[C++] Limited iOS support

[asfimport]

We at Unfolded have been making use of Arrow in our native implementation of deck.gl (https://github.com/UnfoldedInc/deck.gl-native). As iOS is one of the platforms we plan on supporting, we've spent some time building Arrow so that we can make use of it on iOS.

 

There is a detailed writeup on issues we've encountered while doing so (https://github.com/UnfoldedInc/deck.gl-native-dependencies/blob/master/docs/iOS-BUILD.md#arrow-v0170). Some of them had to do with cmake, but there were a few updates that had to be made to Arrow source.

 

As noted in the writeup, we use a limited set of optional features that cover our needs right now (json, csv, filesystem). With this in mind, and knowing that we did not resolve issues across all optional features (known issues building parquet support due to Boost/Thrift dependencies), would incorporating some of these fixes, or supporting iOS in general, be of any interest at this stage?

Reporter: Ilija Puaca / @ilijapuaca
Assignee: Ilija Puaca / @ilijapuaca

Subtasks:

• [C++][CI] Add a test job for iOS

PRs and other links:

• GitHub Pull Request #7189

_{Note: This issue was originally created as ARROW-8795. Please see the migration documentation for further details.}

[asfimport]

Antoine Pitrou / @pitrou:
We definitely would like Arrow to work on as many platforms as possible. However, one concern is that the project has no iOS CI. Also, other Arrow contributors may not have access to the platform to test their changes. Given that Arrow development moves rather quickly, there is a significant chance for regressions to happen. That said, feel free to open PRs with your changes.

Also cc @kou

[asfimport]

Kouhei Sutou / @kou:
Interesting.

We should add a CI job for iOS and then fix problems step-by-step like we're doing for s390x.

[asfimport]

Antoine Pitrou / @pitrou:
Issue resolved by pull request 7189
#7189