I am trying to create an iOS app but i don't have apple computer, is it possible to build iOS app inside a Mac hosted in a virtual machine ?
Actually I have an application's Android version and i need to create a iOS version too
You can opt to have hackintosh if you're desperate.
But like the other guy said, you can google it(the way to use VM as Hackintosh).
it's common thing now to build an iOS app on virtual machines (because macs is bit pricey ...) so i think there will be so many example to do that.
though if you want to publish your app or even simulate it on devices, you have to create a developer account to get license,provisions, keys, etc..
i heard it cost you about 100$ or so to join with dev account.
You can:
Download iOS from some torrent and run it on VirtualBox locally, breaking Apple's SLA.
Rent a Mac from one of the following providers, costs $20 - 50 per month
https://www.macstadium.com
https://macincloud.com
https://xcloud.me
Related
We are starting to work with react-native at my company. We have one mac and the rest of the team is running on windows.
Is there a way to write the app on windows with the ios device connected to the windows machine or local wifi. Then launch the build on the mac (from the windows pc) and get the app launched on the ios device ? So it would like using the mac only as a build/package server.
Hope i am clear enought.
Thanks.
We can launch the build on windows using Virtual Machine, the detailed steps for doing that can be found in the following link:
https://blog.udemy.com/xcode-on-windows/
Honest advice
The functionality of developing IOS apps on windows is something that Apple intentionally wants to block and hence tries to give you hard time doing that by purposeful hindrances in the software that slow you down in such attempts.
To do that, you will need to install Xcode, which requires MacOS, which you would have to install on a virtual machine if you ever want to use on windows, which itself is against the apple terms and policy
So, even if it works, you wouldn't be smoothly developing in such blocked environment. So I believe it isn't worth spending time on.
I am writing this since I have tried it myself, and want to help you to not waste your time. Since most websites during search including on youtube, this subject is for clickbait with videos with more dislikes than likes. The most you can get is the following
Use cloud services like MacInCloud, MacStadium, XcodeClub ( They are expensive )
Install MacOS on virtual machine like VirtualBox or Vmware ( Apple intentionally hinders such activities and you will have hard time installing it let alone using it for bearable development )
Build and use hackintosh ( expensive, I prefer buying mac )
I hope this saves your time
You should explore the option of running macOS in VMWare on Windows machines for building purposes.
EDIT:
Now using:
expo build:android
expo build:ios
Way simpler.
Old question, but for’people who are still searching for an easy solution, take a look at https://appcenter.ms
App center let you to build iOS app in the cloud, it’s free (unless you need lot of builds), easy (you just need to know how provisioning profile and certificate works and host your code on a online fit repo).
We use it to build and deploy app on iOS and android for 3 year (even if we work on Mac)
We only have 2 main issues: it’s slow 30 minutes for an iOS build, and not extremely stable. Sometime we need to relaunch build 3-5 times.
Well, you can setup a virtual machine.
Install VM Ware software and add MacOS image to run the operating system.
Then setup Xcode and build the react native iOS app.
I'm new to IOS app development and I don't have a Mac machine. But I'm planning to get virtual Mac Machine from https://www.macincloud.com and start developing. I think when build and publish the app Xcode should automatically manage app signing and provisioning. right ?
Let's say I found better virtual machine in the future ( eg: AWS MAC ), is it possible to build and publish the same app on different virtual machine ? Now on the different machine, XCode will be different and still ill be able to publish the same app without any issues ? ( will it be any signing and provisioning issues ? )
The same will happened when I get the physical Mac machine and it will have different Xcode... still ill be able to build the same app and publish to the save account ?
pls explain
You will want to make sure XCode is the same version on all machines, otherwise you could run into strange bugs, but it is easy to develop the same project on multiple machines. You can either keep all of your source code in a repository like Github and use xcode connect to it and pull/commit as necessary or you can sign into the different Macs with your Apple ID and store the xcode project files in an iCloud synced folder and just work on them from there (I do this a lot and it works fine).
In xcode just use your developer account as the development team of the project across machines and you should be fine, but you need not worry about this at all if you're new to iOS development, just focus on building your app and when you're actually ready to publish it (or close to it) then sign up for your Apple Developer Account and add it to xcode. You won't be able to easily test your app on a physical device until you have your dev account, but you can use the simulator instead for most of the development life of your project.
I apologize if this has been covered elsewhere. I have researched this topic to the best of my ability but I am still unsure of the answers I have found. I am a senior in college and I am developing an app to essentially act as a remote control for a device that my team is building for our senior capstone project. Everything is progressing fine for the Android app etc., but we are interested in developing an iOS app as well. We were steered toward Visual Studio 2015 or later for this since none of us own a Mac. We do not have an iPhone and we are not interested in trying to actually sell or deploy the app officially. All we really need is a means to simulate the iOS app on a PC and demonstrate that the functionality is still there to control our device.
I have seen several posts stating the requirement of a Mac regardless to, at the least, handle conversions for any app development on a Windows machine. I have also found a couple posts with a potential work around that involved installing a Mac VM, though I am not sure if these are "legal" solutions or not? We do not have it in our project budget to purchase any Mac systems, OS, or cloud services to develop the app. I have only done light work on Macs unrelated to programming so I know very little about what is possible regarding VMs etc.
At this point I am looking for some clarity on whether there is an actual legitimate and legal means to simulate an iOS app using Visual Studio and a Windows PC only? In our case, we would need the simulation to be able to connect to our device wirelessly and control it. It is OK that the physical device would actually be a Windows laptop, the CS department just wants to see that we have developed software that could in theory work on an iOS device. We would be presenting our work in detail during weekly updates so the solution would need to be above the table in all regards.
I apologize if this is answered elsewhere. The options in Visual Studio and most of the guides online are pretty unclear about what you can and can't do specifically under the various project types. We didn't want to get too deep into development with C# only to hit an impassable wall and lose all that time. It seems Apple keeps everything under close guard so I was suspicious about the VM alternatives to having a Mac. Thanks in advance for you time!
You must have a Mac to develop iOS apps, either to act as a build server, or as your primary development machine. Even when using Xamarin, the build tools and iOS Simulator are provided by Apple and will only run on Apple's OS. You can only legally run Mac OS on Apple hardware.
Just to add to the previous (and correct answer imo) which states that you need a mac to legally build IOS apps.
You don't need a powerful mac in order to do the building. I've been using a mac mini as a build server for a year now with no major problems. I wouldn't want to do any actual development on this machine, but it's great for sitting in the corner and doing builds sent via visual studio.
You can still do all IOS Dev on windows with visual studio (connected to the mac for building). Additionally with the enterprise version of VS you can run the IOS simulator on the PC, but again it requires a connected Mac. Although I'm hoping that they will eventually bring this functionality back to community users.
In your specific (academic) case whether or not you do manage to get a mac for building, I would suggest looking at Xamarin Test Cloud for providing evidence that your software will work on a large number of devices.
We are starting to work with react-native at my company. We have one mac and the rest of the team is running on windows.
Is there a way to write the app on windows with the ios device connected to the windows machine or local wifi. Then launch the build on the mac (from the windows pc) and get the app launched on the ios device ? So it would like using the mac only as a build/package server.
Hope i am clear enought.
Thanks.
We can launch the build on windows using Virtual Machine, the detailed steps for doing that can be found in the following link:
https://blog.udemy.com/xcode-on-windows/
Honest advice
The functionality of developing IOS apps on windows is something that Apple intentionally wants to block and hence tries to give you hard time doing that by purposeful hindrances in the software that slow you down in such attempts.
To do that, you will need to install Xcode, which requires MacOS, which you would have to install on a virtual machine if you ever want to use on windows, which itself is against the apple terms and policy
So, even if it works, you wouldn't be smoothly developing in such blocked environment. So I believe it isn't worth spending time on.
I am writing this since I have tried it myself, and want to help you to not waste your time. Since most websites during search including on youtube, this subject is for clickbait with videos with more dislikes than likes. The most you can get is the following
Use cloud services like MacInCloud, MacStadium, XcodeClub ( They are expensive )
Install MacOS on virtual machine like VirtualBox or Vmware ( Apple intentionally hinders such activities and you will have hard time installing it let alone using it for bearable development )
Build and use hackintosh ( expensive, I prefer buying mac )
I hope this saves your time
You should explore the option of running macOS in VMWare on Windows machines for building purposes.
EDIT:
Now using:
expo build:android
expo build:ios
Way simpler.
Old question, but for’people who are still searching for an easy solution, take a look at https://appcenter.ms
App center let you to build iOS app in the cloud, it’s free (unless you need lot of builds), easy (you just need to know how provisioning profile and certificate works and host your code on a online fit repo).
We use it to build and deploy app on iOS and android for 3 year (even if we work on Mac)
We only have 2 main issues: it’s slow 30 minutes for an iOS build, and not extremely stable. Sometime we need to relaunch build 3-5 times.
Well, you can setup a virtual machine.
Install VM Ware software and add MacOS image to run the operating system.
Then setup Xcode and build the react native iOS app.
I am a beginner on iOS development. And I am following this which seems to be great.
I have:
Ubuntu with phone gap installed
iPhone 5 for testing
Have installed phonegap in iPhone
Created a simple hello world using phone gap
The project pings and runs perfectly on my mobile (I think that is like emulator)
What I want?
Generate ipa file (like apk file in android I think) so that I can send that executable file to one of my friend for testing purpose.
Question:
How to create ipa file on Ubuntu using phone gap and where will that be located?
Edit:
As suggested here (which is for Windows), is it compulsory to pay $99 to just test and distribute to my friends?
You can't create an IPA file using Ubuntu. You will need a Mac to create that file or use a cloud service like Phonegap Build.
You need a MAC to build IPA. There are somethings that you can try if you are not a MAC user:
Asking your friends for MAC (Nah! not a preferred way)
Hiring an IOS app developer
Buying a MAC (If you have enough money RN in your hands :) )
Buying a MAC VPS server
The third option will be great. You can rent or buy a cloud MAC server from somewhere. They may cost $20 - $100 per month according to the system specs. You can search for them.