New features in Xcode 8 at a glance

During the 2016 Apple Global Developers Conference (WWDC), Apple, as always, disclosed to developers the new version of integrated development tools –xcode, in the past in each major release, Apple will actively improve the development tools, add some attractive new features, this year is no exception.

1. Swift 2 and 3

In the past, each version of Xcode was bundled with a fixed version of the Swift programming language, which is no longer the case in Xcode 8, and Swift 3 has caused a lot of syntactic changes to the swift programming language, which would have failed to compile programs based on the previous swift version.

The newly created project in Xcode 8 uses Swift 3 by default, and fortunately Xcode 8 enables developers to explicitly select Swift 2 or Swift 2.3 to compile in the compilation settings.

Support for previous versions of the Swift language

That means you can choose the right time to migrate the project to Swift 3, if a target needs to support Swift 2.3, you need to set the use Legacy Swift Language Version to Yes in the target's compilation settings.

Xcode 8 also provides a migration tool to help you upgrade your project to Swift 3, but the migration tools provided by Xcode are mixed, and the Swift 3 upgrade has changed much more than the last upgrade, and hopefully the Xcode 8 migration Tool will improve.

2. SOURCE Editor Extension

Xcode 8 The most surprising thing is to support the source editor third-party extension, developers for the local plug-in system has been eagerly awaited for many years, the source code Editor extension is the direction of the plug-in system to take a solid first step.

The source Editor extension is very similar to Xcode's extension, but Apple has repeatedly emphasized that the current extension focuses on the operation and navigation of the source code, which is why it is called the Source Editor extension, and Xcode 8 even provides an editor extension template for you to get started quickly.

Xcode Source Editor Extension template

One of my favorite features of the current extension architecture is that each extension runs in a different process, which means that the extended exception crash does not cause Xcode to terminate unexpectedly, and as the local plug-in is more and more, especially when Apple releases the new version of Xcode, the advantage of running the sub-process becomes more and more prominent.

Extension Contrast plugin Another advantage is that you can sign in and publish extensions via your Development Account, and Apple also mentions that developers can sell extensions through the Mac App Store, which is a great opportunity for developers who want to make money by selling extensions.

I am very excited about the Source editor extension, although I am a fan of Alcatraz, but Apple's local expansion is closer to the right direction in the future. We are looking forward to the extensions that developers will provide in the future, but there are already people posting plugins on GitHub.

3. Commissioning

Even if the best developers spend a lot of time debugging every day, knowing that your Apple provides better tools to make debugging easier, Xcode 8 has a lot of significant optimizations for debugging.

Interface debugging

The interface debugging in Xcode 8 is very powerful, the interface debugging can show the runtime problem, the improved interface debugging is easier to debug the unclear or dissatisfied layout.

Run-time issues? Yes, Xcode 8 also provides runtime issues in addition to compile-time issues, and if you encounter automatic layout problems at run time, Xcode will show these issues as runtime issues in the left navigation panel, which will be a very popular feature.

Run-time issues

Memory debugging

The memory debugging capabilities of Xcode 8 have also been significantly optimized for finding memory leaks and circular references, and I'm not sure if, but it looks great in actual projects.

Memory debugging

4. Code Signing

Code signing is very unfortunate for those interested in the Apple platform, but fortunately Apple did not make the ostrich with its head buried in the sand, Apple saw the developers encounter problems and try to solve, some experienced developers will occasionally encounter the issue of signatures, in this year's platforms The State of the Union video, Apple even self-deprecating the Fix Issue button, not only rarely fixes the real problem, sometimes makes the problem worse.

Fix Issue button does not usually fix the problem

Code signing issues will become a past in Xcode 8, and for each target you can tick the checkbox to have Xcode manage your code signature, which is checked by default for new projects. In the case of a tick, Xcode helps you manage certificates, configuration files, application labels, and more.

Code Signing Done for you

I hope Apple can solve the signature problem this time, and the marts developers will pray with me.

5. Other improvements and enhancements

San Francisco Mono Font

If you enjoy using finely crafted software, you should like the San Francisco Mono font in Xcode 8, see:

San Francisco Mono

Highlight when moving forward

Have you noticed that the current line above is marked as highlighted? This is another popular feature in Xcode8, and I'm currently using backlight for Xcode in Xcode 7, which is no longer needed in Xcode 8.

Automatic Picture code completion

Speaking of some plugins that will be discarded, I am currently using Kent Sutherland to develop plug-ins ksimagenamed to help with the image code in Xcode, and I will not need this plugin in Xcode 8 because this feature is already built into Xcode 8.

Automatic picture completion

6. Documentation

I believe that every developer will spend a lot of time browsing and reading documents, good documents are very helpful to developers, in fact, Apple's documents are very good, but the offer is not so friendly.

This problem will be solved in Xcode 8, the new document format looks great, and document browsing becomes simple and fast. Apple has also been optimized for memory issues, and the new version will have a much smaller memory footprint.

Here are two documents about the document, is not very design sense?

New Document Browser Figure 1

New Document Browser Figure 2

Summarize

Finally, I would like to say that this article is just a part of the new functionality of Xcode, and I am always looking forward to upgrading the large version of Xcode. Which is the new feature in your favorite Xcode 8? Share it in the comments section.

English original: What's New in Xcode 8

New features in Xcode 8