I've looked everywhere and no article gives me exactly the solution I'm looking for.
Is there a way to "install" a custom framework into Xcode?
For example, let's say I've created a framework called 'MyAwesomeFramework' which is really reusable (for example contains a lot of useful UIView extensions). Now what I want to do is be able to just create any new project and type import MyAwesomeFramework to use it, instead of having to add the respective Xcode Project to the project I want to use it in.
Apple Documentation
There are a few different options. You can manually add them via drag and drop or use one of many framework managers such as Carthage or Cocoapods.
Whatever method you choose has a few steps and can be a bit daunting initially so I’d recommend following a tutorial of some sort(I used YouTube). If done correctly you will be able to just import like you would do any other library.
Related
I am working on a project with SwiftUI and it originally started with creating a new project as an "App" (Xcode, clicked on file, new, project, click on "App") but was then later asked to put it into a pod as a framework. I did it successfully (Xcode, clicked on file, new project, click on "Framework"), however I am unsure what the differences are and I'm unsure why I would want to do that. To me they look very similar, except that I'm unable to launch my project as a framework in the simulator. Luckily SwiftUI offers the canvas preview window however it is a bit finicky when it comes to certain button interactions, which is why I am wanting to use the simulator.
Two places of confusion:
What is the difference between an app and a framework project?
Why is it more advantageous to have my project as a framework?
An App is a standalone application that can be launched and run. For example, all of the apps that you have on your phone are just that -- apps. You tap on them and they launch and run, presenting a user interface, accepting input, etc.
A framework is something else entirely. It's a collection of code that is bundled together into a package that is used by another framework or by an app. Some frameworks are provided by the system -- for example, SwiftUI is a framework that it sounds like you're using in your app. Other frameworks are provided by 3rd parties. For example, you can find many frameworks via CocoaPods or the Swift Package Manager -- Alamofire is a common example. Also, you can make your own frameworks and use them in your own code as a form of organization and separation of responsibilities.
Why is it more advantageous to have my project as a framework?
It is not -- they are two almost completely different concepts (besides both ultimately being collections of code and resources). If you intend to build an app that is launch-able on someone's device, your only choice is to make an app. If you intend to make a collection of reusable code for use in your or someone else's app, than you would make a framework.
Excellent answer (and upvoted) by #jnpdx. Let me give you a physical example:
(1) Create a project in Xcode that is a framework. Call it "MyAppKit". Inside it create, well, basically anything - a View, UIView, or more likely a function that will be shared by several views. (Let's go with that.)
public func setLoginName(_ login:String) -> String {
return ""Hello, " + login + "!";
}
Pretty simple. Call it, pass in something, and it returns a string saying hello. Please note the public piece. It matters. (And there's much more there. This is a simple example.)
(2) Now we get to your app or apps. Let's say you have two apps that need to use this (again, very simple) code. One is SwiftUI, one is UIKit. (It doesn't matter except for syntax.) Sine my forte is UIKit I'll use that. (And it can be several dozen apps too.)
import MyAppKit
let myLoginMessage = setLoginName("World").
Pretty much, it's "Hello, World!'
Again, this is really a nonsensical example. But it should get you started on what the difference in Xcode is between a Framework project and an App project is.
I think I just must be stupid.
I'm having a lot trouble understanding very basic things concerning frameworks in Xcode/iOs/Swift. While I've certainly gotten some things to work, I've gotten more and more confused about what I'm actually doing. And the documentation on the web just confuses me more.
When I see discussions about how to import particular frameworks (e.g. https://github.com/danielgindi/Charts is the library I'm playing with, but I've seen this pattern repeated in other libraries) they seem to always tell me include the Xcode project file as a child project of my project, in addition to linking things as an embedded binary. This confuses me. Is it not possible to link an already compiled framework to my project without including all the source code of the project?
That is, can't I just take a library.framework file, and add it to my embedded libraries list and be done with it?
In the frameworks I've played with (again https://github.com/danielgindi/Charts is my primary example, but this is true in many others I've played with) I can't seem to use the framework without Carthage or CocoaPods. For me at this stage, that is just confusing... I accept that they are useful tools to automate a difficult process, but I'd really like to understand what that process actually is before I let a tool automate it for me. As I search the web I just seem to always be led back to these tools as being the correct way to do things.
So here are my questions.
If I find a framework library on the web... do I need its source code or can I somehow just link to a compiled version of the framework?
In my reading, it seems that libraries made with Swift are somehow second-class citizens because Swift is a newer thing. Is that still the case? (The articles I read about this seems to date from 2014-2015).
Is there are good place to understand how Apple expects me to add a framework to a project, without using CocoaPods or Carthage?
No need to add source code. Just add the framework to Target ->
General -> Linked Framework and Libraries -> Tap on + and select
your framework.
In my opinion, many new libraries are being written is Swift. So you won't be left behind for using swift.
Apple has documentation about adding frameworks to XCode. But I would suggest to use Cocoapods , as its easy to manage libraries.
Cheers :)
I've got an iOS dynamic framework written in Swift and would like to know what ways I can "export" the framework for use in external projects, while leaving the implementation unexposed.
The "best" solution I've come across so far is from this article, but for some reason autocompletion stops working when I'm trying to use classes from the framework in a project.
Right now I'm using a Xcode workspace to use the framework within a project. However, as mentioned I don't want to have the implementation exposed.
I understand that Swift doesn't have separate interface and implementation files found in Objective-C, but am just curious as to how other people approach this.
I have an app that has many components. In my case, there are several visual assets (a pie chart, a bar chart, a line chart, etc), and I'd like to be able to reuse those across multiple projects.
I have coded everything with a nice, top level delegate, which if implemented, the component can run on its own. (similar to UITableViewDelegate, or the like).
What's my best bet for separating the code out? It seems that the options are to create a Framework, or to use a subproject in XCode.
Frameworks look pretty robust, but seem complex to create. Also, with a framework, can you debug/step through code within the framework (assuming I have all the source, since I wrote it).
If anyone has done this for themselves, I'd be grateful for some insight.
I like to package reusable components into CocoaPods and either put them in a shared spec repo or reference them directly in the project's Podfile.
I'm doing a series of book apps for a client. There's a lot of books in the series, and each one will be a separate app. Instead of making changes to all the apps every time they want something tweaked in all of them, like the position of a button or something, I'd like to make a universal "framework" (library?) that I can import to a project, just as I would do for one of the iOS SDK's frameworks. The framework would have all the universal components of the apps, which would include a controller class I would subclass in each app to do the app-specific things. Then when I need to make changes to all of them, I could just change the code in the framework, and it would affect all the apps that use it. I'd also like to be able to include common images and other media.
Do I want to use the "Cocoa Touch Static Library" template in Xcode? I also saw this project in github: https://github.com/kstenerud/iOS-Universal-Framework; would this be a better fit for what I'm trying to do?
For your purposes, the simplest approach would simply be to set it up as a static library project. Then, for each application you want to use it, drag the project into your workspace and add the static library product as a dependent target.
As far as I am aware, the current leading method for building a framework on iOS is Jeff Verkoeyen's iOS-Framework.