An Xcode replacement-ish development environment that aims to be your reliable Xcode alternative to develop exciting new apple software products 🚀.

Table of Content

• 👁 Overview
• 🌝 Motivation
• 🌟 Features
• 💆 Generators
• 🛠 Requirements
• 🦾 Installation
• 🎮 Usage
• ⚙️ Defaults
• 🩺 Debugging
• 🎥 Preview

👁 Overview

XBase enables you to build, watch, and run xcode products as well as swift packages from within your favorite editor. It supports running products on iOS, watchOS and tvOS simulators, along with real-time logging, and some lsp features such as auto-completion and code navigation. (🌟 Features).

Furthermore, XBase has built-in support for a variety of Xcode project generators, which allow you to avoid launching Xcode or manually editing '*.xcodeproj' anytime you add or remove files. We strongly advise you to use one ... at least till XBase supports adding/removing files and folders, along with other requirements. (💆 Generators)

Please be aware that XBase is still WIP, so don't hesitate to report bugs, ask questions or suggest new exciting features.

🌝 Motivation

I chose to dive into iOS/macOS app development after purchasing an M1 MacBook. However, coming from vim/shell environment and being extremely keyboard oriented, I couldn't handle the transition to a closed sourced, opinionated, mouse-driven development environment. I've considered alternatives like XVim2 and the built-in vim emulator, however still, I'd catch myself frequently hunting for my mouse.

As a long-time vim user who has previously developed a several lua/nvim plugins, I decided to invest some effort in simplifying my development workflow for producing 'xOS' products.

🌟 Features

• Auto-Completion and Code navigation
  Auto-generate compilation database on directory changes + a custom build server that assists sourcekit-lsp in providing code navigation and auto-completion for project symbols.
• Multi-nvim instance support
  Multiple nvim instance support without process duplications and shared state. For instance, you can stop a watch service that was being run from a different instance.
• Auto-start/stop main background daemon
  Daemon will start and stop automatically based on the number of connected client instances.
• Multi Target/Project Support
  Work on multiple projects at one nvim instance at the same time.
• Simulator Support
  Run your products on simulators relative to your target's platform. (+ watch build and ran on change)
• Runtime/Build Logging
  Real-time logging of build logs and 'print()' commands
• Statusline Support
  Global variable to update statusline with build/run commands, see Statusline
• Zero Footprint
  Light resource usage. I've been using XBase for a while; it typically uses 0.1 percent RAM and 0 percent CPU.
• Multi XcodeProj Generator Support
  Auto-generate xcodeproj, when it doesn't exists, generator config files a updated or new files/directories added or removed.
• Swift Package Support
  Auto-generate when .build folder doesn't exists, Package.swift file is updated or new files or directories are added or removed.

💆 Generators

XBase primarily supports two project generators: XcodeGen and Tuist.

XcodeGen is recommended if you are just starting started with xcodeproj generators since it is considerably simpler with a yml-based configuration language. Having said that, Tuist is more powerful and packed with features, of which xcodeproj generation is but one.

XBase's support for generators is available in the following forms:

• Identification.
• Auto-generate xcodeproj if you haven't haven't generate it by hand.
• Auto-generate xcodeproj when you edit the generator config files.
• Auto-compile project when xcodeproj get regenerated.
• Code Completion and navigation (#tuist)

Limitations

XcodeGen

• No support for custom named yml config files, only project.yml.

Other Generators

With current XBase architecture, it should be pretty easy to add support for yet another awesome xcodeproj generator. feel free to get started with [CONTRIBUTING.md] or open a github issue

🛠 Requirements

Shared

• rust ^1.60 _{compile project locally}

Neovim

• neovim ^0.7 _{Neovim Editor.}
• lspconfig * _{LSP integration.}
• telescope.nvim ^0.1 _{better picker UI experience optional}
• dressing.nvim * _{support for other neovim ecosystem pickers optional}

Vscode

TODO

🦾 Installation

To install XBase on your system you need run make install. This will run cargo build --release and resulting binrary to ~/.local/share/xbase/.

Neovim

With packer

use {
  'xbase-lab/xbase',
    run = 'make install', -- or "make install && make free_space" (not recommended, longer build time)
    requires = {
      "neovim/nvim-lspconfig",
      -- "nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim", -- optional
      -- "nvim-lua/plenary.nvim", -- optional/requirement of telescope.nvim
      -- "stevearc/dressing.nvim", -- optional (in case you don't use telescope but something else)
    },
    config = function()
      require'xbase'.setup({})  -- see default configuration bellow
    end
}

With vim-plug

" Plug 'nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim' " optional
" Plug 'nvim-lua/plenary.nvim' " optional/requirement of telescope
" Plug 'stevearc/dressing.nvim' " optional/in case you don't use telescope but use something else
Plug 'neovim/nvim-lspconfig'
Plug 'xbase-lab/xbase', { 'do': 'make install' }
lua require'xbase'.setup()

With dein

" call dein#add('nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim') " optional
" call dein#add('nvim-lua/plenary.nvim') " optional/requirement of telescope
" call dein#add('stevearc/dressing.nvim') " optional/in case you don't use telescope but use something else
call dein#add('neovim/nvim-lspconfig')
call dein#add('xbase-lab/xbase', { 'build': 'make install' })
lua require'xbase'.setup()

NOTE: You need to setup sourcekit-lsp (see sourcekit-setup) and consider adding more file to root patterns

Vscode

TODO

🎮 Usage

Neovim

TLDR:

• Install XBase
• run require'xbase'.setup({ --[[ see default configuration ]] })
• Open xcodeproj codebase.
• Wait for first time project setup finish.
• Start coding
• Use available actions which can be configure with shortcuts bellow

When you start a neovim instance with a root that contains project.yml, Project.swift, or *.xcodeproj, the daemon server will auto-start if no instance is running, and register the project once for recompile-watch. To communicate with your daemon, checkout the configurable shortcuts.

Statusline

XBase provide feline provider, other statusline plugins support are welcomed. However, using vim.g.xbase_watch_build_status you can easily setup statusline indicators.

require("xbase.statusline").feline() -- append to feline setup function

Vscode

TODO

⚙️ Defaults

Neovim

-- NOTE: Defaults
{
  --- Log level. Set it to ERROR to ignore everything
  log_level = vim.log.levels.DEBUG,
  --- Options to be passed to lspconfig.nvim's sourcekit setup function.
  --- Setting this to {} is sufficient, However, it is strongly recommended to use on_attach key to setup custom mappings
  --- {
  --- cmd = { "sourcekit-lsp", "--log-level", "error" },
  --- filetypes = { "swift" },
  --- root_dir = pattern("Package.swift", ".git", "project.yml", "Project.swift"),
  --- }
  sourcekit = nil, -- Disabled by default (xbase will not call it for you)
  --- Statusline provider configurations
  statusline = {
    watching = { icon = "", color = "#1abc9c" },
    device_running = { icon = "", color = "#4a6edb" },
    success = { icon = "", color = "#1abc9c" },
    failure = { icon = "", color = "#db4b4b" },
  },
  --- Simulators to only include.
  --- run `xcrun simctl list` to get a full list of available simulator
  --- If the list is empty then all simulator available  will be included
  simctl = {
    iOS = {
      -- "iPhone 13 Pro", --- only use this devices
    },
    watchOS = {}, -- all available devices
    tvOS = {}, -- all available devices
  },
  --- Log buffer configurations
  log_buffer = {
    --- Whether toggling the buffer should auto focus to it?
    focus = true,
    --- Split Log buffer height
    height = 20,
    --- Vsplit Log buffer width
    width = 75,
    --- Default log buffer direction: { "horizontal", "vertical" }
    default_direction = "horizontal",
  },
  --- Mappings
  mappings = {
    --- Whether xbase mapping should be disabled.
    enable = true,
    --- Open build picker. showing targets and configuration.
    build_picker = "<leader>b", --- set to 0 to disable
    --- Open run picker. showing targets, devices and configuration
    run_picker = "<leader>r", --- set to 0 to disable
    --- Open watch picker. showing run or build, targets, devices and configuration
    watch_picker = "<leader>s", --- set to 0 to disable
    --- A list of all the previous pickers
    all_picker = "<leader>ef", --- set to 0 to disable
    --- horizontal toggle log buffer
    toggle_split_log_buffer = "<leader>ls",
    --- vertical toggle log buffer
    toggle_vsplit_log_buffer = "<leader>lv",
  },
}

Vscode

TODO

🩺 Debugging

Sometimes xcodebuild acts up and things might break, the first step to find the root cause is to check logs. The following is how you can have a stream of logs in your terminal.

# Daemon logs
tail -f /tmp/xbase.log
# Build Server logs
tail -f /tmp/xbase-build-server.log

In case, you need to manually stop servers:

killall xbase xbase-sourcekit-helper