Adding Flipper to Generic iOS Apps

note

Swift and Objective-C are supported for Flipper with CocoaPods as build and distribution mechanism.

CocoaPods

The following configuration assumes CocoaPods 1.9+:

project 'MyApp.xcodeproj'
flipperkit_version = '0.250.0'

target 'MyApp' do
  platform :ios, '10.0'

  # It is likely that you'll only want to include Flipper in debug builds,
  # in which case you add the `:configuration` directive:
  pod 'FlipperKit', '~>' + flipperkit_version, :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'FlipperKit/FlipperKitLayoutComponentKitSupport', '~>' + flipperkit_version, :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'FlipperKit/SKIOSNetworkPlugin', '~>' + flipperkit_version, :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'FlipperKit/FlipperKitUserDefaultsPlugin', '~>' + flipperkit_version, :configuration => 'Debug'
  # ...unfortunately at this time that means you'll need to explicitly mark
  # transitive dependencies as being for debug build only as well:
  pod 'Flipper-DoubleConversion', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'Flipper-Folly', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'Flipper-Glog', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'Flipper-PeerTalk', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'CocoaLibEvent', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'boost-for-react-native', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'OpenSSL-Universal', :configuration => 'Debug'
  pod 'CocoaAsyncSocket', :configuration => 'Debug'
  # ...except, of course, those transitive dependencies that your
  # application itself depends, e.g.:
  pod 'ComponentKit', '~> 0.31'

  # If you use `use_frameworks!` in your Podfile,
  # uncomment the below $static_framework array and also
  # the pre_install section.  This will cause Flipper and
  # it's dependencies to be built as a static library and all other pods to
  # be dynamic.
  #
  # NOTE Doing this may lead to a broken build if any of these are also
  #      transitive dependencies of other dependencies and are expected
  #      to be built as frameworks.
  #
  # $static_framework = ['FlipperKit', 'Flipper', 'Flipper-Folly',
  #   'CocoaAsyncSocket', 'ComponentKit', 'Flipper-DoubleConversion',
  #   'Flipper-Glog', 'Flipper-PeerTalk', 'Flipper-RSocket', 'Yoga', 'YogaKit',
  #   'CocoaLibEvent', 'OpenSSL-Universal', 'boost-for-react-native', 'Flipper-Fmt']
  #
  # pre_install do |installer|
  #   Pod::Installer::Xcode::TargetValidator.send(:define_method, :verify_no_static_framework_transitive_dependencies) {}
  #   installer.pod_targets.each do |pod|
  #       if $static_framework.include?(pod.name)
  #         def pod.build_type;
  #           Pod::BuildType.static_library
  #         end
  #       end
  #     end
  # end
end

For pure Objective-C projects

For pure Objective-C projects, add the following to your settings:

1. /usr/lib/swift as the first entry of the LD_RUNPATH_SEARCH_PATHS

2. Add the following in LIBRARY_SEARCH_PATHS

   "\"$(TOOLCHAIN_DIR)/usr/lib/swift/$(PLATFORM_NAME)\"",
   "\"$(TOOLCHAIN_DIR)/usr/lib/swift-5.0/$(PLATFORM_NAME)\"",

3. If, after following the above two steps, there are still errors such as Undefined symbol _swift_getFunctionReplacement, then set DEAD_CODE_STRIPPING to YES. The reference for this fix is in the Swift forum

This is done to overcome a bug with Xcode 11 which fails to compile Swift code when bitcode is enabled. Flipper transitively depends on YogaKit, which is written in Swift. For more information about this issue, refer to the Swift code tweet and Github issue.

Install the dependencies by running pod install. You can now import and initialize Flipper in yourAppDelegate.

ObjC

#import <FlipperKit/FlipperClient.h>
#import <FlipperKitLayoutPlugin/FlipperKitLayoutPlugin.h>
#import <FlipperKitLayoutComponentKitSupport/FlipperKitLayoutComponentKitSupport.h>
#import <FlipperKitUserDefaultsPlugin/FKUserDefaultsPlugin.h>
#import <FlipperKitNetworkPlugin/FlipperKitNetworkPlugin.h>
#import <SKIOSNetworkPlugin/SKIOSNetworkAdapter.h>

@implementation AppDelegate

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions
{
  FlipperClient *client = [FlipperClient sharedClient];
  SKDescriptorMapper *layoutDescriptorMapper = [[SKDescriptorMapper alloc] initWithDefaults];
  [FlipperKitLayoutComponentKitSupport setUpWithDescriptorMapper: layoutDescriptorMapper];
  [client addPlugin: [[FlipperKitLayoutPlugin alloc] initWithRootNode: application
                                                 withDescriptorMapper: layoutDescriptorMapper]];

  [client addPlugin:[[FKUserDefaultsPlugin alloc] initWithSuiteName:nil]];
  [client addPlugin: [[FlipperKitNetworkPlugin alloc] initWithNetworkAdapter:[SKIOSNetworkAdapter new]]];
  [client start];
  ...
}
@end

Swift

import UIKit
import FlipperKit
@UIApplicationMain
class AppDelegate: UIResponder, UIApplicationDelegate {

  var window: UIWindow?


  func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplication.LaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {
    // Override point for customization after application launch.
    let client = FlipperClient.shared()
    let layoutDescriptorMapper = SKDescriptorMapper(defaults: ())
    FlipperKitLayoutComponentKitSupport.setUpWith(layoutDescriptorMapper)
    client?.add(FlipperKitLayoutPlugin(rootNode: application, with: layoutDescriptorMapper!))
    client?.start()
    return true
  }
}

Enabling plugins

Finally, you need to add plugins to your Flipper client. The Layout Inspector plugin is shown above to get you started. See Network Plugin and Layout Inspector Plugin for information on how to add them and enable Litho or ComponentKit support. You can check the sample apps in the GitHub repo for examples of integrating other plugins.

Issues or questions

If you encounter any issues or have any questions, refer to the Troubleshooting section.