Sneak Peek: First Chapter From New SwiftUI, Combine, and Catalyst Books!

3) Catalyst by Tutorials

Catalyst by Tutorials shows you how to take all of those great apps you’ve build on iOS and run them right on macOS. But like everything else with Apple, it’s not always as straightforward as you’d like it to be.

This book will show you how to design your apps to work well on macOS, what you can and can’t port between the two platforms, and any other “gotchas” to keep an eye out for when building apps under Catalyst.

This book is for developers who have a good handle on building iOS apps and want to learn how to port those apps to run on macOS as well.

In today’s sneak peek, we’re releasing Chapter 1 from the book. In this chapter, you’ll learn how to get started porting an iOS app to macOS, and you’ll learn what features you get for free, and what features don’t work quite as well out-of-the-box (i.e. what we’ll be covering in the rest of the book).

This is just one of the 14 chapters that will be in the final book, coming this fall:

1. The Checkbox: In this chapter, you’re going to get your first look at the sample app that you’ll be interacting with for the remainder of this book. Once you familiarize yourself with the basic functionality and architecture, you’ll take your first steps toward bringing the app to macOS.
2. Migrating to Split View Controller: Here, learn why you should use Split View Controller and gain Instruction on how to migrate from iPhone-style Navigation Controller with master/detail push to Split View Controller.
3. Drag & Drop: In this chapter, you’ll learn how to add support for dragging photos from other apps and dropping them into your app. You’ll also learn how to implement drag and drop for collection views with smooth animations and cell reordering.
4. Setting the Scene(s): In this chapter, you’ll learn how to enable a feature that has been available since the beginning on the Mac, and has just arrived with iOS 13 on the iPad, multi-window support.
5. Adding Some Context: In this chapter, you’re going to learn all about context menus, adding support for long-press menus on iPad and how those menus will automatically port to Mac.
6. The Keyboard: In this chapter, learn how to use keyboard commands to navigate across a list and delete items, as well as the UIKeyCommand and setting first responder.
7. Preferences & Settings Bundle: Learn layout preferences, and override individual items from dark mode, similar to Mail.app and the reader pane.

Section II: Making a Great Mac App

8. Making Your App Feel at Home on MacOS: In this chapter, you’re going to take things to the next level by making some adjustments that will really make your app shine when running on macOS via Catalyst. Throughout the rest of this section, you’ll go deeper on several other Mac-specific features. When you’re done, you’ll have the makings of a world-class Mac app.
9. The Mouse: Use UIHoverGestureRecognizer to show a shadow effect when hovering over a diary entry in the sample app.
10. Barista Training: Menu Bar: In this chapter, you’ll learn all about the menu bar by trimming the default menu bar, as well as adding new items to delete, share and add new diary entries.
11. Barista Training: Toolbar: In this chapter, you’ll learn to customize the toolbar items, including Share, Insert and Print.
12. Barista Training: Touch Bar: In this chapter, you’ll continue to develop your app by adding the toolbar items to the Touch Bar.

Section III: Distributing Your App

13. App Store: In this chapter, you’ll read about the pros and cons of distributing on the Mac App Store, and learn how to go from Xcode all the way to a released app on the App Store.
14. Third-Party Distribution: In this chapter, you’ll learn how to make sure everyone with macOS can run your app, as well as how to improve the installation experience for your potential users.

About the Catalyst by Tutorials Authors

Andy Pereira is an author of this book. He is an iOS developer in Atlanta, GA. He enjoys traveling the world with his wife, learning new cultures, and playing guitar.

Nick Bonatsakis is an author of this book. He is an accomplished software engineer with over a decade of experience in mobile development across both Android and iOS. He is a passionate technologist, musician, father and husband. He currently works as an independent consultant under his own company, Velocity Raptor Inc.

Marin Benčević is an author of this book. He is a Swift and Unity developer who likes to work on cool iOS apps and games, nerd out about programming, learn new things and then blog about it. Mostly, though, he just causes SourceKit crashes. He also has a chubby cat.

Where to Go From Here?

Want to check out the sneak peek?

• If you already preordered the books, you can download them now – and stay tuned for the next EA release in a few weeks!
• If you didn’t preorder yet, consider ordering your copies now! The books are on currently on sale; you can get all 3 for just $99.

This sale is only available for a limited time, so be sure to grab it before it’s gone.

We hope you enjoy these sneak peeks, and stay tuned for another early access release soon!