Producing .xcframeworks

[keith]

This is just a tracking issue for producing xcframeworks, since this is a common use case we should support

[mathaeus]

@keith @brentleyjones

From what I see adding xcframework support was added here? Or am I wrong about that?

Are you planning on releasing this anytime soon?

---

I gave the whole thing a shot and I think I ran into a bug, or the thing is just not ready yet.
Anyway here's what I tried:

WORKSPACE file

load("@bazel_tools//tools/build_defs/repo:git.bzl", "git_repository")

... 

git_repository(
    name = "build_bazel_rules_apple",
    remote = "https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_apple.git",
    branch = "master",
)

BUILD file

load("@build_bazel_rules_apple//apple:apple.bzl", "apple_xcframework")

...

apple_xcframework(
    name = "MyFramework",
    bundle_id = "com.foo.bar",
    deps = [
        ":SomeObjcDep",
        "@ios_opencv//:OpencvFramework",
    ],
    families_required = { "ios": "iphone" },
    infoplists = ["Info.plist"],
    ios = {"device": "arm64"},
    minimum_deployment_os_versions = {"ios": "14.0"},
    minimum_os_versions = {"ios": "14.0"}
)

I then run into that error:

ERROR: /private/var/tmp/_bazel_mathaeus/7daf80b34ca02d70eeaf84c8ae68b14f/external/build_bazel_rules_apple/apple/internal/xcframework_rules.bzl:326:19: name 'json' is not defined
ERROR: /private/var/tmp/_bazel_mathaeus/7daf80b34ca02d70eeaf84c8ae68b14f/external/build_bazel_rules_apple/apple/internal/xcframework_rules.bzl:390:19: name 'json' is not defined

Seems like it can't find the json encoder.

---

Please let me know if I'm on the right track here or how I could try out apple_xcframework (if it's ready).

Thanks!

[brentleyjones]

Are you using bazel 5.0? The next release will require it (which is why we haven't made a release yet, as it's still in RC).

[mathaeus]

Thanks for the quick reply @brentleyjones.

No, the project I'm trying to run has 3.7.2 in its .bazelversion, and from what I can see bazelisk was using that version therefore.

So bazel 5.0 is a requirement then for this, if I understand correctly?

[brentleyjones]

Yes. And Bazel 4.x is required for the latest release (or, that is all we tested it with, it might somehow work with 3.7.2).

[cpsauer]

Was this solved by the recent 0.33.0 release?

(Saw "Add rule for producing xcframeworks for iOS" in the release notes)

[thii]

Partially, yes. There's still missing support for producing XCFrameworks bundling static frameworks.

[keith]

I think we can close this overarching issue now since it works for many cases, and using libraries over frameworks is probably fine in many cases. We can file a separate tracking issue for that if we want to.