How to import Alamofire/AFNetworking in my custom cocoapod - ios

Question

How do I include Alamofire (a web request pod like AFNetworking) in my cocoapod source files? I have a service in my cocoapod that needs to make web requests using Alamofire, my cocoapod doesn't seem to have a podfile that I can see, so I don't know how to add the dependency to my cocoapod.
I am creating a cocoapod using pod lib create The build fails whenever I go to import Alamofire in any of my files. In a normal project, I'd just add Alamofire to my podfile, but this is a cocoapod, so I can't figure out where to add the dependency, or how to get it to build successfully.
I followed the guide here but it doesn't say anything about importing another pod into my cocoapod's files.
My directory structure looks like this:
MyLib.podspec
Example/
MyLib example project
Pod/
Source files for my cocoapod

Answer 1

If your pod depends on other pods you can define that in your pod's .podspec file. You can add dependencies there.
Have a look at RealmSwift's podspec file as an example. The RealmSwift pod has a dependency to the Realm pod. This is defined in RealmSwift.podspec:
Pod::Spec.new do |s|
s.name = 'RealmSwift'
s.version = `sh build.sh get-version`
s.summary = 'Realm is a modern data framework & database for iOS & OS X.'
s.description = <<-DESC
The Realm database, for Swift. (If you want to use Realm from Objective-C, see the “Realm” pod.)
Realm is a mobile database: a replacement for Core Data & SQLite. You can use it on iOS & OS X. Realm is not an ORM on top SQLite: instead it uses its own persistence engine, built for simplicity (& speed). Learn more and get help at https://realm.io
DESC
s.homepage = "https://realm.io"
s.source = { :git => 'https://github.com/realm/realm-cocoa.git', :tag => "v#{s.version}" }
s.author = { 'Realm' => 'help#realm.io' }
s.requires_arc = true
s.social_media_url = 'https://twitter.com/realm'
s.documentation_url = "https://realm.io/docs/swift/#{s.version}"
s.license = { :type => 'Apache 2.0', :file => 'LICENSE' }
# ↓↓↓ THIS IS WHERE YOU DEFINE THE DEPENDENCY TO ANOTHER POD ↓↓↓
s.dependency 'Realm', "= #{s.version}"
# ↑↑↑ THIS IS WHERE YOU DEFINE THE DEPENDENCY TO ANOTHER POD ↑↑↑
s.source_files = 'RealmSwift/*.swift'
s.prepare_command = 'sh build.sh cocoapods-setup without-core'
s.preserve_paths = %w(build.sh)
s.pod_target_xcconfig = { 'SWIFT_WHOLE_MODULE_OPTIMIZATION' => 'YES',
'APPLICATION_EXTENSION_API_ONLY' => 'YES' }
s.ios.deployment_target = '8.0'
s.osx.deployment_target = '10.9'
s.watchos.deployment_target = '2.0' if s.respond_to?(:watchos)
end

Answer 2

You should check out the AlamofireImage project. It uses Carthage to add the Alamofire submodule to the project. The Alamofire project is then added as a dependency to the AlamofireImage project.
The AlamofireImage.podspec also demonstrates how to add Alamofire as a dependency for CocoaPods. If you follow the AlamofireImage project structure exactly, you'll be up and running in no time. Here are some useful commands to get you going:
Cartfile
github "Alamofire/Alamofire" ~> 3.0
Checkout through Carthage
brew update
brew doctor
brew install carthage
// or
brew upgrade carthage
carthage update --no-build --use-submodules
Hopefully that helps!

Answer 3

If you have created a pod and in your .podspec file you are trying to add a dependency (like Alamofire, RealmSwift..) after that you should go to the Example/.. folder and do a pod install to make the dependencies required from the .podspec of your custom pod visible to the .swift files in your custom pod/framework.
A typical example of a pod project folder hierarchy would be:
- MyLib/
- _Pods.xcodeproj
- Example/ // <-- do a pod install under this folder in order to get the dependencies declared in your .podspec
- Podfile
- MyLib.xcodeproj
- MyLib.xcworkspace
- MyLib/
- Classes/ // <-- folder with pod specific logic that also uses Alamofire
- Assets/
- MyLib.podspec // <-- your podspec with dependencies (Alamofire..)