Cappuccino Blog » Blog Archive » Using Xcode to develop in Cappuccino

Using Xcode to develop in Cappuccino

After the creation of Objective-J, one of the first things Francisco did was write a new mode for his favorite text editor, SubEthaEdit. It was immediately obvious that we should try to make our favorite development environment as productive as possible.

A lot of people working with Cappuccino are coming from the Cocoa world, which means they’re almost universally developing in Xcode. We’ve had several requests for writing tools to integrate well with Xcode, but we just haven’t had the time. Thankfully one of our users, Raphael Bartolome, took it upon himself to build a great new Xcode plugin specifically for Cappuccino!

If you’re an Xcode user, go ahead and download the plugin now, and we’ll take a look at how it works. When you first launch the installer package, you’ll be greeted with a welcome screen. Click continue, and you’ll be presented with three options:

xcode setup step 1

You should make sure the first option is checked, so that the build tools will be installed. Be aware that this will overwrite any existing build tools installation, so if you’ve installed tools off trunk, you may want to uncheck this. The second choice will pull the latest source from GitHub for creating new projects, and the final option installs all the Xcode extras that you’ll want on your system.

Once you’ve finished installation, open Xcode, and go the new project wizard (cmd-shift-n). Choose “Web” under Mac OS X on the left hand side, and you’ll see two Cappuccino Project templates.

xcode setup step 2

The first option is an empty project that puts “Hello Cappuccino” on the screen using a CPTextField, just like NewApplication in the Cappuccino starter package. The second creates a project that includes a “CIB”, the Cappuccino Interface Bundle. CIB based applications are not yet supported, so this won’t be useful to most people just yet, but if you’ve been playing around with nib2cib, or are developing CIB technologies, you may want to use this template. Once you’ve selected your template, go ahead and finish creating the project. You’ll be greeted with a new Xcode window that looks something like this:

xcode setup step 3

You’ll find AppController.j in the Classes folder, and your other, mostly standard, files in Other Sources. Even the documentation is directly accessible in the navigation on the left, to help you look up API questions and get answers quickly. Finally, the coolest part of all — click Build & Go, and you’re Cappuccino project will automatically be bundled together and loaded in your default Browser.

Now you can edit in style with syntax coloring, (basic) code completion, and many of the other powerful features Xcode offers. Thanks again to Raphael for this exciting contribution to Cappuccino! If there’s some feature you’d like to see in the next version of the plugin, post it to the comments.

Update: I should have mentioned that it requires Xcode 3.1. The developer is working on support for earlier versions.

Tags: Cappuccino, ide, xcode

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 1st, 2008 at 9:08 pm and is filed under Cappuccino. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

nacho4d

Did anyone get this working in Xcode 3.2.3? (Or even better in 4.0 preview?)
It installs without problems, but when I try to build my project, it does not work.I get:

mkdir: /Users/nacho4d/Desktop/CappuccinoText/build/Debug: File exists
cp: /Developer/Cappuccino/Tools/cxhelper/cxhelper: No such file or directory
/Users/nacho4d/Desktop/CappuccinoText/build/CappuccinoText.build/Debug/CappuccinoText.build/Script-643C0D440E7F85EC00F64609.sh: line 4: /Users/nacho4d/Desktop/CappuccinoText/build/Debug/CappuccinoText: No such file or directory

And when following instructions given by Sven Resch ( 3 comments up) I can build it but it will neven end loading. ;( what I am doing wrong?

louisk2

Hi all, this blog post is out of date. Don't use the installer package noted in the article.

Grab the new Xcode Template from the following link and follow the installation instructions in the download.
http://github.com/rbartolome/xcode-cappuccino

A few notes on my experience in getting the templates to work correctly.

1. I would recommend copying the folders into the /Library/Application\ Support/Developer/Shared/Xcode folder rather than your ~/Library... to avoid permissions errors.

2. If you intend on using images and setting them in your object attributes in the nib, you MUST do the following:

2.1. Name all of your image attributes with their extension (ex a button image will be "add.tiff"). This will cause IB to display a (?) in the simulated interface, but don't worry it will appear in cappuccino.

2.2. Alter the Build Script in Xcode to tell the nib2cib converter where your image resources are. To do this go to your build targets, and open the Build Application script. Go to line 178, and change it to this:

test $xibFile -nt $cibFile && nib2cib $xibFile -R ./Resources/ || echo "- Interface Builder File '$cibFile' is up-to-date";

Do the same for line 185

test $nibFile -nt $cibFile && nib2cib $nibFile -R ./Resources/ || echo "- Interface Builder File \'$cibFile\' is up-to-date";

This will save you a HEAP of time, i.e less interface coding.

Don't forget to use the Build Results window (Shift-Command-B) and enable the script log to see any errors in the nib conversion as they won't appear anywhere else. You'll be scratching your head as to why your interface doesn't update between builds, when you stick in an cappuccino unsupported cocoa object.

switcherdav

Thanks for the tips,

I installed the version linked here and of course it doesn't works

Now, I try to instal the new one and create the folder Application SupportDevelopper/Shared/Xcode

re launch Xcode but it's the same result

What the first installer do ?
May I have to re install Xcode ?

regards

Sven M. Resch

Would really like to see installer working with xCode 3.2.1 on Snow Leopard as well. Under /Developer/Cappuccino the frameworks and tools directories are empty. Selected all 3 options in the installer. Resulting new project will not build.

Sven Resch

Just did a build|run of an empty project and then added some widget using Interface Builder. Very impressed to see the result of a build|run again afterwards.

Looking forward to trying this out more.

Sven M. Resch

Installed and ran successfully with 3.2.2 on Snow Leopard.

- Install cappuccino first following http://github.com/280north/cappuccino/
- Install cappuccino-xcode next following http://github.com/rbartolome/xcode-cappuccino/
- Create a project in xcode and build|run.

bfrolicher

hello,

I have some problems with this plugin.

First is corrected (problem with cxhelper : use pacifist to extract cxhelper)

but i can't resolve the second problem :

Xcode say

"mkdir: /Users/BiB1/Documents/Cappuccino/firstApp/build/Release: File exists"

Any idea ?

thank you in advance

Ben

Ziyad Saeed

shouldn't xcode support be top prority? right now it looks like it's up to the mercy of third party developers.

Klaus

Is there anybody out there, who got the xcode plugin to work properly with Snow Leopard and xcode 3.2.1? I extracted the cxhelper from the installer package with pacifist and put it into /Developer/Cappuccino/Tools/cxhelper because the installer does not work.

I created a new blank Application from New Project.

But when I hit build (release) I still get an error mkdir /Users/klausk/Klaus-Dokumente/xcode/cappuccino/fourthTry/build/Release/ : File Exists.
And it Stopps.

With build (debug) I get hundreds of errors like this:
2010-03-26 00:07:41.317 fourthTry[42459:903] Argument 0: /Users/klausk/Klaus-Dokumente/xcode/cappuccino/fourthTry/build/Debug/fourthTry
2010-03-26 00:07:41.337 fourthTry[42459:903] Argument 1: --build
2010-03-26 00:07:41.338 fourthTry[42459:903] Argument 2: .web
2010-03-26 00:07:41.338 fourthTry[42459:903] Argument 3: /Developer/Cappuccino/Frameworks
2010-03-26 00:07:41.339 fourthTry[42459:903] Argument 4: index.html
2010-03-26 00:07:41.390 fourthTry[42459:903] is it a nib file /Users/klausk/Klaus-Dokumente/xcode/cappuccino/fourthTry/build/Debug/fourthTry.web
2010-03-26 00:07:41.407 fourthTry[42459:903] recheck check at /Users/klausk/Klaus-Dokumente/xcode/cappuccino/fourthTry/build/Debug/fourthTry.web/AppController.j
2010-03-26 00:07:41.408 fourthTry[42459:903] is it a nib file /Users/klausk/Klaus-Dokumente/xcode/cappuccino/fourthTry/build/Debug/fourthTry.web/AppController.j

Then the Browser shows up with a never ending rotating animating gif.

Any ideas?

It´s not clear to me, where all the different files, packages, frameworks, libs and tools should go.
As I understand xcode should assamble it alltogehter into the build folder.
A tutorial where I have to put what files and the exact location or URL where to get them would be nice.

Thanks

odotash

Hi,

I tried to add the tools to Xcode 3.2 under Snow Leopard.
The folders in the Developers/Cappuccino stay empty.

Is it mine bad manipulation or the Cappuccino_Developer_Tools.pkg is not compatible with those versions ?

boucher

It's probably not compatible. You might want to try the newer plugin
that's in the github repository.

robde

http://github.com/rbartolome/xcode-cappuccino/

beefon

Thanks!! Great!!!

dparizek

Any way the source of the plugin could be released or open sourced so that others can add to it?

boucher

Another user contributed a new xcode plugin, which is in the source
repository. It should be a lot easier to extend, but it doesn't do
quite as much as the old one just yet.

stuffmc

Is this Plugin being updated one day? :-)

bensyverson

I'm anxious to see an update too... Currently, the skeleton apps bail with errors.

Glenn Rempe

I also had problems with this (as a cappuccino newbie).

First problem, this seems to install and entirely separate installation of Cappuccino than the one that is installed by downloading and installing as recommended on the download page. This XCode tool seems to install to /Developer/Cappuccino and the official install goes into /usr/local/share/objj and /usr/local/bin. Can you make it so that the Xcode plugin uses the same installation?

Second problem is that you installer seems to install all of your tools under /Developer/Cappuccino as root owned and rwx permissions for ALL users. This should clearly be more restrictive.

As mentioned by someone else, the /Developer/Cappuccino/Frameworks dir is empty by default. So even the sample project template as generated by Xcode does not work when you do build and go.

I think its an awesome start. I look forward to the next version that hopefully clears up the remaining issues. Is there a project home page for this new tool?

Thanks!

j4johnfox

Hi Folks:

The Xcode plugin is a glorious thing, but I'm having a bit of trouble with one thing. In my Xcode preferences, I have it set so that closing brackets are automatically added, and the tab key will indent any selected text. For some reason, these preferences don't work for Cappuccino projects.

Here's a quick screen movie that demonstrates what I'm talking about:

http://memoryminer.com//video/XcodeCappuccino-w...

Is this a known issue, or is there something I can do to help fix this?

I would very much love to use Xcode to both edit, and build (including bake).

Tim Henrion

After installing this on XCode 3.1, Build and Go would not work on a created skeleton app created from New Project. I debugged this down to the /Developer/Cappuccino/Frameworks directory being empty after the install. I copied all of the folders from the Frameworks directory in the "Starter" ZIP file to this directory, re-generated the project and this seems to work.

milestinsley

Whenever I "Build and Go", only the AppController.j is packaged into the debug build. That is to say, my other classes never appear in the debug build folder. Once I copy and paste the missing classes, the app runs fine.

I am new to Xcode and feel like I am missing something obvious...!!

boucher

I've also run into this. Raphael, any suggestions?

milestinsley

Hey, I have just worked out the solution. In the Groups & Files list, you need to drag the new classes you have created (i.e not AppController.j) into the Sources folder of your app in the Targets section. I think this just tells the compiler to include the new files when it builds you app. Although, I am sure someone can explain it much better! It works though :P

Raphael

Hi,
yes this is the solution, normaly the xcode project copies by default the file into the right
build phase.
Currently you have to copy the files into the target where it has to be after the build.

For example you create a new j source file you have to drag the file inside Source and so on.
I work on a version that filter the files and copy it to the right target.

-raphael

Steven Troughton-Smith

Very nice work here, going to enjoy this a lot.

Dave

Is there something that one must do for this package to work with Xcode 3.1 for iPhone?

http://img.skitch.com/20081002-3xnehbyh2p6a9uph...

Raphael

No, this is am known Bug, i'm not 100% eure why the Syntax coloring sometimes not work.
If you open the file again it works normaly.
Try to fix it in the next version!
Their are more open fixes for the next version.

-raphael

Andrew

I have noticed since 3.1 Xcode syntax coloring has been kind of hinky in general.

marius

Thanks, Raphael ;-)

Raphael

Thanks! :-)

Discuss

Categories

Archives

Using Xcode to develop in Cappuccino

Learn

Discuss

Contribute

Download