I'd like to create a Swift framework that others can import into their project and use, but I don't want to distribute the source code. I'd like to be able to distribute a binary and allow others to import the module and use the functions. Is this possible?
Note: I'm coming from .NET where you can build an entire project into a single .dll file and allow others to simply reference it.
Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!
Related
Currently, I got a task to explore google flatbuffers on iOS and OSX. I explored the documentation provided by Google.
Also found some libraries on Github on swift language like FlatBuffersSwift and others that implement the flatbuffers.
So, I have mainly two concerns on that
Will Apple approve my app if I used this in my iOS application?
Is it possible to create schema on runtime from JSON ? or we must manually create schemas (.fbs) and use flatc library for creating model binaries (like .swift) files.
Any help please
Thanks in advance
1) There's nothing in the Apple approval process that has to do with your choice of serialization library.
2) To get the benefits of this library, you want to create a schema and generate code for it ahead of compilation time. If your use case is so dynamic that you want to be able to do everything at runtime, you're probably better off with a good JSON library.
I am a (very) novice iOS/Swift programmer with a basic question about moving reusable software objects to their own ... something.
I am developing three iPhone apps that present information from three distinct data sets. Those data sets contain unique information but are structurally similar. As such, the apps share some Swift classes that are identical, specifically the classes that model the data. As I continually refactor the code, I find that when I tweak a class in one app's project, I have to remember to go to the other two projects and make the same tweaks to the same classes for those apps. It's getting to be a big headache.
What I would like to do is have one class definition in its own ... something that I can share, link, import, or attach to/from each app's project. From my online research, I suspect that the ... something is a library? or maybe it's a framework? or a module? I have found all three terms are used, but I am not sure how they relate to each other.
Given that all of the software I am writing is in Swift, does Xcode support what I am trying to do? Thank you!
It seems you have the issue of needing the same Swift class in multiple projects. You could build a Framework (aka Module) for this class then copy it in to each project. This is probably the formally correct approach but it is a bit of overkill for just a single class.
Instead, you could just make the file in the Navigator panel a reference in each project to the one actual file.
You could also make a Workspace and then put each project into the workspace and just have the file at the top level (but this may introduce some build complexity).
I am trying to build an iOS swift framework to display encrypted photos. Photos are sent by my server (something like a hashed binary file) after calling a specific API with specific details. I will then decrypt the photo, and display it to the user.
Correct and point me in the right direction if I am wrong, but swift only allows frameworks - meaning no static library. And this will expose my implementation details (such as the method to decrypt my photo).
What I would like to achieve is to create a cocoapod distributable framework for paid developers to implement (once they subscribe to me). It is supposed to expose simple public APIs, and hide implementation details.
I have tried various ways to achieve that but to no avail. I would really like to keep the implementation to swift codes only, with minimal Obj-C codes.
Build a swift framework, and build an objective-c static library as a wrapper
But I cannot seem to get it to work. Any idea if this is possible?
Build a swift framework in a swift framework
Stupid idea, i'm able to see the framework's implementation details within the other framework...
Build a swift framework, and build an objective-c framework as a wrapper
I cannot seem to get this to work either...
I have been working on this project for about 2 weeks now, and have been all over Googling for it. Just in case anybody would like to try, you may try to do the following and check if it works.
Cocoapods Friendly Framework
Implementation Details Hidden
Uses Alamofire (or any public framework that connects to internet)
Any help would be appreciated, thanks!
I'm working in a iOS project that includes a static library created by another company.
The library include an old version of AFNeworking and I don't have any source files.
Now i need to use a more recent (and less bugged) version of afneworking, but i cannot include the same class twice in the project (of course) because all the "duplicate symbols".
I understand that it's impossible replacing the version included in the library, but how can i include another version along the old one?
There is a (easy) way to refactor the entire framework before include in my project?
thanks
You'll have to repackage the static library to remove the embedded AFNetworking files.
Unpack the library with:
$ ar x libwhatever.a
And re-package it, including all files except the AFNetworking object files:
$ ar cr libwhatever.a file1.o ... fileN.o
You will then have to link your executable with the new AFNetworking static library and hope that there haven't been API changes which will break the code in libwhatever.a. If there are then I doubt there is much you can do.
I'm afraid this isn't easy to do. Very few environments allow you to link against two separate versions of the same framework at the same time, and Xcode / iOS is not one of them.
As I see it, you have three options:
1) Link against their library and use the same version of AFNetworking they use.
2) Link against their library, and manually load the newer version of AFNetworking and pull symbols from it. Be warned: this will get ugly fast and future maintainers will wonder what you were smoking.
3) Get them to update their library.
On a side note, I don't know the circumstances here, but in general they should be providing you with sources. It's a very backwards practice to provide only a static (static!) library and no way to know what it's doing inside. You'll have to sign a software license agreement and whatnot to protect their interests.
The best and most proper way of handling this would be to contact the the creator of the static library and get them to resolve the situation. They could resolve it either by updating the embedded version of AFNetworking, removing their dependence on AFNetworking, or adding a prefix for their embedded copy of AFNetworking. The last one is probably a good idea anyway when a third party library embeds a different library, because otherwise it would be impossible to use two libraries simultaneously that both include the same third party library.
You could also refactor the copy of AFNetworking that you include yourself to change the names of classes to have a prefix, although this should be unnecessary, as the static library vendor should have done this themselves already.
Lastly, you could find a different library that accomplishes the same thing as your current one but that doesn't embed AFNetworking.
I'm developing an iOS SDK that integrates other SDKs (Facebook SDK 3.5, for example).
To prevent collisions and allow my customers to import those SDKs as well, I want to rename all of the classes/enums in my code (for example, rename FBSession to RDFBSession, etc).
Is there an easy way to do this instead of going class-by-class and using Xcode's rename feature?
Apple provide a command-line tool called tops(1) that is designed for scripting large-scale code refactoring (renaming C functions, Objective-C methods, classes, and other tokens):
tops -verbose replace "FBSession" with "RDFBSession" Sources/*.[hm]
If you have a lot of replacements, you can put all of the replace... commands into a file that you pass with the -scriptfile option. The man page has more information on the more complex commands/options (and examples).
Xcode also offers textual Search and Replace. This will be faster than individual refactors, but it is ultimately less automated. You can make the step by step refactoring faster by first minimizing the project to the relevant dependencies/sources (if possible).
However, renaming the declarations in a library will not alter the symbol names of its associated binary. If it is distributed with a binary, then renaming will just result in linker errors or (in some cases) runtime errors.
The best idea if you need to use a 3rd party library which your clients might also use is to simply inform them they need to link the library with their app, then publish the version(s) the current release supports so they know they have some extra testing if they go too far ahead with some libraries.
I think that a better approach than simply renaming your classes would be to download Facebook's open source code, rename the classes there and compile a new static library with a set of renamed header files. Then you can be sure that no collisions occur and that you're using symbols that you named yourself.
I must warn you though - working like this may make updating the SDK a nightmare regardless of how you tackle this specific issue.