Skip to main content

Setting up App Push on iOS

Using the Notificare iOS library will allow you to quickly implement push notifications in your app.

Pre-requisites
  • The latest version of Xcode
  • Access to the Apple's Developer Portal

Before you can start sending messages in iOS, you will have to issue an APNS certificate. This is done via Apple's Developer Portal. Keep reading this document to learn how to create an APNS certificate.

Creating an App ID

In this document we will assume you did not create an App ID yet and we will guide through this process.

Start by signing in Apple's Developer Portal. Once you've sign in, you should click in the Certificates, IDs & Profiles menu item:

alt text

This will take you to a new page where you should locate the Identifiers menu item:

alt text

In this new page, click in the plus icon:

alt text

In this page, select the App IDs option:

alt text

Then go ahead and click in Continue:

alt text

You are now about to register a new app, start by providing a name for your app and the identifier for your app, this should take the form of a reverse DNS name (eg.: com.mydomain.myapp):

alt text

Finally you should select which capabilities your app will use. Obviously you should check all the services you want to use:

alt text

Once you are done selecting your app's capabilities, click in Continue:

alt text

You will then see the confirmation screen with all the services you've selected, if everything is OK go ahead and finish creating your App ID by clicking in Register:

alt text

After that, your app will be in the list of App IDs as shown below:

alt text

Generate an APNS Auth Key

Apple introduced this new authentication mechanism with the new APNS service launched in 2016. With these auth keys, you are able to generate one single key for all the apps in your Apple's Developer account. These keys also never expire which makes it easier to manage although if you revoke and generate a new key used by multiple apps, you will need to upload it to all the providers where the revoked key is used.

In Apple's Developer Portal, locate the Certificates, IDs & Profiles menu item:

alt text

In this new page, click in the Keys menu item:

alt text

Then go ahead and click in the plus icon:

alt text

In this new page, name the key you are about to register and select the services you want to use (in this case you should select Apple Push Notification service):

alt text

Click in the Continue button:

alt text

In the next page, confirm the data and click in the Register button:

alt text

Once you've registered the new key you can either download it or postpone that download for a later time. Please note that once you've downloaded it, you cannot do it again:

alt text

If you chose to download it, you will have now a .p8 file ready to be given to the Actito team. This will allow us to send notifications to your application.

Please provide this .p8 file to the Actito team so they can finalize the configuration of your integration.

caution

To share sensitive elements like the SDK files or keys for the Android/Huawei/iOS platforms, we use Actito's Transfer Box.

Once Actito have received the .p8 and finalized the integration, they will provide you with the SDK configuration file. Keep reading our Implementation guides located here.