We have a static library in Xcode which we need to assign a version number to, just like in an app.
This is useful for many reasons, but mainly because if we could assign a version number we could easily build the library to a specific output folder:
Library-1.0.0
Library-1.0.1
Library-1.0.2
Library-1.1.0
Library-2.0.0
If you see what I mean.
It might also be useful for our clients to manage dependencies and such in their apps.
Is there a way that we can add a version number to the build?
Thanks for your help.
This has everything you need to know: Framework Versioning
Essentially it boils down to a few settings within the framework's Build Settings. There are Major versions and Minor versions. Major version is found in the build setting "Framework Version". It starts off with a value of "A" by default. Minor versions are set with the setting "Current Library Version".
Major versions indicate incompatiblity with previous frameworks. Minor versions indicate compatible updates to the current version.
Related
I'm distributing libraries for other developers to use (http://empiric.al). I've noticed that between swift versions, even 2.0 to 2.1, I'll get Module file was created by a (newer/older) version of the compiler.
I need to be distribute in a future-proof way.
How can I make sure my compiled frameworks can be used by newer versions of Swift in the future so I don't have to recompile as soon as Apple puts a new beta out?
From Apple's website:
Binary Compatibility and Frameworks
While your app’s runtime compatibility is ensured, the Swift language
itself will continue to evolve, and the binary interface will also
change. To be safe, all components of your app should be built with
the same version of Xcode and the Swift compiler to ensure that they
work together.
This means that frameworks need to be managed carefully. For instance,
if your project uses frameworks to share code with an embedded
extension, you will want to build the frameworks, app, and extensions
together. It would be dangerous to rely upon binary frameworks that
use Swift — especially from third parties. As Swift changes, those
frameworks will be incompatible with the rest of your app. When the
binary interface stabilizes in a year or two, the Swift runtime will
become part of the host OS and this limitation will no longer exist.
Until the Swift ABI (application binary interface) stabilises (I'm guessing another year or two) the only way to distribute libraries that will work across different Xcode versions is to distribute the source code. Cocoa pods and Carthage are both good tools for making library distribution easier but for Swift code they will still rely on source code being available.
It might be possible to have an Cocoapod that detects the version of Xcode it is run with and then downloads and provides the correct build of your library but you will still need to build the libraries for all Xcode versions that you want to support and recompile every time Apple release a new Xcode but at least the user wouldn't need to download a new version manually.
Is there a way to have Xcode tell me when I'm calling a method that isn't available in the SDK of the minimum supported target?
For example, the method [NSURLConnection sendAsynchronousRequest:queue:completionHandler:]. This method is available on iOS5 and up. But my application's minimum target is iOS4.
If I use that method (sendAsync), I'd like Xcode to tell me that that method isn't available for the minimum target I'm trying to support.
I've tried putting __IPHONE_OS_VERSION_MAX_ALLOWED=40000 in the preprocessor settings, but that just triggers a bunch of Apple SDK errors that aren't helpful. (Probably because my active SDK is iOS5.1)
Is the only solution to get ahold of old SDKs and install them in Xcode?
Are there any easier solutions?
There is unfortunately no standard way of doing this. By setting the target OS to a lower number than the base SDK, Xcode will weakly link the libraries and frameworks. When doing that Xcode will not warn you for using methods that may not be available on the target OS.
You could temporarily set the base SDK lower, but that might not always work. Since you want to ignore most of the errors and warnings produced (because they are only called conditionally in your code path), and many warnings and errors are dependant on other error that you may need to resolve before the compiler will give any meaningful output.
I do not think there exist any static analysis tools for this, neither from Apple nor third party.
After doing some research, reading the Apple Doc about it, and trying a number of things. The solution is downloading an old Xcode DMG from Apple, grab the .pkg file for the same SDK as your deployment target and install it in your version of Xcode. Here's how:
Download older Xcode.dmg from Apple
Open the DMG
In Terminal, go into packages: "cd /Volumes/[DMG]/Packages; open ."
Find the SDK you want, something like iPhoneSDK_4.0.pkg
Install that package, but change the install directory to /Applications/Xcode/Contents/Developer
Restart Xcode if it was open.
Now that you have the same SDK as your deployment target, set your BaseSDK to the same. When you build you'll get warnings about missing methods. Your project may or may not successfully build with an older BaseSDK in a new version of Xcode, but that doesn't matter - you've just found the method calls you need to wrap in a feature check with respondsToSelector:.
As of Xcode 7.3, the compiler can now generate these warnings for you. All you need to do is set the -Wpartial-availability warning flag in the Build Settings, as described in this answer.
Some background info: Syntax color/highlighting and auto-suggest stopped working correctly. I read a lot of questions about how to fix this but none of them helped me as they were related to Derived Data.
I'm learning Swift from some online tutorials, and noticed my syntax highlighting was different to that of the course teacher's. Then I noticed that when I create an instance of my struct, and use the dot syntax after the instance, Xcode didn't auto-suggest the struct's functions and variables, whereas it does in the downloaded version of the project. After some investigation I noticed that a key difference between my project and the teacher's is that my project has a Deployment Target of 8.1, whereas the teacher's has 8.0. I changed mine to 8.0 and immediately the syntax highlighting was restored and I could access the struct instance's functions and variables.
I'm guessing this may be a bug in Xcode, but perhaps I have something misconfigured in Xcode? I'd be grateful if anyone could explain how/why this bug occurred and what is best practice when choosing the Deployment Target.
The setting is located at Project > General > Deployment Info
I hope the above info may help others who encounter this issue.
Deployment Target is the iOS version that your app is intended for. This does not mean it is incompatible with other versions, simply that it is designed to work best on that version. Generally, using the app on a device with a newer version of the OS is much safer and less likely than using the app on a device with an older version of the OS. There's actually a lot of restrictions around installing an app with a deployment target higher than the OS version on the phone.
The most common deployment target right now is going to be 7.x, as most apps were updated when iOS 7 first came out (there was a pretty big change in UI standards and SDK functionality from 6 to 7), and iOS 8 isn't too terribly different from 7, so there's no need to restrict it and/or write new versions of the app for the new SDK. By having a deployment target of 7.x, you should ensure that the app works well on 7.x and all higher versions, including 8.x. You should also have the lowest deployment target you can that's reasonable - so, a purely iOS 8 app should ideally be targeting iOS 8.0. You'll save yourself a lot of PR and invalid bug reports from users who don't understand versioning.
In your scenario, it sounds like there may be a bug in Xcode when using the iOS 8.1 deployment target. You might want to check and see if your docs are downloaded. Go to Xcode -> Preferences -> Downloads and ensure everything is downloaded. I'm not sure if these are actually used in syntax highlighting and completion code, but it's possible. I would also do clean the build folder (Product -> Hold Alt -> Clean Build Folder). Again, I'm not sure, but I think there's just some small thing that's not clicking here. I'm assuming you cleared Derived Data based on your first paragraph - if not, do that (Window -> Organizer -> Select Project -> Delete).
I have made a project in xcode4.2 and when i opened it with xcode4.5 ,iOS 6 SDK it gives error 255 and the reason seems to be absence of libxml2.2.7.3.dylib.
What are my options is there any other substitute provided?
thanks
Xcode 4.5, or more precisely the iOS6 SDK (because the libraries available are dependent of the SDK, not the Xcode version) still has libxml2.2.dylib.
It is just probably not the version 2.2.7.3 but a newer, up-to-date 2.2.x.y version that is embedded in the SDK now.
You should generally not link your application with a specific version of libraries like that, but better with a generic version like libxml2.dylib or libxml2.2.dylib.
Generally libraries respect the semantic versionning, meaning that:
their major version change only when the API is not backward compatible with the previous major version,
the minor version change only when new methods are introduced in the API, but are still compatible with the previous API,
patch version means that some bug fixes have been made, but the API hasn't changed.
So if libxml respect this semantic versioning (and I guess is does, like quite every standard library), every version 2.2.x.y of libxml is API-compatible with any other 2.2.x.y version and will continue to work with your program. A hypothetic new version libxml2.2.x.z will simply fix bugs, but won't introduce any change in its API. And when a version of libxml2.3.x.y will arise, it will still be backward compatible with 2.1 and 2.2 too (just adding new features but not dropping the existing ones).
Thus, you can safely link your application with the generic library version libxml2.dylib, which will automatically point to the latest 2.x.y.z version available in the current SDK. Or link with libxml2.2.dylib which will point to the latest 2.2.x.y version (these are symbolic links to the latest versions, as all UNIX-like OSes use to do)
I think SDK for iOS6 just contains different version of libxml
I need to run an activity and remove all the other activities for my application to save memory. I have seen in the sdk that the flag FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TASK does exactly this but I can't find it in the ActivityFlags enum in monodroid.
Is this possible to be done with monodroid?
ActivityFlags.ClearTask is available in Mono for Android. However, Android didn't introduce this flag until API version 11, so I'm guessing that you're targeting a previous version. In order to use this flag, you'll need to update the minimum version of Android you target to 3.1, which is configurable in the project's properties page.
Edit: This question has some other approaches you can take to do this on previous versions of Android.