Rise

• 

  No more snoozing

• 

• 

  Custom icons to suit every kind of user

Inspiration

Ever since I can remember, I’ve been terrible at waking up. It’s like a battle every morning between my discipline and my pillow. I’m a disciplined guy, but let me tell you, it all goes out the window when the alarm goes off. Recently, I decided to try and solve this issue that haunts me every morning. The first thing I did was to look for an existing app. To my surprise, there are barely any apps in the App Store dedicated to alarms, which I later discovered was because there are no dedicated APIs paired with extremely restrictive access from Apple. The apps I found were extremely outdated and bloated with features, so I decided to give it a shot on my own. I focused on the main feature of the app, being the alarm, and tried to stick to Apple’s design language to have that familiar look everyone knows and loves.

What it does

How many times do you hit snooze on your alarm every morning? If you’re anything like me, a lot. This is the problem Rise aims to fix. It is an alarm developed with one purpose: to wake you up, by whatever means necessary. The only way to turn the alarm off is by completing the actions featured in the app, such as scanning a barcode, shaking the device, typing a quote, or solving a math problem. The reasoning behind blocking the alarm behind actions is to stimulate the brain upon waking up, so even if you complete the action, you’re already awake, making the conscious decision to get out of bed easier. This is the main issue with a regular alarm: you can hit snooze or turn it off without waking up fully, making it extremely easy to fall asleep again. The alarm also features a check to ensure you’re awake, which ranges from one to five minutes after the alarm goes off. You then have one hundred seconds to tap a button to confirm you’re awake, failing to do so will restart the whole process. Delaying the check allows you to be aware of its appearance instead of falling asleep again. As a heavy sleeper and a student, I’ve been surprised by how well it works. Waking up early, while still unpleasant, has become much easier than before. It gives me that necessary window of time where I can make the conscious effort to get out of bed and start the day.

How we built it

The app is built using SwiftUI and its APIs, with some parts written in UIKit where it was more practical or where SwiftUI lacked the necessary functionality. The app is divided into four main sections, each representing an action you can perform to deactivate the alarm, making it a sort of Frankenstein's monster composed of four smaller apps.

Challenges we ran into

The list of challenges I encountered during the development of this project is extensive. Firstly, Apple provides no resources or APIs for developing an alarm app. Due to the nature of such an app, it requires critical permissions and access to the device that Apple does not grant. This meant that the alarm functionality had to be built from scratch, which proved to be extremely difficult. The following conditions had to be met:

• The alarm must go off when the device is turned off.
• The alarm must go off when the device is in silent mode.
• The alarm must go off when the app is in the background. Apple does not provide access to any of these features, so I had to resort to workarounds, which required an incredible amount of trial and error.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

There are several accomplishments I'm proud of. Firstly, creating the alarm functionality for the app. There were times I thought it couldn't be done, but somehow, I made it work. Secondly, releasing the app. I have a terrible habit of starting projects and never finishing them, but despite this project's challenges, I knew I had to finish it. Finally, I'm very proud to have generated some revenue with the app, which motivates me to keep going.

What we learned

I learnt so much while working on Rise:

• It's very important to understand the scope of the app.
• Building a POC should always be the first step.
• Posting about it online is great for feedback.
• Releasing an app is incredibly fun.
• Never forget the 90/90 rule.

What's next for Rise

The next steps are to spread the word by posting about the app on different platforms, improving ASO, adding cool new features, and hopefully generating enough revenue to continue working on it.

Built With

• avfoundation
• combine
• coremotion
• mediaplayer
• revenuecat
• swiftui
• uikit