Can Unity Remote on iPhone be used for Unity on Windows?

Is it possible to use Unity Remote for iPhone while developing on Unity free version in Windows environment?

 

No
As you can not develop for iOS on windows, you can not use it as remote either

 

i think, the only thing you could try is
1) run virtual macOSx on your Win7. I think VirtualBox had less trouble with EFI boot, than WMWare
2) use BrassMonkey, no image on phone, but controls can be used on PC

 

I'd like to see this change.

UDK's iOS remote works on PC, and bonjour works on Windows, so no reason not to (and lots of reasons in favour of it).

 

If you've got a Unity Android license + an Android device, you could simply use the Unity Android Remote to get the same result on your PC.

If not, go to the Android forum and search for UMote, see if it works for you. Hope it helps.

Good luck

 

So if i develop for an android mobile then while porting to iphone i wont have to worry about the input for it? Of course i will be testing it on an itouch but atleast my development time will be saved if this is possible.

 

Thats a theory, cause android multitouch is such a topic on its own ...

As for the iOS remote being able to work on windows: right, that would be possible. But unity does not allow any iOS authoring on windows so offering it is meaningless, without a mac you won't do any iOS development, that simple it is and restricting the remote ensures that people don't forget about it (and don't conclude from the remote for android that you can do more than 30-40% without an actual android license and won't get beyond ~60-70% without deploying to device ... you will otherwise find out the hard way how wrong the assumption was - the same holds for iOS)

The remote is no way to avoid working on the actual device as what you see and what performance and experience you get on the editor has really little to nothing to do with the actual device, the remote is just so you can test input etc without waiting for the build each time

 

Thanks for the quick reply . I am asking this because i am in a dilemma whether to go for iphone dev or android dev and whether there is a way to reduce the porting time between the two. For now i can afford only one dev env cause i need to buy everything needed for either of the dev env. For android: mobile, android basic license. For iphone: itouch, iphone basic license, mini-mac.

 

The porting from Android to iOS is, given you don't use plugins, normally the easier and faster one than in the other direction, because the Android side is the more troubled platform (top selling devices in 2010 like the HTC Desire don't have fully correct multitouch handling, performance is worse, more hardware and screen size fragmentation, very limited maximum app size on the android market), so when its all fine and working on android, going over to iOS is commonly pretty painless and straight forward, a handfull of adoptions for screen size for example and its done.

 

Thanks.

 

Controls are one of the most important things for any application. Not being able to test them because of the lack of a license isn't the best reasoning. I can plug and use a PS3 controller without having a PS3 license, so why not an iOS or Android device? It might also get people without Macs to think about making the shift to develop for iOS, once they get an idea of what's possible.

More seriously, as someone developing in Unity on PCs and Macs for both desktop and iOS, I'd like the flexibility to test from either platform. Sure, it's only really going to be useful when prototyping, but crucially most of our prototyping occurs on PC (where 99% of the content creation side occurs) and moves to Mac for the real thing. We've also got designers here who're exclusively on PC and don't understand why they can test controls from a PC in UDK but not Unity; it's fair to say that each one of them represents untapped potential.

 

I'd like to +1 this feature... Ran into the need for prototyping controls and touch behaviour whilst on my pc, figured it would just work... was wrong

 

Can someone please try this out and confirm?

 

And its exactly as meaningless if you do this as it would be to use the iOS as remote without a license to test on device aka completely meaningless. Also you can't do it. if you hook up the ps3 controller to the pc, its a pc controller, not the ps3 one anymore, it has characteristics and behavior as any other pc controller.
The same holds for the remote, the experience you get has little to nothing to do with really running on the device as the performance normally is worse, more laggy and different as NOTHING is running on the device. The remote only renders and image and sends input and the image it sends is directly what you see in the game window, not the resolution the mobile would have etc so without a mobile license not even the resolution might be right / meaningfull.

Its fine to do initial input testings, but anything that goes beyond fast prototypes to test something requires deploy to the device to experience the input.

The pc is not able to replicate the ps3 or iOS behavior, performance and memory limitations, if there is a problem with reasoning here then with you missbelieving that remotes etc allow you to develop for mobiles without mobile licenses and testing on device.

Also, as long as you don't have the corresponding license, you are just not developing for the mobile. You are thinking about and potentially preparing to go to mobile, but you don't develop for it. Argue with that point as much as oyu want, but cheapsaking and doing half arsed work like this (doing mobile dev by remote, laughable), is the reason why Apple tried to shut out middleware from iOS in 2010, to avoid exactly this kind of stance which results in software thats not opted and making the best out of the device.

If you don't want to get a mobile license, then please do no mobile development, cause you have no itnerest in it at all obviously, otherwise you would be eager to get it running on the device as fast as possible ot get an idea if the experience is of any use and playable at all (usage wise and performance iwse)

I personally didn't welcome the fact that UT made the Remote working on all project types instead of only mobiles, it has lead to exactly this kind of total unrealistic assumptions on what kind of use it has at all.



Also, just to clarify that as you brought up the PS3 controller comparision: The PS3 controller is a control device that can be used anywhere on windows as its just a game input.
The remotes only work inside the unity editor. The recent addition only changed that the device remotes are no longer limited to their explicit platforms (android remote in a unity android project, iOS remote in a unity iOS remote), you can not use them in games or anything.
The touches and accelerometer API in Input is also limited to the mobiles

 

Currently you can use Android device as a remote input device both on Mac Windows and you don't need any Android license for that. iPhone remote currently is available only for Mac (including Unity Free licenses), Windows support will come later.

 

Dreamora, normally I agree with your posts, but on this I think you're just being a little wilfully stubborn. None of this affects you, and if you're offended by it; that's your problem.

As it is, I have an iOS Pro license (that's all it says in my Sig in fact). I don't care about that, I care about how I work and what makes it more productive and efficient for me and mine.

You're no stranger to asking for improvements and features that will make life easier and increase flexibility in your working patters. If you want things included in Unity to suite your needs, you can afford to take a step back and respect what other people feel would be useful to them. We're both paying customers.

 

Nice one, thanks for heads-up

 

This is really strange, I don't have an android device and frankly it is a bit ridiculous to buy a device only for this matter. It should be like a piece of cake for unity team to develop a unity remote for iphone which work BOTH on windows as well as mac. UKD did it so it means that it is possible.

 

Hmm, does this work? If it does, I might have to look into this. What is the basic idea of virtual macOSx?

 

I think the same.

 

4.5 is released, this is still not supported. I still cannot use my iphone's unity remote on my windows computer. Why? Will it be added?

 

Lack of man power. But remote is getting some attention now. Windows support, as well as additional features like GPS, compass, and more are coming in 5.0.

 

And...can you tell us more about a releasedate? iOS remote via a Windows pc would be nice to have.

 

We don't speculate on release dates, but we're currently approaching beta phase.

 

Now it is possible!

 

I'm either blonde or lacking the option.

How do I activate it ? does it work with Unity Remote 4 ?
Does the iPhone need to be connected before starting unity?

 

It should work with Unity Remote 4. First connect iPhone via USB, then navigate to Edit->Project Settings->Editor, and select the device under Unity Remote settings. Launch Unity Remote 4 app on iPhone and editor will automatically connect to it when you hit Play button.

 

Actually, I found out that you can't remote debug apple products using non Apple products, one of the multiple reasons why I hate Apple and given out my iPhone 6 plus to the kid at home. Things are so easy now with my android phone.

 

I am using an iPod touch 4th and it works pretty good on my Windows 7 (Unity Remote 4). I got another try with an iPad mini (ios 7) and it still works fine.

But I read this on the Unity Manual:
"Unity Remote currently supports Android devices (on Windows and OSX via a USB connection) and iOS devices (iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, through USB and only on OSX)"

 

Has anyone successfully used Unity 4 Remote in an iPad Air with a Windows Unity?

 

I'm currently trying to get Unity Remote 5 to work with Unity 5 with an updated iPad and iTunes on Windows. I have tried it on three differenct PC:s. With USB 2, USB 3 and USB C. Nothing works. I never get the option to select an iOS-device in Unity. Have tried both Windows 8 and Windows 10. Have tried starting the app before and after I launch Unity, no difference. I have accepted to "trust" the pc's of course. I'm using the Apple-USB-cable. What more can I try?

Update: I have got it working now! Yay! I have installed the latest Unity-version (5.5.0f3) and it just works. I'm happy.

 

I'm jumping back into 3D game engine tech for product demos/simulations. If this iOS remote feature works "talking" to a windows PC, is it possible to just have the "game" or demo GUI menus on the iOS device as well as control of the PC, touchscreen or otherwise? A basic scenario Im looking to do is have an interior of a living room you can navigate around using mouse/touchscreen. the user can run an app on their iOS device that would bring up a GUI menu with, for instance a button to tun on/off lights, open/close shades, etc. Is this possible? Part B is more ambitious, being able to place a virtual camera in the scene and have its output shown on the iOS device, like a security camera remote viewer?

 

Hello Everyone, I'm really new at unity and I'm doing the Shooter TO MOBILE tutorial...
I was wondering if actually the iphone 7 with Unity remote is supposed to work with Unity 5 more on windows.
I just connected my Iphone7 to my Vaio and I can see it in the EDITOR SETTINGS into the devices list and I'm also able to select it ....but it doesn't control anything when I press play....

Any suggestions??
Thanks
David

 

Hello Zita, Did you really managed to use Unity 5 on your iPhone using a Windows computer for developing on Unity? What is your setup? I cannot make it work... As I wrote down I can see the iphone into the devices list but it doesn't do anything when I click on play... :-(
Thanks

 

As for me, I selected ios device in the edit -> project setting -> editor. I have unity remote running on ios and it's running fine when I press play on window desktop

 

I'm running Unity 5.5.1f1 with my iPhone selected in edit->project setting->editor. When I press Play, the game doesn't appear on Unity Remote, only the default Unity Remote info screen. Advice?

 

Hello. Yes of course I have it running on my iPhone and it is connected by usb to my Vaio pro... I have also selected it in the project settingss...
When I click play, even if it seems to be correctly connected, by tapping on the screen nothing happen... I was doing the "convert mobile shooter to mobile" tutorial when I tried.
Any other advice?

I'm planning to install Unity also on a Mac in the future, but actually my Vaio Pro is super portable and perfect for learning...I would be interesting to use controls by iphone.
thanks

 

Hello again,
Yes I have installed iTunes and it's able to recognize my iPhone 7.
And also YES, now I can see the Game on the screen on my iPhone when it's connected and I press play but I really cannot use touch or any input from the screen. Any Idea ?

 

After a bit of troubleshooting I was able to get this working -- using an iPhone 7 and running windows 10.

I did not read through this entire thread so apologies if this is redundant info.

The important bits are:

1) The unity-iphone-build-thing-package-whatever-it's-called must be installed. You can verify this is installed by going to 'File > Build Settings' and select iOS from the list. If the 'Build' button is NOT grayed out, it's installed. If you're missing it you can install it right then and there (option appears). Without this, the device will not appear in the dropdown list when browsing under Edit > Project Settings > Editor.

2) iTunes must be installed, and your win machine must be a trusted source (IMPORTANT!!!). You can verify this by checking iTunes in windows and if you're able to access the phone from here, all is well. If not, just unplug/re-plug the usb cable and you should be prompted to TRUST. This can be confusing cause there are several prompts that can appear (i.e, 'Do you want to allow this device to access your photos?', etc).

Hope this helps someone.

Cheers,

m

 

Thank you very much it works on my iPhone 6

 

Does the statement:

"2) iTunes must be installed,...." mean installed on Windows machine or installed on mobile device?

 

Is there anything else we need? I still only see Any Android Device on the drop down.