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Early widget innovation / watchOS & Today Extension
TicTacToe — Widget Edition
An innovative game playable entirely inside the iOS Notification Center widget and Apple Watch, solving undocumented Today Extension memory constraints.
Product Hunt FeaturedBehance Design FeatureAppAdvice Featured
Live gameplay recorded directly inside the iOS Notification Center widget
Platforms Widget + Watch
Engine 3 AI Difficulty Levels
Memory <16MB Hard Cap
The situation
What the project needed.
Built immediately following Apple's release of widget and WatchKit APIs. The main challenge was extreme memory limitations and undocumented lifecycle events when dismissing the Notification Center.
The work
What I shipped.
- Pioneered interactive gaming inside Apple's Today Extension sandbox when widgets were brand new.
- Implemented single-player Minimax AI with 3 difficulty tiers, pass-and-play multiplayer, and state persistence.
- Overcame strict widget memory limits (under 16MB) through three architectural iterations without crashes.
Personal contribution
Technical architecture & leadership.
- Led a team of 4 iOS developers from concept, design iterations, memory profiling, to App Store launch.
Outcome & Impact
Results in production.
- Featured on Product Hunt, Behance, and AppAdvice, praised for seamless Notification Center integration.
Your product
Have a similar challenge?
Whether you are architecting a new Apple product, optimizing video/AVFoundation pipelines, or enforcing strict TDD, tell me what needs to be solved.