New Features in Xcode 4.3

Xcode 4.3 adds features to support iOS 5.0 and Mac OS X v10.7.

The Xcode 4.3 Toolset Is Repackaged as a Single App

This version of Xcode is distributed as a single application bundle, Xcode.app, installed through the Mac App Store directly to the Applications folder. Installing Xcode 4.3 no longer requires the Install Xcode application. These changes make it easier for you to install and update Xcode using the standard Mac App Store mechanism.

Complementary Tools Launch from Within Xcode

The Xcode 4.3 installation reorganizes other key development tools and allows launching them using the Xcode > Open Developer Tool menu (Figure 1).

Figure 1  Open Developer Tool menu in Xcode 4.3

For your convenience, you can also add these tools to the Dock to allow direct access, as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2  Adding bundled developer tools to the Dock

Command-Line Tools Are Optional

The command-line tools are not bundled with Xcode 4.3 by default. Instead, they can be installed optionally using the Components tab of the Downloads preferences panel as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3  Components tab of the Downloads preferences panel

/Developer No Longer Exists

The simplification afforded by repackaging Xcode 4.3 as a single app bundle eliminates the need for the /Developer directory containing prior versions of Xcode. As a result, the Install Xcode application and the uninstall-devtools command line script are also no longer needed.

Note: The first time you run Xcode 4.3, you are prompted with a dialog to delete the Install Xcode application from the Applications directory if one is resident, and to remove any older installation of Xcode (Figure 4). These actions are optional, Xcode 4.3 can co-exist with older installations of Xcode on the same Mac. Some operations may require an administrator password to enable them if you switch from one version of Xcode to another.

Figure 4  Option to remove older versions of Xcode If you choose not to delete these items on the first launch of Xcode 4.3, you can remove the  /Developer folder and the Install Xcode application by dragging them to the Trash at any time.

Since the /Developer directory no longer exists with Xcode 4.3, some other parts of prior Xcode installations have moved.

Sample Code. The three sample projects previously available in /Developer/Examples—TextEdit, Sketch and CircleView—have been moved to the Sample Code sections of the iOS and Mac OS X Developer Libraries at developer.apple.com.

Plug-ins, templates and other sub-components. Any path for component additions to developer tools that was previously found in a subdirectory of/Developer is now going to be located internal to the Xcode 4.3 application bundle. For example, Instruments templates—files such asAutomation.tracetemplate—previously located in the /Developer subdirectory at /Developer/Platforms/iPhoneOS.platform/… is now stored in a similar path inside /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/….

Other standalone utility applications and add-on technologies. Several additional tools are no longer part of the default Xcode installation, they are now downloadable as separate packages. The More Developer Tools menu command (Figure 5) provides a direct jump to developer.apple.com/downloadsin Safari where these development tools can be found.

Figure 5  Downloads for Apple Developers webpage

The available downloads include:

• Audio tools: AULab, HALLab, and audio utility source code

• Accessibility tools: Accessibility Inspector, Accessibility Verifier

• Hardware IO tools: Bluetooth tools, IORegistryExplorer, USB Prober

• Graphics tools: CI Filter Browser Widget, OpenGL tools, Pixie, Quartz Debug, Quartz Composer tools

• Auxiliary tools: Clipboard Viewer, CrashReporterPrefs, Help Indexer, PackageMaker, Speech tools, SleepX

• Dashcode: Dashcode application

Auto Layout Is Now the Default for All New Cocoa Projects

New Cocoa projects created in Xcode 4.3 now use Interface Builder’s Auto Layout feature by default. It can be disabled by deselecting an option in the Interface Builder design canvas (Figure 6):

Figure 6  Use Auto Layout option

Next Previous