Distributing the app. Creating an Xcode project. To develop an iOS app, you start by creating an Xcode project. A project contains all the elements needed to create an app, including the source files, a graphical representation of the user interface, and build settings needed to build your app. Create a Mac app built with Mac Catalyst. For Xcode 12.0 and later help, see Xcode in Apple Developer Documentation. Welcome to Xcode. I am a developer of iOS, and developed a mac app. Now I want to distribute my app so that a searched for it and found that we need to upload.app to Mac App Store it looks fine. While for self distribution we can have three options: is to share our app; is to create.dmg file; is to share.pkg file (Package Maker). When making apps for an Apple device (phone, watch, computer) you need to use Xcode. A free piece of software created by Apple that allows you to design and code up apps. Xcode only works on Apple's operating system OS X. So if you have a Mac, then you can run Xcode no problem. If you don't have a M. Xcode 12 builds Universal apps by default to support Mac with Apple Silicon, often without changing a single line of code. Designed for macOS Big Sur. Xcode 12 looks great on macOS Big Sur, with a navigator sidebar that goes to the top of the window and clear new toolbar buttons. Xcode 11 came with an extra surprise by removing the long standing developer tool Application Loader, which was an alternative method to upload apps to Apple’s Mac and iOS App Stores. Per the Xcode 11 release notes: Xcode supports uploading apps from the Organizer window or from the command line with xcodebuild or xcrun altool.
With an all-new design that looks great on macOS Big Sur, Xcode 12 has customizable font sizes for the navigator, streamlined code completion, and new document tabs. Xcode 12 builds Universal apps by default to support Mac with Apple Silicon, often without changing a single line of code.
Designed for macOS Big Sur.
Xcode 12 looks great on macOS Big Sur, with a navigator sidebar that goes to the top of the window and clear new toolbar buttons. The navigator defaults to a larger font that’s easier to read, while giving you multiple size choices. New document tabs make it easy to create a working set of files within your workspace.
Document tabs.
The new tab model lets you open a new tab with a double-click, or track the selected file as you click around the navigator. You can re-arrange the document tabs to create a working set of files for your current task, and configure how content is shown within each tab. The navigator tracks the open files within your tabs using strong selection.
Navigator font sizes.
The navigator now tracks the system setting for “Sidebar icon size” used in Finder and Mail. You can also choose a unique font size just for Xcode within Preferences, including the traditional dense information presentation, and up to large fonts and icon targets.
Code completion streamlined.
A new completion UI presents only the information you need, taking up less screen space as you type. And completions are presented much faster, so you can keep coding at maximum speed.
Redesigned organizer.
An all-new design groups all critical information about each of your apps together in one place. Choose any app from any of your teams, then quickly navigate to inspect crash logs, energy reports, and performance metrics, such as battery consumption and launch time of your apps when used by customers.
SwiftUI
SwiftUI offers new features, improved performance, and the power to do even more, all while maintaining a stable API that makes it easy to bring your existing SwiftUI code forward into Xcode 12. A brand new life cycle management API for apps built with SwiftUI lets you write your entire app in SwiftUI and share even more code across all Apple platforms. And a new widget platform built on SwiftUI lets you build widgets that work great on iPad, iPhone, and Mac. Your SwiftUI views can now be shared with other developers, and appear as first-class controls in the Xcode library. And your existing SwiftUI code continues to work, while providing faster performance, better diagnostics, and access to new controls.
Universal app ready.
Xcode 12 is built as a Universal app that runs 100% natively on Intel-based CPUs and Apple Silicon for great performance and a snappy interface.* It also includes a unified macOS SDK that includes all the frameworks, compilers, debuggers, and other tools you need to build apps that run natively on Apple Silicon and the Intel x86_64 CPU.
Updated automatically
When you open your project in Xcode 12, your app is automatically updated to produce release builds and archives as Universal apps. When you build your app, Xcode produces one binary “slice” for Apple Silicon and one for the Intel x86_64 CPU, then wraps them together as a single app bundle to share or submit to the Mac App Store. You can test this at any time by selecting “Any Mac” as the target in the toolbar.
Test multiple architectures.
On the new Mac with Apple Silicon, you can run and debug apps running on either the native architecture or on Intel virtualization by selecting “My Mac (Rosetta)” in the toolbar.
Multiplatform template
New multiplatform app templates set up new projects to easily share code among iOS, iPadOS, and macOS using SwiftUI and the new lifecycle APIs. The project structure encourages sharing code across all platforms, while creating special custom experiences for each platform where it makes sense for your app.
Improved auto-indentation
Swift code is auto-formatted as you type to make common Swift code patterns look much better, including special support for the “guard” command.
StoreKit testing
New tools in Xcode let you create StoreKit files that describe the various subscription and in-app purchase products your app can offer, and create test scenarios to make sure everything works great for your customers — all locally testable on your Mac.
Get started.
Download Xcode 12 and use these resources to build apps for all Apple platforms.
Each year, Apple releases updates to its software platforms and development tools, which always comes with a bevy of changes. Xcode 11 came with an extra surprise by removing the long standing developer tool Application Loader, which was an alternative method to upload apps to Apple’s Mac and iOS App Stores.
Per the Xcode 11 release notes:
Xcode supports uploading apps from the Organizer window or from the command line with xcodebuild or xcrun altool. Application Loader is no longer included with Xcode. (29008875)
Historical Background of Application Launcher and altool
If you write traditional Mac or iOS software in Xcode, you normally submit your apps to the App Store via the Organizer window in Xcode. However, if you build or distribute your software via other methods, then the Xcode Organizer may not be the way you generally upload the software. This is where Application Loader was useful by being able to take an existing app and upload the software to Apple. With that route now absent in the latest release of Xcode, alternative methods are necessary.
How To Create A Mac App In Xcode Tutorial
Application Loader was a companion developer tool that, according to its copyright date, goes as far back as 2002, but the oldest version of Application Loader I could find came with Xcode 3.2, putting it around the same time period that the iOS and Mac App Stores were starting up. This app came bundled with Xcode and could be accessed via the following menu in Xcode: Xcode > Open Developer Tool > Application Loader
Even though Application Loader has been inexplicably retired, there is an alternative solution, the command line tool altool, which has been available since at least Xcode 6. altool is a versatile utility which can notarize, verify, or upload an app. Considering that altool was part of Application Loader before being moved over to the ContentDeliveryServices framework, it can perform the same duties that Application Loader handled.
Validate App
This is the same process as what Xcode uses to validate an app, and it will also return any success or error messages from the validation.
Upload App
In these examples, appstore_password is a per-application password you need to create at Apple’s website. If you have multiple products, you will need to create a separate password for each app.
xcrun is used to locate and run development tools on the system, which is a useful utility to have, especially in the case of using altool, since its location has changed between Xcode 10 and Xcode 11. In Xcode 10, altool was part of the Application Loader app (/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Applications/Application Loader.app/Contents/Frameworks/ITunesSoftwareService.framework/Versions/A/Support/altool), but with Xcode 11, it has been moved to be part of the ContentDeliveryServices.framework (/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/SharedFrameworks/ContentDeliveryServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/AppStoreService.framework/Versions/A/Support/altool).
Since altool is a command line utility, it can be easily utilized in an automated system, such as with a continuous integration and deployment build process. If you prefer to use Application Loader, make sure to have a copy of Xcode 10 available, but it is unknown how long that will continue to work, so it is a good idea to eventually migrate your process to using altool, instead.
How To Download Xcode 10
Using altool with the Keychain
If you are adding altool to a CI/CD automation flow, it is best to store the application-specific password in either an environmental variable or the macOS Keychain, instead of displaying the password in a plain text script.
To add the password to the keychain, run the following command from the macOS Terminal:
MY_SECRET is whatever value you wish to set for the name to store in the Keychain. Verify that the password was successfully saved in the Keychain (/Applications/Utilities/Keychain.app).
To make use of the password stored in the Keychain:
Transporter
About a month after Xcode 11.0 was officially released, Apple replaced the abandoned Application Loader with another app: Transporter. Transporter originated as a Java-based command-line tool for Windows, Linux, and Mac to submit content to the iTunes Store, App Store, and iBooks Store. Transporter 1.1 is now a Mac app which can also upload app binaries to App Store Connect, effectively supplanting Application Loader.
Transporter is not bundled with Xcode, but it can be downloaded from the Mac App Store and used in a similar manner to the retired Application Loader to upload .ipa or .pkg files to App Store Connect. Log in with either a App Store Connect, iTunes Connect, or encoding house account to upload your content to the appropriate portal.