Post by Willow on Jun 17, 2016 8:49:24 GMT 9.5
Anvitha’s animals app catches Apple’s eye at coder conference
It’s not every day a nine-year-old Australian is singled out by Apple chief Tim Cook at its showcase developers’ conference and is pursued by the US media.
But Anvitha Vijay is not your everyday Australian girl; she is the youngest developer at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference being held in San Francisco, and a successful one at that.
The Australian interviewed the then seven-year-old last year when she won a prize at the OzApp awards for her GoalsHi app.
At the time she got to impress US ambassador to Australia John Berry, investment firms such as Qualcomm Ventures and founders of start-ups Voxer, Toro and Farmville.
Now it’s Mr Cook himself after she won one of 350 student scholarships to attend this week’s San Francisco event with her iOS app, Smartkins Animals.
She said she designed the app herself and used Apple’s new coding language Swift to build it, which is no mean feat. “I love creating things that will benefit other people, which is why I started creating apps,” she said yesterday.
Smartkins Animals lets small children record their voices saying the names of animals depicted in a series of digital flashcards.
Apple developers use the Xcode environment to build apps, and in 2014 the company released Swift, a general purpose programming language that it believes can turn even children into star app developers. Mr Cook said more than 100,000 apps out of two million in the App Store used Swift.
Apple hopes that soon many more will. At this week’s conference it announced a free iPad app called Swift Playground which visually teaches children coding in Swift. It will be available in the App Store with the release of Apple’s iOS 10 upgraded operating system in the spring.
Anvitha said she tried the coding languages Objective C and Swift: “I liked Swift and chose to code in it.’’
She said she learnt a lot creating Smartkins Animals. “It got so challenging, many times. I had to keep the never-give-up attitude and just keep going. I am so glad I finally did it.’’
She said she’d love to speak at the conference to inspire other kids to code to help people. “I want to share with them how exciting it is to finally launch your creation. All the hard work does not seem like hard work any more when people download and start using what you have made. It is the best feeling ever.’’
Yesterday, two Australian-built apps were among 10 awarded the 2016 Apple Design Award.
One was Sydney-based James Tonkin and Niall McCarthy’s personal trainer app Zova, which can be accessed via multiple Apple platforms. You can work out watching Zova clips on Apple TV. The app uses Apple Watch to record heart rate and the iPhone to record steps during the day.
The other, Streaks, by Adelaide developers Isaac Forman and Quentin Zervaas, helps users set and monitor progress undertaking a series of six personal challenges. It could be reading books, or walking a dog.
It’s not every day a nine-year-old Australian is singled out by Apple chief Tim Cook at its showcase developers’ conference and is pursued by the US media.
But Anvitha Vijay is not your everyday Australian girl; she is the youngest developer at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference being held in San Francisco, and a successful one at that.
The Australian interviewed the then seven-year-old last year when she won a prize at the OzApp awards for her GoalsHi app.
At the time she got to impress US ambassador to Australia John Berry, investment firms such as Qualcomm Ventures and founders of start-ups Voxer, Toro and Farmville.
Now it’s Mr Cook himself after she won one of 350 student scholarships to attend this week’s San Francisco event with her iOS app, Smartkins Animals.
She said she designed the app herself and used Apple’s new coding language Swift to build it, which is no mean feat. “I love creating things that will benefit other people, which is why I started creating apps,” she said yesterday.
Smartkins Animals lets small children record their voices saying the names of animals depicted in a series of digital flashcards.
Apple developers use the Xcode environment to build apps, and in 2014 the company released Swift, a general purpose programming language that it believes can turn even children into star app developers. Mr Cook said more than 100,000 apps out of two million in the App Store used Swift.
Apple hopes that soon many more will. At this week’s conference it announced a free iPad app called Swift Playground which visually teaches children coding in Swift. It will be available in the App Store with the release of Apple’s iOS 10 upgraded operating system in the spring.
Anvitha said she tried the coding languages Objective C and Swift: “I liked Swift and chose to code in it.’’
She said she learnt a lot creating Smartkins Animals. “It got so challenging, many times. I had to keep the never-give-up attitude and just keep going. I am so glad I finally did it.’’
She said she’d love to speak at the conference to inspire other kids to code to help people. “I want to share with them how exciting it is to finally launch your creation. All the hard work does not seem like hard work any more when people download and start using what you have made. It is the best feeling ever.’’
Yesterday, two Australian-built apps were among 10 awarded the 2016 Apple Design Award.
One was Sydney-based James Tonkin and Niall McCarthy’s personal trainer app Zova, which can be accessed via multiple Apple platforms. You can work out watching Zova clips on Apple TV. The app uses Apple Watch to record heart rate and the iPhone to record steps during the day.
The other, Streaks, by Adelaide developers Isaac Forman and Quentin Zervaas, helps users set and monitor progress undertaking a series of six personal challenges. It could be reading books, or walking a dog.