FR: Support for "iPad apps for Mac" aka Marzipan/Catalyst

[siburb]

[REQUIRED] Step 2: Describe your environment

• Xcode version: 11
• Firebase Component: All

[REQUIRED] Step 3: Describe the problem

Steps to reproduce:

Attempting to build an iPad app for Mac, but it uses Firebase via Cocoapods, but we receive a lot of the following error:

Building for UIKit for Mac, but the linked framework '<frameworkName>.framework' was built for <unknown>. You may need to restrict the platforms for which this framework should be linked in the target editor.

Apparently, the Firebase binaries need to be built using Xcode 11 with the "Mac" option checked.

Relevant Code:

[ryanwilson]

Thanks for the report, @siburb! There are some docs and sessions we need to catch up on in order to find out how to get this working for folks. We're working on it and will update this issue as we find out more :)

[paulb777]

And, as always, PRs are welcome!

[davidhakki]

Any update on this? I would love my iPad / Mac apps to all run on FB back end.

[morganchen12]

No update yet. In terms of infrastructure, adding Catalyst support would mean adding most of the support for AppKit apps as well. We're in the process of figuring that out and will have more to share soon.

[davidhakki]

Are there any work arounds like building it for mac and the importing it into a project?

[morganchen12]

Theoretically what you're describing should be possible, since Catalyst apps are built on macOS apps, but will only work for the existing macOS-compatible libraries and defeats the purpose of Catalyst (at that point you're just building an AppKit app). You could then create a bundle using Firebase and load it into your Catalyst app.

[guidedways]

I really hope it's not going to only work for Catalyst supported apps. We really need this to work for all macOS apps with or without Catalyst.

[morganchen12]

AppKit support is also on our list of things to do. Fortunately, the Firebase website wouldn't need to distinguish between the two (i.e. console can display both as platform macOS), so much of the work is overlapping.

[appfrilans]

Is it possible to include firebase for macOS (UIKit for Mac) via pod 'FirebaseCore' ? I tried to make a separate target and set it in its own CocoaPods target (platform :macos, '10.15'), but importing via "import FirebaseCore" just gives me an error:

No such module 'FirebaseCore'

Any ideas? Or is this way impossible?

[ryanwilson]

@appfrilans as far as I can tell, UIKit for Mac apps need an XCFramework instead of regular frameworks (please someone jump in and correct me if this is incorrect 🙂) - CocoaPods doesn't currently support that. I'm installing Catalina beta now on and hope to get XCFrameworks built for the open source pods that currently support macOS, I'll be updating this thread as I discover things (may not be until early next week that I'm successful, but I'll try to get something ASAP).

[jonas-sleepcycle]

Here are someone who have gotten iOS frameworks working for UIKit for mac (not macOS though):

https://forums.developer.apple.com/message/362577