Stewart Lynch News
​2026 - 6

Please pass on the subscription link to others in your sphere so I can broaden my reach.
​https://stewartlynch.kit.com​

Recent Videos

All three of the Network Manager series videos have been released and you can find them all at the YouTube Playlist​

Last Sunday's video tackles one of the most practical challenges in iOS development and that is making long lists actually usable. I walk through adding search, multi-property sorting, dynamic row reordering, and finishing with a drag-to-scroll index scrubber modelled after the iOS Contacts app. It's a longer one, but the end result is a reusable pattern you can drop into almost any project. Starter and completed source code are available on GitHub.

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SQLiteData Series.

The SQLiteData series is finally here. There will be 10 videos overall with the first 4 coming in the next two weeks. One on each Sunday and Wednesday of the week.

My monthly Ko-fi subscribers already have access to the entire series, but you too can get immediate access with a one time $15 contribution to my Ko-fi fund. As soon as I get the notification, I will send you a direct email with all of the links

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This 10-part series teaches you how to build a production-ready iOS app using SQLiteData, the powerful open-source framework from Point-Free that gives you full control over your database in ways that Swift Data simply doesn't allow. Using a Gift Registry app as our real-world project, we cover everything from initial database setup through advanced CloudKit features. You'll learn how to design and query a SQLite database, work with it from anywhere in your app, not just inside SwiftUI views, and build out increasingly complex data relationships including one-to-many, one-to-one, and many-to-many using proper foreign keys and join tables. Along the way we handle image blob storage, cascade deletion, and safe database migrations so your schema can evolve without breaking a live app. In the final two videos we take the app to the cloud, wiring up full CloudKit synchronization so your data stays in lockstep across every device your users own, then implementing CloudKit record sharing so users can collaborate on shared gift lists with family and friends in real time. By the end of the series you'll have a complete, fully synchronized multi-platform app running on both iPhone and iPad, and the knowledge to apply these same patterns to any app you build going forward.

IconComposer Lite

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I have long been a fan of Jordi Bruin’s Bakery app. For years I used it to quickly create simple app icons for my Xcode projects. I really dislike seeing those generic white icons on my simulator screens, so if you have ever downloaded one of my sample projects you have probably noticed they all include custom icons.

Until iOS 26, all of those icons were created with Bakery.

With Xcode 26, Apple introduced the new AppIcon.icon format created using the Icon Composer app. Icon Composer works well, and I walk through it in my video Mastering Icon Composer – Create Stunning App Icons. But I still missed the simplicity Bakery offered. It made it incredibly easy to drop an SF Symbol or emoji onto the canvas, resize it, recolor it, and position it exactly where you wanted.

While looking for alternatives, I came across a great Swift package called Icon Generator, a command-line tool that can generate app icons using squircles, gradients, and SF Symbols. It can export PNGs, SVGs, traditional Xcode .appiconsetbundles, and the new Icon Composer .icon bundles used in Xcode 26.

So, with a little help from Claude Code (actually a lot) I built a small macOS app that wraps this functionality and also incorporates my own SFSymbols and Emoji picker packages. The result is a lightweight “Bakery-style” tool that exports icons directly in the new format. It is not as feature-rich as Bakery, but it gets the job done quickly.

The project is open source. You can clone it from GitHub:

https://github.com/StewartLynch/IconComposerLite

If you prefer, you can also download a compiled version from the Releases section of the repository.

A link to the DMG installer is in the repository notes.

If you enjoy what I do and want to support my work, you can join my Ko-fi community and either make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter for as little as $5/month. Monthly supporters get early access to my videos as soon as they’re uploaded to YouTube (as unlisted videos), sometimes up to a month before they’re made public. Monthly supporters also get priority responses to their questions, and I’m happy to help with coding challenges.

In addition to PayPal, Ko-fi now supports Stripe, which makes it easier to pay by credit card.
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My Other Stuff

Channel Listing App

A Searchable Mac app containing a list of all of my YouTube videos including the ability to watch them in the app and download starter and completed source code

Free on Gumroad

SymbolBrowser App

Browse Apple's complete SF Symbols library from your menu bar. Search, preview effects, customize colors, generate SwiftUI/UIKit/AppKit code, and copy symbols as images — all without leaving your workflow.
Available on Gumroad: (Pay what you want)

GitHub Directory Downloader for Mac

This simple app lets you download any specific directory from any GitHub repository—whether it's public or private. Just copy the folder URL, paste it into the app, and download exactly what you need. It remembers your download locations, keeps a history of what you've grabbed, and even supports branch selection. Perfect for developers who want quick access to starter projects, code examples, or specific folders without the hassle of cloning entire repositories.
Available on Gumroad: (Pay what you want)

Smile4Me Course

The course is now Free to download from: https://stewartlynch.github.io/Smile4Me-Course-Content/​

Affiliate Links

BigMountain Studio Books 

Mark Moeykens is a master at creating SwiftUI reference books. I have purchased every one of these books and refer to them all the time.

Use this link and we both will benefit

​https://www.bigmountainstudio.com/a/77jt8​