iOS - start Spark Core App, finds my one and only core and drops into Tinker for that core. App remembers the name I gave it, but no I/O setup for all the I/O pins. This seems like a pretty basic thing to remember. Anyway to fix this?
And a nice feature would be the ability to name pins. That is after Tinker can first remember the last thing it was working on.
You act like Tinker is a person… a really dumb one…
Software only does what you code it to do, so just ask for features to be added and stop bullying the apps! 
I agree it would be nice to be able to create custom layouts for Tinker… so you could recall a set of pin definitions and labels for an application, like Robot Remote, Garage Door, Garden Sensor.
Meanwhile you can try my simple remote web apps (you get to customize it yourself, then then it’s only as smart as you are! And I know you’re really smart, so I’ll be excited to see what you create with it. no sarcasm)
Changing the title to something more constructive and less judgey 
And perhaps most importantly, more easily searchable for others with the same question/concern.
Let it be known that the title was previously “Is Tinker really this brain dead? Can’t remember I/O setup?”
Also, to actually address the issue raised; it’s a good point and something we debated when we designed the app.
Selecting a pin mode on the app doesn’t do anything to the Core; no API request is sent until you actually tap the pin to call the function. Our decision to make the app stateless was based on the assumption that people would make a lot of modifications to their circuit or use the same Core in lots of different circuits, and therefore we shouldn’t keep the state of the pins around between uses. But that was before we had users 
What do people think? Should we persist the pin modes in the iPhone/Android apps?
“Should we persist the pin modes in the iPhone/Android apps?”
Of course, I am a solid yes - and more!
I just want to have simple functionality that anybody in the household can use. Maybe my own web app is the way to go, but I figured hey, there is already this iOS app that talks to the core and can diddle I/O. Using that I figured I could have functionality to perform a bunch of simple tasks using just I/O on/off. And I wouldn’t need to write an app and pay for CPU time at Heroku.
I bought my core to provide a “Dinner Bell” for my shop. So 1 digital I/O. I setup the buzzer and tried it out, worked great. So I got my wife to get the Spark Core app, sign in, and boom, there is the Dinner Bell core. Then I said press that D0 button to ring me. Then I had to explain about digital and analog I/O and blah blah blah, and now my new toy was already tarnished.
So I would love for Tinker to remember I/O assignment; allow me to change the I/O labels (D0 becomes Ring Shop); and change the low and high labels.
Then the holy grail would be an iOS app that allowed me to drop Spark Core code behind buttons or images using the web IDE. Maybe Apple/iOS doesn’t allow this, I don’t know. But the ability to have an iOS app with a blank canvas that I could fill with Spark Core functionality from the web IDE would be super cool. Hey, that sounds like a web page, but it is actually better because it is a spark app, with Spark glitter all over it, and it is way more approachable to folks than bringing up a browser and trying to find my secret app(s).
Right now I will probably move to a web app here quickly, and all my wants above will be quickly forgotten (except for the holy grail). So thanks for the help BDub and zach, and I am sure there are more pressing issues at Spark than my ramblings.
I let you know how my app comes out.
As far as I’ve seen the Android app does “remember” the pin assingnments for each core even accross reboots.
And as a quick and dirty way of naming the pins - w/o actually messing with existing code - I’ve just altered the background shadow image inside the app package on my rooted phone (that’s one advantage of the Android app over the iOS version )