Failed Registering Bundle Identifier of watch app

It’s hard to say what’s going on here without more details. Specifically, I need to know what (myappBundleID) is.

If you’re willing to share that publicly, please do so.

If you want to keep that detail private, submit a DTS code-level support request with it. Once I have that information, we can continue the discussion here in the forums

IMPORTANT If you create this request, indicate that you were referred by someone at Apple and make sure to include a link to this thread.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

I wasn't sure if it's a good idea to publish the bundle identifier in the forum. I created a support request with more details to the app. (Case-ID: 9822686)

I wasn't sure if it's a good idea to publish the bundle identifier in the forum.

It’s really up to you. Some folks are happy to share, but it’s absolutely fine if you’re not.

I created a support request with more details to the app.

Got it. Thanks!

I looked up you bundle ID and, well, that’s weird. It, or variants of it, seem to be used by a bundle of unrelated teams across the world. Did you perhaps publish this app’s source code as sample code? Or maybe it’s open source?

As to what you should do, I think I have an answer for you but I need to run it past a colleague first. I hope to get back to you in a day or two.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

I have this app open source on Github. Thats a good hint. Maybe it was a mistake to do so. But ultimately i should be the first using this bundle id as my app is already in App Store. So i guess it should be tied to my team in the first place and nobody else should be able to register it.

I have this app open source on Github.

Ah, that explain what I saw.

I’m did run your question past my colleague, but he didn’t know whether my idea will work. We’ve escalating this further and we’ll let you know.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

Well, that was interesting.

First up, here’s my theory as to how you got into this pickle:

1. You created your app and registered its App ID with your team, with the bundle ID being (myappBundleID).

2. You published your code on GitHub.

3. Some other developer downloaded your code and started playing around with it.

4. At some point they did something with watchOS, which caused Xcode to register an App ID for (myappBundleID).watchkitapp with their team.

5. Subsequently you decided to add your own watchOS app and that failed because (myappBundleID).watchkitapp is allocated to another.

IMO step 4 suggests a bug at our end. If team A registers (myappBundleID) then we should make sure that no other team can register (myappBundleID).watchkitapp. However, I tested this and this restriction isn’t working correctly. I was able to register com.example.eskimo1.Test767280 in the shared DTS team and then register com.example.eskimo1.Test767280.watchkitapp in my individual team O-: We have a bug report tracking this (r. 138933994).

As to what you can do, I have two suggestions:

• If you know which team registered (myappBundleID).watchkitapp, you could ask them to delete it. For example, if you were working with another engineer on watchOS stuff, perhaps they registered it?

• If not, my next best suggestion is to change the last component of your watchOS to something other than .watchkitapp. As far as I can tell, that will be accepted by Xcode, App Store Connection, iOS, and watchOS. The exact .watchkitapp suffix isn’t required; the only requirement is that it be prefixed by the container app’s bundle ID.

If you go with the second option, make sure to test the new version of your app with TestFlight before releasing it to your customers. It’s hard for me to do an end-to-end test like this — I can’t publish apps on the store, natch — so you really want to do that yourself.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

Thanks for your investigation and suggestion. But i think step 4 and 5 were the other way round.

I actually submitted my watch OS app to store so i guess i first registered it with my team. and somehow another team could register it afterwards and now it's not possible anymore for me.

But i will try to change the last component of my app to something other than .watchkitapp. I thought it's mandatory to have this naming convetion from what i read on the internet.

Edit: Tried to update it but Xcode is not allowing to upload to AppStoreConnect

Invalid Bundle Identifier. Attempting to change bundle identifier from (myappBundleID).watchkitapp to (myappBundleID).(newName) is disallowed for bundle Sensor-App.app/Watch/Sensor-App-Watch.app. (ID: a037e632-4c6b-4337-b00a-0625e73922f4)

Unfortunately I don't know which other team registered it with their account because the source code was open source but I didn't collaborate with others on it. Is it not possible for apple to delete it from the other team if it was registered due to a bug?

Is it not possible for apple to delete it from the other team if it was registered due to a bug?

Me personally? No. I do have limited visibility into App ID allocations but I’m certainly not authorised to delete them.

somehow another team could register it afterwards and now it's not possible anymore for me.

I don’t see how that could happen.

Attempting to change bundle identifier from (myappBundleID).watchkitapp to (myappBundleID).(newName) is disallowed for bundle

Hmmm, that’s a new one.

At this point I think I’ve reached the limit of what I can do here on the forums. I’m going to re-open your formal support case and get back to you via that channel.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

Thanks for all your support. I really hope this can somehow get resolved as it‘s a very strange issue

Earlier I wrote:

my next best suggestion is to change the last component of your watchOS to something other than .watchkitapp

Since writing that I came across the following quote in the CFBundleIdentifier documentation:

For watchOS apps that have a companion iOS app in the same project, the embedded WatchKit app and WatchKit extension targets must have the same bundle ID prefix as the iOS app. The WatchKit app must have the format [Bundle ID].watchkitapp

That’s quite unequivocal, and it completely precludes my earlier suggestion.

I have another idea how to proceed here, and I’ll reach out to you about that via your support case.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

I want to close the loop here.

As I mentioned above, the CFBundleIdentifier documentation makes it crystal clear that a watchOS app must have the bundle ID of the container app plus the .watchkitapp suffix. There’s no debate about that.

Given that, the Developer website shouldn’t let team A register an App ID of AAA.III and team B register an app ID of BBB.III.watchkitapp, where AAA and BBB are App ID prefixes for teams A and B respectively, and III is a bundle ID.

However, it’s clear that this protection isn’t, or at least hasn’t been, working. In Volker88’s case, their app is open source and we suspect that a different developer downloaded and built their project, whereupon Xcode somehow managed to register the watchOS app’s App ID to that developer’s team O-: That’s speculation though. I wasn’t able to fully explain how this happened, largely because I was focused on helping Volker88 fix it.

The solution was for that developer to remove the App ID from their team, allowing Volker88 to re-register it to their team. Getting that organised took a while )-:

In conclusion, I have three bits of advice.

First, if you encounter this problem yourself, try to work out what other team registered the App ID. I most commonly see this where developer’s collide with themselves. For example, you might be a member of multiple teams and you accidentally register the App ID with the wrong team. It’s easy to fix that: Switch to the other team and delete the App ID.

Second, if your app is open source, minimise the risk of this happening by using a different bundle ID in your open source project. One option here is to use a disambiguator like we do for sample code. To see that in action, download any modern sample (like this one) and search for SAMPLE_CODE_DISAMBIGUATOR.

Finally, if you do hit this problem and are unable to resolve it yourself, you should contact Apple Developer Program Support via Apple > Developer > Contact Us. Please be patient with them though. This is a complex issue and you’re gonna need to spend some time explaining it before you get any traction.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"

Thank you very much for your support. The issue was successfully resolved and I released already the first update to my app today.

I also have the same issue for a separate open source app. Case-ID: 16450175. No solution yet.

Hopefully @Volker88 or @DTS Engineer can explain that resolution.

Perhaps what happened is that back in the day if you published with MYBUNDLE identifier then your certificate implicitly also covered MYBUNDLE.watchkitapp. Then, either from time immemorial, or starting with some other watchOS release, this .watchkitapp became available.

At the moment we are seeing this only with open source apps, with honest mistakes, for obvious reasons. But this is probably also a vector for denial of service against existing apps that are not open source. Probably only the ones that have been around since the early days of watchOS.

Case-ID: 16450175

One of my colleagues responded to you via that DTS case on 16 Oct.

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Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"