App Extensions

App Extensions are an iOS feature that allows developers to extend the functionality and content of their app beyond the app itself, making it available to users in other apps or in the main operating system.

From version 7 onwards, The mParticle SDK supports data collection from certain types of app extensions, particularly the iMessage Extension Type. See Apple’s Documentation for more information on App Extensions.

Getting Started with Extensions

1. Import the SDK in your Extension

Cocoapods

Your App Extension is a separate Target in Xcode. You need to separately import the SDK.

Update your podfile:

pod 'mParticle-Apple-SDK', '~>7'

target '<Your Extension Target>' do
    pod 'mParticle-Apple-SDK/AppExtension', '~> 7'
end

Import the SDK:

// If using mParticle as a framework:
@import mParticle_Apple_SDK; //Apple recommended syntax, but requires "Enable Modules (C and Objective-C)" in pbxproj
// OR
#import <mParticle_Apple_SDK/mParticle.h> //Works when modules are not enabled

Carthage

You will need to manually add the SDK to your App Extension target.

For Objective-C projects, go to Build Settings -> Apple LLVM 7.x Preprocessing, expand Preprocessor Macros. For your App Extension target, add MPARTICLE_APP_EXTENSIONS=1 under both the Debug and Release fields. For your main project target, set MPARTICLE_APP_EXTENSIONS=0 under the Debug and Release fields.

For Swift projects, go to Build Settings -> Swift Compiler - Custom Flags. For your App Extension target only, set -DMPARTICLE_APP_EXTENSIONS.

2. Initialize the SDK

You can initialize the SDK in the extension just as you would normally, but in the viewDidLoad method, instead of didFinishLaunchingWithOptions. There are some special configuration considerations for App Extensions, see below for details.

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];
    // Do any additional setup after loading the view.

    MParticleOptions *options = [MParticleOptions optionsWithKey:@"foo" secret:@"bar"];

    // Recommended for app extensions, see Lifecycle Data.
    options.automaticSessionTracking = FALSE;

    // Access to the Shared Group ID, this should also be set in your main app code. See App Groups.
    options.sharedGroupID = @"group.com.example.domain.shared";

    [[MParticle sharedInstance] startWithOptions:options];

    [MParticle sharedInstance].logLevel = MPILogLevelDebug;
}
override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()
    let options = MParticleOptions(key: "REPLACE WITH APP KEY",
                                         secret: "REPLACE WITH APP SECRET")  
      // Recommended for app extensions, see Lifecycle Data.                                   
      options.automaticSessionTracking = false

      // Access to the Shared Group ID, this should also be set in your main app code. See App Groups.
      options.sharedGroupID = "group.com.example.domain.shared"

      options.logLevel = MPILogLevel.debug   

    MParticle.sharedInstance().start(with: options)

  }

Once the SDK is initialized, you can call all mParticle methods as normal.

App Groups

App Extensions can exist as part of an ‘App Group’ with the main app. This allows both apps to share access to the NSUserDefaults API to store and retrieve user preferences.

Reference Apple’s Documentation for creating an App Group.

The mParticle SDK also makes use of the NSUserDefaults API. To help the SDK track users consistently across the main app and the extension, you can configure the Shared Group ID in the MParticleOptions object.

MParticleOptions *options = [[MParticleOptions alloc] init];
    // Do this in both your extension and main app
    options.sharedGroupID = @"group.com.example.domain.shared"; //replace with your Shared Group ID
let options = MParticleOptions.init()
    options.sharedGroupID = "group.com.example.domain.shared"; //replace with your Shared Group ID

If you do not create an App Group and configure the Shared Group ID in MParticleOptions, any info stored under NSUserDefaults will not be available in the app extension and you may not be able to consistently identify users across your main app and the extension. For this reason, you will need to create a new workspace in mParticle for your app extension, and create a new iOS input, with a new API key and secret to initialize the SDK in the extension.

Lifecycle Data

The SDK can collect Application State Transition events in App Extensions, but since there are no background processes, Session information is unreliable. For this reason, we recommend turning off automatic session tracking in the MParticleOptions object when initializing the SDK in an App Extension. This will not affect session tracking in the main app.

MParticleOptions *options = [[MParticleOptions alloc] init];
    // See above for other required settings
    options.automaticSessionTracking = FALSE;
let options = MParticleOptions.init()
    options.automaticSessionTracking = FALSE;

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