14 DAY TRIAL // Today, January 30 2017, Apple announced the availability of the first Beta build of the upcoming watchOS 3.2 operating system for Apple Watch devices, but only for registered developers.
A new watchOS 3.2 Beta entry appeared earlier on our Apple Developer account, tagged as build 14V5205d, which appears to include the watchOS SDK (Software Developer Kit) 3.2 so we can build watchOS applications for the next major release of the Apple Watch operating system.
Introducing Theater Mode and SiriKit for Apple Watch
Apart from the usual security patches and bug fixes, the watchOS 3.2 Beta release introduces a new Theater Mode that was first rumored to launch with the iOS 10.3 operating system for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch devices. When activated, Theater Mode simply makes sure that your Apple Watch is quiet as a mouse when you are in a theater watching a movie.
It ensures that your Apple Watch's screen doesn't bother you and other viewers, as well as that all sounds are muted. However, it would appear that you'll still get notifications via the built-in haptic feedback technology included in the device. Moreover, watchOS 3.2 Beta comes with SiriKit integration for developers who want to build apps with Siri support.
These will be the next-generation Apple Watch apps that will make your life a lot easier, allowing you to order food or cabs, or make any kind of payments just by giving a voice command to Siri. The Cupertino company is also working on a much-improved user experience for new Apple Watch owners, so they've added various performance improvements and fixed numerous issues.
watchOS 3.2 Beta is available for download from your developer account
This first watchOS 3.2 Beta version comes one week after Apple seeded the initial Beta builds of its upcoming iOS 10.3, macOS 10.12.4 Sierra, and tvOS 10.2 operating systems, which have been released to Public Beta testers (only iOS 10.3 and macOS 10.12.4 Beta) as well after a couple of days. It can be downloaded and installed right now.
To receive OTA (Over-the-Air) updates for the watchOS 3.2 operating system, you can install the configuration profile directly on your device as instructed on the release notes available on your Apple Developer account, which also include details about some known issues that'll probably be fixed in the next Beta milestones.
Of course, this is only the first Beta, but it's packaged with a comprehensive set of Xcode frameworks, tools, and compilers designed to help us develop the most attractive and intuitive apps for watchOS. Among these tools, we can mention the latest Xcode IDE (Integrated Development Environment) and Instruments analysis utility.