It seems that Fleet will support building XCode apps. It looks like a big regression from AppCode. As of today Fleet doesn't compile my macOS app. I try regularly on new updates. No alternatives, unfortunately
JetBrains already announced it is no longer targeting Fleet as its iOS strategy for Kotlin Multiplatform. Instead it will be realizing its strategy through IntelliJ IDEA and Android Studio.
This tool says "Xcode replacement" and "Xcode-free development". I thought there is no way they can build apps without Xcode. How would they replicate the libraries, compilers, etc.
I dug more and of course they don't: "Though we don’t rely on the Xcode build system, you still need to install Xcode for the iOS SDK and toolchain"
I think they should clarify their messaging. This is not a replacement or an alternative. It's a layer on top designed for what they think is a better experience.
I think you are mixing some different concepts here. It's not that this is a layer on top of Xcode/xcodebuild, it's just that Apple today happens to package everything iOS/Swift-related together with Xcode releases. So even if you couldn't care less about the Xcode IDE itself or the xcodebuild build system, you still need to have it because this is the only way for you to download / install those toolchains. Apple could provide these separately, but they just don't.
xtool creator here, this is correct. it wouldn’t have been possible to support Linux if xtool was just a layer on top of Xcode, as Xcode doesn’t run on Linux.
we only need Xcode to be installed on macOS since it bundles the iOS SDK (ie all the header files.) similarly, we ask the user to supply a copy of Xcode.xip during the setup process on Linux in order to extract the SDK.
it definitely depends on your definition of “replacement” in the end, but I (and most people I’ve spoken with in the iOS community) would consider “Xcode” to be the Xcode build system, user interface, and proprietary tooling. xtool doesn’t rely on any of this, not even for signing and installation. you can (read: must on Linux, may on macOS) use it with the open-source Swift and Clang toolchain + LLVM’s LLD linker and MachO tooling. Codesigning uses zsign, an MIT-licensed x-platform codesign alternative, and installation relies on the open source libimobiledevice project, which is installed by default on many Linux distributions (eg Ubuntu).
I've been developing a fairly popular macOS app for years. I consider myself in the community for that reason.
Apple has bundled everything together in a big mess.
- Only certain macOS versions can run certain XCode versions
- Only certain XCode versions contain certain SDK versions
- XCode embeds "Command line tools" which contains things like gcc, ruby, python, installed as a package, and conflicting with other versions on the machine
- Interface Builder is built into XCode and has its own compatibility story
It's a big messy blob and you can't pick-and-choose parts. You have to update your whole machine to move to the latest OS so they will let you run the latest XCode, so your app can compile on the latest platform for your users. It's not the best experience for sure. Many ecosystems have SDKs that you can download as you wish. I don't need to update my OS to download a version of the JDK for example.
That being all said, if you require users to download XCode, regardless of which part of it is necessary, i don't think you should mention "XCode free experience" or "XCode replacement".
I'm already developing a macOS app without launching the XCode GUI. I use the xcodebuild CLI that ships with XCode. My IDE is AppCode. I also use xcodebuild on CI to build the app headless. I would never call that a XCode free experience though, as i suffer from all the issues i mentionned above with version upgrades and XCode issues
I'm not too familiar with the xcode dev environment; could Theos be used instead of the huge xcode bundle? As far as I know, it provides the compilers and frameworks directly.
When you use Theos outside macOS, you have to install a toolchain and SDK. The toolchain is built from LLVM + cctools, and is in fact very similar to the one we use in xtool (I maintain both.) The SDK is hosted on GitHub and I could’ve decided to use this instead of getting the user to supply a copy of Xcode, but the copyright status is iffy; there’s an argument to be made in light of Google v. Oracle but I didn’t want to take any chances.
Would it be possible to get just the SDK from the Xcode package? Like Asahi installer streams only the relevant parts of macOS images from Apple’s servers.
I looked into streaming but afaict the XIP format doesn’t support random access the same way that ZIP does. specifically because 1) it doesn’t seem to have a Central Directory like ZIP and 2) it has an optimization where files can be hardlinks to other files (by ID) in the XIP, so if you want to extract a file but all you get is a hardlink ID, you can’t expand the contents until you encounter and expand the hardlink pointee. it’s possible I’ve missed something, open to ideas for sure.
I do have an idea that will add a lot of complexity for sure: you can extract Xcode, mapping out whick portions of the archive correspond to the SDKs we need, then use this mapping to only download these relevant parts, reconstruct the archive and expand it. Not sure if it’s worth it!
But that's wrong. You don't need macOS. That's why they say "cross-platform Xcode replacement". You just need the SDK, which can be used on every platform.
IIRC, you need to run on Apple hardware for a valid SDK license. VM or Asahi or Hackintosh would suffice, but not a VM on a random Linux box. Or did the terms change lately?
Domestication is often thought of as a unilateral relationship. Like all relationships, it goes both ways.
We have domesticated cows and wheat. Now their population has reached tremendous size. So has our population. We both need the other species to survive. We need them, and they need us.
You could definitely take the perspective that we have been domesticated. For example, plants have domesticated us by feeding us.
I'm the author of AltTab (https://alt-tab-macos.netlify.app/), a popular window switcher for macOS, imitating Windows famous alt+tab shortcut. I know for a fact how hard it is to implement what you did. It looks very nice, well done!
I see you ran into the issue of not being able to detect windows from other Spaces. Apple introduced it in macOS 12.2. If you're curious, you can see the vast efforts we've deployed trying to find a workaround: https://github.com/lwouis/alt-tab-macos/issues/1324. I wish some retro-engineering genius would solve this. We haven't been lucky so far. Of course Apple could fix this all in an instant with a new API, but that's very unlikely to happen.
I am an occasional alt tab user and it is a great product. Thanks for building it. I am reasonably used to MacOS window management behavior but I still need something like alt tab once a while, that’s why it keeps running in the background.
I also really appreciate the partnership and open attitude your comment above demonstrates, and that to a potential‘competitor’.
Are you familiar with the change Apple made to app stack ordering where cmd+h no longer deprioritizes the window resulting in the wonderful cmd+h cmd+tab agghhhhhh cmd+h cmd+tab cmd+tab rage fest I haven't been able to stop inflicting upon myself every three seconds for years? I have yet to find a third-party app that fixes this. :)
This is what I don't understand. Ok apple does not care or does not want to spend resources on the window management mess of MacOS for whatever reason (iOS is more important, MacOS does not bring services revenue etc)
Just open the API for the 3rd party developers to fix your mess!
Coincidentally, after 10 years, and 100 releases of 0.9, HammerSpoon just released 1.0 in August 2024:
Hammerspoon is a bridge between the operating system and a Lua scripting engine. What gives Hammerspoon its power is a set of extensions that expose specific pieces of system functionality, to the user.
You can write Lua code that interacts with macOS APIs for applications, windows, mouse pointers, filesystem objects, audio devices, batteries, screens, low-level keyboard/mouse events, clipboards, location services, wifi, and more.
Working harder at something will create better outcomes. There is a lot to think about, mitigate, deal with. The more time you put on something, the better the results.
For example, your crops are getting attacked by insects. It's exogenous yet if you wake up in the night to come out and kill them, you'll save more crops.
I'm genuinely wondering how our nose is not a good enough sensor. Are there common cases that affect large areas like the one you live in, where the pollution is not smellable?
I never could smell the pollution in Bangkok. I don't think people in LA could smell the smog. Certainly when we had wildfire smoke here near Seattle a couple years ago, I could not always smell it. Sometimes when it was heavy, you could smell smoke right when you went outside, but not always... and your nose gets used to it really quickly. But like, that was pollution you could see, the skies were dark and orange. Not really typical pollution levels that people live in every day.
