Hello everyone, I’m looking for some clarity from the community regarding eligibility for the Swift Student Challenge 2026, particularly for students taking a gap year in India. I graduated from high school (Class XII, CBSE – India) in May 2025. After graduating, I chose to take a gap year to prepare for competitive entrance examinations in India, with the goal of pursuing Computer Science / Engineering. I’ll be applying to accredited universities for programs starting in mid-2026, and I’m not currently enrolled in a college. My question: The eligibility guidelines state that high school graduates must have graduated within the past 6 months and must be awaiting acceptance or have received acceptance to an accredited institution. Since the submission deadline is February 28, 2026, my graduation would be about 9 months prior, which puts me in a gray area. Has anyone here participated in, or seen others participate in, the Swift Student Challenge while taking a gap year and preparing for university entrance exams? Is there any known flexibility or precedent for students in this situation? I’ve been following the Swift Student Challenge since 2023 and would really love to participate if I’m eligible. Any insights or experiences would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

We are going to replace our iPhone SE to iPhone 16e. The issue is that we are unable to install an in-house app on the new iPhone 16e. The app works on the iPhone SE Both phones run on the same iOS version (18.5) Has anyone else experienced the same issue? I initially thought the iPhone 16e was the successor to the iPhone SE

Background / Objective We are currently developing a solution to centrally manage Apple OS updates (major and minor) across managed macOS devices. Before implementing at scale, we need Apple’s guidance on supported and future-proof update mechanisms under MDM. Questions / Ask (Apple Guidance Requested) Apple recommended method What is Apple’s recommended approach to perform: Minor updates (e.g., macOS X.Y → X.Z) Major upgrades (e.g., Ventura → Sonoma) in an enterprise fleet? Support boundary Is macOS update management only supported via MDM (including any newer declarative workflows), or are local mechanisms (installer + command-line tooling) also considered supported for enterprise automation? Use of startosinstall Can we leverage the existing utility: /Applications/Install macOS .app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall for automated upgrades in enterprise environments? If yes, are there recommended flags/workflows Apple endorses for unattended or minimally interactive upgrades? Long-term support / stability Does startosinstall have any form of long-term support / stability guarantees across future macOS releases? Are there any known deprecations planned (or guidance that customers should transition to MDM/DDM workflows)? MDM interaction / interference When using startosinstall, can MDM policies (software update deferrals/restrictions, update enforcement, etc.) interfere with or block the upgrade? If interference is expected, what is the correct supported way to coordinate: MDM software update settings local startosinstall execution to avoid failures and ensure compliance? What We Need From Apple (Desired Outcome) A clear statement of recommended and supported update workflow(s) for enterprise managed macOS: for minor updates for major upgrades Guidance on whether startosinstall is acceptable for long-term automation, or whether we should only use MDM/DDM-driven workflows. Any best practices or reference documentation Apple recommends for implementing this safely and reliably.

Summary: When applying a configuration profile that uses allowListedAppBundleIDs to permit a defined set of apps, essential Apple Watch apps are unexpectedly removed from the paired Watch — even though their associated iPhone bundle IDs are explicitly included. This issue occurs with a minimal profile, and has been consistently reproducible on the latest versions of iOS and watchOS. Impact: This behavior severely limits the use of Apple Watch in managed environments (e.g., education, family management, accessibility contexts), where allowlisting is a key control mechanism. It also suggests either: Undocumented internal dependencies between iOS and watchOS apps, or A possible regression in how allowlists interact with Watch integration. Steps to Reproduce: Create a configuration profile with a Restrictions payload containing only the allowListedAppBundleIDs key. Allow a broad list of essential system apps, including all known Apple Watch-related bundle IDs: com.apple.NanoAlarm com.apple.NanoNowPlaying com.apple.NanoOxygenSaturation com.apple.NanoRegistry com.apple.NanoRemote com.apple.NanoSleep com.apple.NanoStopwatch com.apple.NanoWorldClock (All the bundles can be seen in the Attached profile) Install the profile on a supervised or non-supervised iPhone paired with an Apple Watch. Restart both devices. Observe that several core Watch apps (e.g. Heart Rate, Activity, Workout) are missing from the Watch. Expected Behavior: All apps explicitly included in the allowlist should function normally. System apps — especially those tied to hardware like Apple Watch — should remain accessible unless explicitly excluded. Actual Behavior: Multiple Apple Watch system apps are removed or hidden, despite their iPhone bundle IDs being listed in the allowlist. Test Environment: iPhone running iOS 18 Apple Watch running watchOS 11 Profile includes only the allowListedAppBundleIDs key Issue confirmed on fresh devices with no third-party apps Request for Apple Engineering: Please confirm whether additional internal or undocumented bundle IDs are required to preserve Apple Watch functionality when allowlisting apps. If this behavior is unintended, please treat this as a regression or bug affecting key system components. If intentional, please provide formal documentation listing all required bundle IDs for preserving Watch support with allowlisting enabled. Attachment: .mobileconfig profile demonstrating the issue (clean, minimal, reproducible) Attached test profile = https://drive.google.com/file/d/12YknGWuo1bDG-bmzPi0T41H6uHrhDmdR/view?usp=sharing

Hello world! First post here. Developing my first app. It primarily targets supervised and MDM managed devices. A few questions: For supervised devices, is serial number available? I want to get the number and use it for app auto activation Is MDM required for supervised devices? Or, as long as a device is enrolled through Apple Business Manager? Which capacity shall I request for the app? Thanks so much!

10:17:34.335397+0900 Process SpringBoard Bootstrapping failed for <FBApplicationProcess: 0x4d8eca700; app<com.a.b.c>:> with error: <NSError: 0x300a3d1d0; domain: RBSRequestErrorDomain; code: 5; "Launch failed."> { NSUnderlyingError = <NSError: 0x300a54090; domain: NSPOSIXErrorDomain; code: 85> { NSLocalizedDescription = Launchd job spawn failed; }; }

Hello ! Currently, we have customers who use about 5,000 devices. In the case of ios26, the phone number is not acquired overall, and 18.x, 17.x, and 16.x are all acquired in half and not acquired in half. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/devicemanagement/deviceinformationcommand/command-data.dictionary/queries-data.dictionary It seems that it is the right behavior not to acquire it on the specification sheet. However, I wonder when it became impossible to acquire. (There are devices that can be acquired and devices that can't be acquired in the same os version.) Will the devices that are being acquired be blocked someday? When it was developed in 2019, it was in a state that could be acquired in full. I would also like to ask if there is an alternative way to get your phone number. Thank you.

Hi, I was looking for advice on the suitable mac to get for a web app development project for university . Would an Apple MacBook Air 2020 M1 8GB RAM 256GB SSD 13.3" macOS Big Sur, be sufficient ?? Or would I need a newer version !

We are currently working on a SCEP server implementation that operates in FIPS-approved mode. In this mode, RSA PKCS#1 v1.5 encryption is disallowed due to compliance requirements, and only FIPS-approved padding schemes such as RSA-OAEP are permitted. However, we have observed that the SCEP client functionality on Apple devices currently does not support RSA-OAEP for CMS EnvelopedData decryption. This creates a challenge for us in ensuring FIPS compliance while maintaining compatibility with Apple devices during certificate enrollment through SCEP. We would appreciate your guidance on the following: Are there any alternative FIPS-approved encryption algorithms or configurations supported by Apple devices for SCEP CMS EnvelopedData decryption? Is there any plan or timeline for future support of RSA-OAEP on Apple platforms for this use case? Feedback raised along with sysdiagnose logs as well : FB17655410

Hi, My client has already developed an ios app and they need an enterprise account to publish the app. What are the procedures to create enterprise account?

Hello, We're testing the new allowedExternalIntelligenceWorkspaceIDs key in the MDM Restrictions payload on supervised iPads. According to Apple's documentation, this key expects an "external integration workspace ID", but it's not clear what this specifically refers to. We've tried the following IDs individually (one at a time, as documentation says only one is supported currently): OpenAI Organization ID ChatGPT user email Apple ID used in ChatGPT Google ID used in ChatGPT login The profile installs correctly via MDM and the key is set, but we want to confirm: What exactly is considered a valid "external integration workspace ID" for this key? Is there a way to verify that the restriction is working as intended on the device (e.g. does it limit specific integrations or apps)? Is there an official list of services that currently support this? Any clarification from Apple or other developers with experience on this would be very helpful. Thanks in advance.

m personal iPhone is managed by an Unauthorized and Unknown mdm management team, The profile isn’t showing up in VPN Settings and I can’t remove them from having Remote access and control over my Personal Device! I’ve SPENT MANY MONTHS TRYING TO GET SUPPORT VIA EMAILING APPLE DEVELOPER AND SPEAKING TO APPLE SUPPORT WHICH HAS BEEN EXTREMELY EXHAUSTING AND HUMILIATIN! I’ve resorted to contacting Internet crime websit, the federal trade commissio, Better business bureau and Consumer Affairs to file an online complaint against Apple for not complying with their Security and Privacy policy for consumers accounts! Because of this unauthorized and unknown mdm device management profile I don’t have COMPLETE CONTROL OVER MY OWN IPHONE! ! Unable to find a team with the given Team II 'L95TAW5KWP' to which you belong. Pleas Developer Program Support. https://developer.apple.com/support I contacted developer support via email and also tried calling but they don’t respond!

Details: Device: iPhone 12 Pro Max System: iOS 26.1 beta 2 Issue Description: When testing MDM device restriction capabilities on iOS 26.1 beta 2, I found that the allowCamera restriction does not work as expected. Observed Behavior: • On a BYOD device: When allowCamera is set to false, the Camera and FaceTime apps disappear from the Home Screen, as expected. However, third-party apps (such as WeChat) can still access the camera and take photos. • On earlier versions (e.g. iOS 26.0.1): Setting allowCamera to false correctly blocks all apps, including third-party apps, from accessing the camera. Initially, I assumed Apple might have changed this restriction behavior so that allowCamera only applies to supervised devices. However, after testing on supervised devices, I found that even there, when allowCamera is set to false, the Camera and FaceTime apps are hidden, but third-party apps can still use the camera. This indicates that the restriction is not functioning correctly in iOS 26.1 beta 2. Expectation: When allowCamera is set to false, all camera access — including third-party apps — should be blocked. Request: Could someone from Apple’s development or MDM team confirm whether this is an expected behavior change or a potential bug in iOS 26.1 beta 2?

Recently, we have encountered some users who have been unable to open the enterprise signature application after upgrading to version 18.3.2, without an IPS file. Through system logs, we found that signature verification has occurred SecKeyVerifySignature failed: Error Domain=NSOSStatusErrorDomain Code=-50 "rsa_pub_crypt failed, ccerr=-7" UserInfo={numberOfErrorsDeep=0, NSDescription=rsa_pub_crypt failed, ccerr=-7} Waiting for the information, I will provide the obtained system logs below. The application package name that crashed is com. mobile. moa aa.txt new

Hi, We're having problems starting an Ad Hoc ipa on an iPad with iOS 12.7.7 and 12.7.8. The iPad's UUID has been added to the provisioning profile. The iPad that we are trying to start the app on is online, so Apple's certificate validation server should be reachable. We don't have any problems with iOS versions above iOS 12. The .ipa was built using the latest version of Xcode (26.2, build 17C52). Here is the anonymised and reduced console log (only the app launch / bootstrap part): default 07:29:35.683108+0100 SpringBoard Icon touch began: <private> default 07:29:35.752640+0100 SpringBoard Icon tapped: <private> default 07:29:35.768538+0100 trustd cert[0]: SubjectCommonName =(leaf)[]> 0 default 07:29:35.791500+0100 SpringBoard Trust evaluate failure: [leaf IssuerCommonName LeafMarkerOid SubjectCommonName] default 07:29:35.793654+0100 trustd cert[0]: IssuerCommonName =(path)[]> 0 default 07:29:36.043497+0100 assertiond Submitting new job for "<APP_BUNDLE_ID>" on behalf of SpringBoard (pid: 48) default 07:29:36.044393+0100 SpringBoard Bootstrapping <APP_BUNDLE_ID> with intent foreground-interactive error 07:29:36.045124+0100 SpringBoard [<APP_BUNDLE_ID>] Bootstrap failed with error: domain: BKSProcessErrorDomain, code: 1 (bootstrap-failed), reason: "Failed to start job" error 07:29:36.045214+0100 SpringBoard Bootstrapping failed for <APP_BUNDLE_ID> (pid: -1): Error Domain=BKSProcessErrorDomain Code=1 "Unable to bootstrap process with bundleID <APP_BUNDLE_ID>" NSLocalizedFailureReason=Failed to start job NSUnderlyingError=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=3 "No such process" BKLaunchdOperation=launch_get_running_pid_4SB BKLaunchdJobLabel=<LAUNCHD_JOB_LABEL> BKSProcessJobLabel=<LAUNCHD_JOB_LABEL> default 07:29:36.046078+0100 assertiond Submitted job with label: <LAUNCHD_JOB_LABEL> default 07:29:36.046442+0100 assertiond Unable to get pid for '<LAUNCHD_JOB_LABEL>': No such process (3) error 07:29:36.046542+0100 assertiond Failed to start job: NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=3 "No such process" default 07:29:36.046607+0100 assertiond Deleted job with label: <LAUNCHD_JOB_LABEL> default 07:29:36.081068+0100 SpringBoard Application process state changed for <APP_BUNDLE_ID>: pid: -1; taskState: Not Running

We are upgrading macOS (minor versions and potentially major versions) using a scripted approach: Install the InstallAssistant package via installer Trigger OS install via startosinstall On MDM-managed assets, OS update policies appear to prohibit or interfere with the update flow. The update often fails with startosinstall reporting “Helper tool crashed…” during the “Preparing” phase. Steps to Reproduce On an MDM-enrolled Mac with OS update restriction/deferral policies applied, run: sudo /usr/sbin/installer -pkg /Path/To/InstallAssistant.pkg -target / && echo 'MACOS_PASSWORD' | /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sonoma.app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall --agreetolicense --forcequitapps --stdinpass --user MACOS_USER Actual Result Package installation reports success, but startosinstall fails during preparation with: Standard Output installer: Package name is macOS15.7_SoftwareUpdate installer: Upgrading at base path / installer: The upgrade was successful. By using the agreetolicense option, you are agreeing that you have run this tool with the license only option and have read and agreed to the terms. If you do not agree, press CTRL-C and cancel this process immediately. Preparing to run macOS Installer... Preparing: 0.0% Preparing: 0.1% ... Preparing: 24.9% Standard Error Helper tool crashed... notes.log Install.log is also attached. Questions for Apple / Ask: We suspect this crash is caused by MDM OS update restrictions/policies. We need Apple’s recommended method to perform macOS updates (minor + major) when MDM is present, especially in environments where update deferrals/restrictions may be configured.

We have noticed that if we apply forceDelayedSoftwareUpdates in Restrictions profile, it causes ScheduleOSUpdates to fail or go into an invalid state. For example: On my iOS device, we have set the forceDelayedSoftwareUpdates to 90 days which removed the latest iOS update iOS 18.2 from the Software Updates section on the device. Post this, if I schedule an update for iOS 18.2 using ScheduleOSUpdateCommand, it fails to download. If I schedule the same without forceDelayedSoftwareUpdates, the update works as expected. Please help what could be the reason for this behavior as forceDelayedSoftwareUpdates should not block ScheduleOSUpdates.

I have enrolled a macbook through ADE to Apple School Manager and register it to the MDM service. Upon sending the initial DeclarativeManagement payload, the device return the client capabilities as below: "supported-versions": [ "1.0.0" ], "supported-payloads": { "declarations": { "activations": [ "com.apple.activation.simple" ], "assets": [ "com.apple.asset.credential.acme", "com.apple.asset.credential.certificate", "com.apple.asset.credential.identity", "com.apple.asset.credential.scep", "com.apple.asset.credential.userpassword", "com.apple.asset.data", "com.apple.asset.useridentity" ], "configurations": [ "com.apple.configuration.account.caldav", "com.apple.configuration.account.carddav", "com.apple.configuration.account.exchange", "com.apple.configuration.account.google", "com.apple.configuration.account.ldap", "com.apple.configuration.account.mail", "com.apple.configuration.account.subscribed-calendar", "com.apple.configuration.legacy", "com.apple.configuration.legacy.interactive", "com.apple.configuration.management.status-subscriptions", "com.apple.configuration.management.test", "com.apple.configuration.math.settings", "com.apple.configuration.passcode.settings", "com.apple.configuration.safari.extensions.settings", "com.apple.configuration.screensharing.connection", "com.apple.configuration.screensharing.connection.group", "com.apple.configuration.security.certificate", "com.apple.configuration.security.identity", "com.apple.configuration.security.passkey.attestation" ], "management": [ "com.apple.management.organization-info", "com.apple.management.properties", "com.apple.management.server-capabilities" ] }, "status-items": [ "account.list.caldav", "account.list.carddav", "account.list.exchange", "account.list.google", "account.list.ldap", "account.list.mail.incoming", "account.list.mail.outgoing", "account.list.subscribed-calendar", "device.identifier.serial-number", "device.identifier.udid", "device.model.family", "device.model.identifier", "device.model.marketing-name", "device.model.number", "device.operating-system.build-version", "device.operating-system.family", "device.operating-system.marketing-name", "device.operating-system.supplemental.build-version", "device.operating-system.supplemental.extra-version", "device.operating-system.version", "management.client-capabilities", "management.declarations", "screensharing.connection.group.unresolved-connection", "security.certificate.list", "test.array-value", "test.boolean-value", "test.dictionary-value", "test.error-value", "test.integer-value", "test.real-value", "test.string-value" ] }, "supported-features": { } } }, com.apple.configuration.softwareupdate.enforcement.specific couldn't be found. The macbook current OS version is 15.5 and it's supervised so looking at this, I assume it should include the Software Update:Enforcement:Specific capability? https://github.com/apple/device-management/blob/release/declarative/declarations/configurations/softwareupdate.enforcement.specific.yaml When I tried sending the payload to the device anyway the valid status is unknown

Microsoft are retiring the “Azure AD Graph API”. We allow the use of Apple email apps in our M365 tenant via the “Apple Internet Accounts” Entra ID Enterprise Application, however this is using the “User.Read” permission from this retiring “Azure AD Graph API”. My concern is that Apple email app’s will stop working in our tenant when Microsoft retire the “Azure AD Graph API” and this permission is removed, as this is an Apple managed Enterprise Application, we have no method of changing the permissions ourselves. I have not been able to find any information on how the “Apple Internet Accounts” Entra ID Enterprise Application can be updated to use the required, newer “Microsoft Graph API” “User.Read” permission. It is not possible for us to change the permissions on the “Apple Internet Accounts” Entra ID Enterprise Application in our tenant, my assumption is that Apple would need to deploy a newer version of Email app that uses the newer “Microsoft Graph API” “User.Read” permission, and we would then need to consent the use of this new permission in our tenant. I would have thought Apple would have deploy this by now, but we have not seen any consent requests. Does anyone have any information about how Apple are handling this Microsoft change and how we can pre-emptively update the “Apple Internet Accounts” Entra ID Enterprise Application to ensure that Apple email client continue to work in our tenant? Many thanks.

In iOS 26.1 beta 4, under MDM restrictions that disable the camera via a configuration profile, the Camera and FaceTime apps are hidden as expected. However, other third-party apps can still access and use the camera function normally. This is unreasonable.