My clients wants to use some of the already available features in my app into their app. But, i dont want to share my source code with them and vice versa. I found out from some googling that, we can do this by creating some static libraries or frameworks in iOS. Can anyone throw some light on how to create a static library or framework (which ever is better) out of my already available source code.
My preference is to use static libraries over Frameworks. You will provide your customers the library file (.a extension) and the header file(s) for the functions in it. They just need to install the files somewhere in their project tree, set the include path, add the library to the project and they are good to go.
Note that if you want them to use your lib in the Simulator as well as on device you will need to provide them two versions of the library, one for each.
For instructions on how to create and use an iOS static library see this site.
Just for your information:
I created a static framework for iOS according to jverkoey's instruction
A ton of thanks to Diney Bomfim for his excellent article on how to create a framework. This is exactly what i am looking for.
EDIT - The Link is NOT working anymore...
Related
I have some source code in C/C++. I have to make static library to use in my iPhone application. is there any third party tool to create static library for armv6/armv7 ?
this link will help you create a static library in xcode ...
http://www.icodeblog.com/2011/04/07/creating-static-libraries-for-ios/
just rename the .m file to .mm file and write your c/c++ implementation code in it....
try it for a small function first and if it works for you can implement all your classes in it...
Please make sure when you try to use this library in any other project in XCODE , only use .mm extension for all your files even the appdelegate... hope this helps.
I would recommend iOS Universal Framework. I have used it to create a number of static frameworks that I link against my application projects. It works like a charm and is really easy to setup - no need to come up with your own complicated shell scripts.
It adds a template for a new target project type, which you can then import and use just like an ordinary Apple framework. I would recommend setting up a workspace containing both the framework project and application project, that way the dependencies are handled automatically by Xcode.
In general, you DO NOT WANT to link to a static lib that is made with another compiler than the one used to compile the lib. Static libs are not really portable between compilers, since static lib formats are not covered by C/C++ standards. Due to name mangling and other formatting differences, you may not be able to link at all, or worse, it seems to work but injects bugs. Worse, if you use the standard library from your compiler in your lib, it will create horrible name collisions when someone links to your lib and they don't use an IDENTICAL version of the standard library!
Publish the lib using the compiler you expect them to be using. And if you must use the standard library, then you have to make sure they have the same version you have. Really, you should just have them compile the lib themselves or prebuild it for each compiler you support. It sucks, but that's the reality of it as it stands today.
I've been writing iOS apps for some time now and for this particular project, I decided that I needed a static library for code sharing purposes.
I've followed some tutorials in creating static libraries and everything works perfectly.
Now I wonder, is there any way of versioning the static library?
I couldn't find any files regarding version number in the static library project, nor any good search results (both Google and here) regarding this particular issue.
I think I could create some kind of "fake" Info.plist and store the version info there.
Is that the way of doing it? Any other approaches to the problem?
Edit:
I think I may have not been clear on my purpose:
I have a workspace that has both my library project and related projects using the library, which is imported using the .xcodeproj file, then configured the dependencies so it builds whenever needed.
I just need some way of versioning the library, so that I can include that in some sort of about box, just in case.
I think you should stay away from bundling binary builds of your own code. Unless you're building a really, really, really massive library, you're better off just importing the code in any of your projects, and rebuilding it each time. You can put it in a separate target though, so Xcode doesn't rebuild it all the time.
You might want to write a tool that takes version info in a .plist and writes it out as literal strings defined in a .h file, which you can then include in your own code.
To make it foolproof (avoid mismatch between the header and the library), define a class method like [YourLibraryClass versionString] that returns a NSString with the version number or signature.
i want to share some code with other iOS projects. So I create static library.
When I use this library in other projects and use header file from that lib I get an error like No such file and Directory. Can any one tell me fixes of it.
Here I get reference for making static lib
http://www.amateurinmotion.com/articles/2009/02/08/creating-a-static-library-for-iphone.html
I downloaded that sample. It is also not working in my case. So please help me to fix that error.
Thanks in advance
My guess would be because the blog, whilst detailed, is probably a bit old now. Like anything there's a thousand ways to skin a cat.
You can now create frameworks for the iPhone sdk and include both simulator and device versions of the classes. Frameworks have the advantage that they can simply be dragged and dropped on Xcode to include them in a project. In addition I like to store my frameworks in version numbered directories so if I make changes, dependent projects can still use the old ones until I'm ready to update them.
I don't do it, but for the above reasons I'm not sure I'd drag and drop a libs project on a client project. To me the idea of a static framework is that it's independent on it's clients. Dropping it into client projects makes a connection between the two projects that is too tight.
Anyway do some searches on lipo and static frameworks. I also have so scripts in my project at https://github.com/drekka/dUsefulStuff that you mint find useful.
I am working on a number of iPhone development projects and I am starting to refactor code and would like to be able to package it in a library or framework that I can reuse in different xcode projects for different iPhone applications. I looked at the New Project dialog in xcode and the only option I have under iPhone OS is to create an Application. I have also read somewhere in the iPhone SDK documentation that I cannot create my own framework to reuse in different iPhone apps. What is then the best way to package my reusable components? I went over the iPhone SDK documentation and could not find out. I could keep all my reusable classes in a dummy project and link to those source files from other projects (so I would have a single copy of the source to maintain), but that feels very clumsy.
Thank you,
fxt
Create your common code as a static library.
Drag the xcodeproj file into the groups and files section of the project you want to use it in.
Update the include path to point to the headers of your static library.
In the info pane for the project you want to use the static lib in add it as a direct dependancy.
This process makes it almost as easy to work with as a regular framework.
Unfortunately Apple does not allow frameworks for the iPhone development at this stage. You can either bundle your code in a static library or just the source files in such a way that can easily use them in multiple projects.
I use SVN and keep my reusable code in repositories so that I can easily include them in new projects as externals
Apple does not allow to create own framwork. But you can achieve your goal by creating static libary.
Here is important link for kick off Static library.
Have a look:
http://blog.stormyprods.com/2008/11/using-static-libraries-with-iphone-sdk.html
I realise that the view/controller stuff will be different between Mac and IPhone apps but the model code may well be similar/the same. So whats the best way to organise a project(s) so that the model code is/can be shared?
Copy/paste - just duplicate it and manually keep it in sync
Have 2 xcode projects point at the same workarea - one for Mac and one for IPhone and share the code.
Common library - presumably you can't do this (or can you)
Thanks for any tips.
There are a few ways to do this. The first thing you can do is is create a project that builds as a framework on Mac OS X. Since you cannot use frameworks on iPhone, you can make static library target that contains the same code files. That basically works, but the header paths will be different. If you want the header paths to be the the same (i.e. <Myframework/MyFramework.h>) you will need to modify the the install path of the static library headers so that they are copied into "$SDK_ROOT/usr/local/include/MyFramework", and make sure /usr/local/include is an included header search path. You will then need to install the library and headers into each SDK_ROOT.
I started out doing the above, but I found it to be a royal pain. So I ended up doing something that is a variant of #2. Basically, I get the header paths to be equivalent by making a directory named "Externals" in my iPhone project root, then a directory named with the appropriate name ("MyFramework") in the externals folder. That is the folder I copy I drag the framework files into.Findally I add the Externals folder as a system header path (which is admittedly sort of a gross hack). You need to manually add new files to the iPhone project, but I have found that to be less of a pain the installing static libs into my build root.
I'm not sure if the suggestion from the previous answer would work. If you look at my previous question, you'll see that I've failed to load a custom framework on the iPhone even though the framework works fine on Mac.
I would go with method 2.
You could develop your application in JavaScript, CSS, and HTML. You would use the WebView and UIWebView objects on the Mac and the iPhone respectively. You can do pretty much anything you want in the WebView objects, even make calls down to Objective-C.
The QuickConnectiPhone installer, found here https://sourceforge.net/projects/quickconnect/, installs QuickConnectMac and QuickConnectiPhone templates into Xcode.
This way you can quickly create an application in one environment and then migrate the view to the other. In fact the QuickConnect framework is highly modular.
If you don't want to develop in JavaScript the same modular framework is found on the Objective-C side of the templates installed.
It should make it much easier for you to do what you are attempting.