declarative control APIs, and (b) they should address the problem of abstracting the API differences between UIKit (iOS) and AppKit (MacOS), that they would tackle them at the same time. Or perhaps the logic is simply that if they're going to create a cross-platform UI framework, the basis for that framework should be a declarative user interface.

We won't wait for long to see if cross-platform features would release this year or not, as WWDC will soon kicks off. Are you exciting for the new feature? Let us know in the comment below!

Image Via Hypebeast