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objective-ctvos

How do I notify users of new content available in tvOS apps from the home screen?

Push notifications have been left out of tvOS (understandably so) but the docs seem to contradict themselves in alerting users to the fact that there is something new available in your tvOS app.

Here it seems to say that you can add an app badge: https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/tvos/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/RemoteNotificationsPG/Chapters/WhatAreRemoteNotif.html

Here it says they've been removed from UIKit: https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/tvos/releasenotes/General/tvOS90APIDiffs/Objective-C/UIKit.html

Removed UIApplication.applicationIconBadgeNumber

Assuming the badge approach is not supported in this release, does anyone know the best practice for alerting a user that there is new content in your app without the user taking an explicit action? ie focusing on the app and showing them something in TopShelf?

Solution

  • I encountered the same problem and dived into this. Probably your best way is to update the topshelf with latest items, which is my way to solve this for now. You can use network calls to update the topshelf with content from your backend. This depends on the type of application. E.g. showing the latest top movies for a movies app.

    You can trigger an update of the topshelf after your network call completed using the following code:

    NSNotificationCenter.defaultCenter().postNotificationName(TVTopShelfItemsDidChangeNotification, object: nil)

    Make sure to implement the TVTopShelfProvider which should be clear using the following documentation:

    This protocol is adopted by the principal class of an app’s TV Services extension. Apps that implement this extension can provide dynamic content to the Top Shelf element rather than having the system use the static image submitted with the app. The topShelfStyle property specifies the interface style you want, and the topShelfItems property specifies the content items to display. Whenever you change the content provided by the extension, post a TVTopShelfItemsDidChangeNotification notification to prompt the system to reload your content.

    Icon badges are removed for app icons, push notifications as well (except for silent push notifications).