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Microsoft dangles code candy in front of iOS devs

Objective-C code-checker is Redmond's latest attempt to get app devs into WindowsLand

Microsoft is pressing ahead with its desire to sweep iOS devs into its embrace, this time offering them a code-testing tool to help them use its Windows Bridge for iOS.

The bridge first landed as a preview in August 2015, and got a leg-up from Intel in April with a slab of Chipzilla-contributed code.

Microsoft had hoped for more external code contributions, but it looks like the feedback had been on the lines of “it's too hard”, so late last week it decided to lend a helping hand in the form of a new testing tool.

Microsoft explains it wants to eliminate the multi-step process an iOS dev would have to go through to find out if their app would work with the bridge.

Instead of having to download the SDK, setup Windows 10 and Visual Studio 2015, and generate a Visual Studio project for the app to run the code, the iOS App Analysis tool provides an immediate “breakdown of what parts of your app are compatible with the bridge”.

The drag-and-drop Web application, here, takes an unencrypted IPA from Xcode and generates a report like the one below.

Presuming the answer is not “this ain't going to work, give up”, the dev will also get some suggestions on how much work will be needed to get their Objective C code working in Windows. For example, the analysis will identify how to integrate partially-supported third-party libraries, and what Microsoft substitutes might exist for unsupported frameworks (for example, maps from Microsoft instead of Cupertino).

The full Windows Objective-C repo is here, and there's a project wiki here. ®

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