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Trying to prepare a single dynamic framework to my customer. My framework (A.framework) uses third-party recognition static framework (B.framework). I can't provide separate A and B frameworks to the customer. Ideally B.framework should be built and included into my A.framework's binary, so the customer's app will only embed A.framework without any additional actions to link with that third-party app.

What I did:

  1. Added B.framework to the project.
  2. Added B.framework to "Linked Frameworks and Libraries" in the corresponding target.
  3. Built A.framework.
  4. Created a demo application and included A.framework to the project.
  5. Added A.framework to "Embedded Binaries".
  6. Demo app's build fails with message "Missing required module 'B'" (despite the fact that it is used in A.framework only).

Note:

  • I neither created any modulemap files for B.framework, nor additional run scripts
  • Making A.framework static is not acceptable because it includes some resources (storyboards, icons and some other files)
  • Tried to make un-recommended "umbrella" framework but got stuck on loading B.framework's bundle in demo app
  • Tried to make fake "umbrella" framework by simply copying B.framework inside A.framework, but got 2 problems - huge size of A.framework and Mach-O error while exporting the demo application (because of Mach-O difference between dynamic A and static B frameworks)

Any ideas would be highly appreciated!

UPD 1: This is not about umbrella framework because the proper umbrella framework implementation requires to load sub-framework from bundle which is not good. The fake framework implementation (sub-framework simply copied to umbrella) won't work for release because of different Mach-O values - dynamic and static. Plus fake umbrella framework has a huge size because sub-framework is being fully copied inside umbrella.

UPD 2: Created a small test project: StaticFrameworkTest which has 3 sub-projects:

  1. Demo-application with dynamic framework dependency (framework A) and shouldn't know anything about framework B
  2. Dynamic framework with static framework dependency (framework B) which ideally should be included in A framework's binary.
  3. Static framework B
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  • Do a small demo project with 1 file in framework A and 1 file in framework B. It would help you understand and also others understand Commented Jun 22, 2018 at 12:46
  • 1
    Possible duplicate of How to create an umbrella framework in iOS SDK? Commented Jun 22, 2018 at 14:35
  • @Rei no, it's not about umbrella framework because all the ways to implement umbrella are not proper solutions for release version. Please see UPD 1 with a bit more detailed explanation. Commented Jun 25, 2018 at 10:12
  • @user1046037 thank you for your reply! Please see UPD 2 with link to the project Commented Jun 25, 2018 at 10:14
  • @semenchikus In your project where have you defined TestDynamic. I couldn't spot TestDynamic. Create a workspace and add the framework and TestApp's project file on to it. Refer: raywenderlich.com/126365/ios-frameworks-tutorial Commented Jun 25, 2018 at 10:21

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A static framework is by definition a fat static library combined with any additional required resources. As such you can embed your third party static library inside your own and also include images, storyboards, plist etc.

You can't do that in a static library (i.e. *.a), but in a static framework you can do. See for example https://www.raywenderlich.com/65964/create-a-framework-for-ios for details on how to do that (at the end of the article it creates the static *.framework out of the static *.a and some resources)

A dynamic framework can never embed a third party static library. The main application that imports the dynamic framework will always have to also explicitly link against the static library, which it seems that is not what you want.

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5 Comments

Thank you! Finally, I was able to build static framework with all the dependencies and resources without any issues. Who will do similar stuff, note: an application that depends on a static framework should be only linked with this framework (not embed it), plus "Framework Search Paths" setting for the application should be set to all the inner frameworks.
> A dynamic framework can never embed a third party static library. I think that is an incorrect statement. A dynamic framework can embed a static binary (library or framework) and then you the App does not need to know anything about this static dependency. Static binary would then be embedded == merged with dynamic binary symbols, exactly the way static binaries always do. I couldn't find a doc proving or disproving that but we have exactly this setup in our project and it works.
You are actually right. It is possible to set it up. But you do still incur the risk of symbol duplication so unless you control the entire app and you can guarantee that's the only place the binary library is imported, it is not a recommended approach.
@semenchikus please let me know if you able to fix this i got same issues
How can I use pod or Firebase or some 3rd party libs in a dynamic framework?

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