The Apple TV is already a pretty great platform. Hopefully it will become even better this year.
Many Apple TV apps require a companion iOS app. My friend wrote a great trivia game for up to four players. Each player must use an iOS app to play the game. Trivia questions are displayed on the TV and players race to select their answers using the companion iOS app. The need to find and install the companion iOS app in the App Store is a significant source of friction. It is also a nuisance to have a companion app icon cluttering up your home screen when the app is only useful while playing the Apple TV game.
A few months ago I had an idea to improve this situation. My idea was to give developers the ability to write iOS extensions to tvOS apps. These extensions could install and run automatically within the Remote app on an iOS device. Basically, the Remote app would double as a container to run these tvOS app extensions. This would enable the Remote app to morph into whatever it needs to be based on the app that is currently running on the Apple TV. The Remote app could take the form of a game controller, or a second screen when watching video content on the TV.
Last week at Google I/O the concept of Instant Apps was introduced. The idea is that the mobile operating system can quickly and automatically install and run a portion of an app as needed. This can be useful to interact with a parking meter, or load content within an app if someone sends you a deep link. It occurs to me that this is similar to my idea for iOS extensions to tvOS apps, except it is more generic and useful for a lot of situations.
Imagine you launch CrossyRoad on your Apple TV. Then you hold your iPhone next to the Apple TV, and iOS asks if you would like to install and launch the CrossyRoad companion game controller app. This would be much easier than trying to find the app in the iOS App Store. Ideally the companion app wouldn't even show up on the home screen once installed unless CrossyRoad is currently running on a nearby Apple TV.
We also need a nice communication framework for iOS apps and tvOS apps to interact with each other.
I hope we'll see some innovations like this at WWDC this year. Until then, cut the cord and try my MythTV app.
