FrameGen

FrameGen is a Mac app and a command-line tool that turn an Xcode framework project into a distributable XCFramework. Pick a scheme, press Build, and FrameGen archives every supported platform, assembles the XCFramework with its debug symbols, signs and zips it, publishes it, and gives you a ready-to-paste Swift Package Manager binaryTarget with the real download URL.

Features

• One-click XCFramework. Runs xcodebuild archive for each selected platform, then xcodebuild -create-xcframework with the dSYM of every slice.
• Projects and workspaces. Opens .xcodeproj and .xcworkspace (including CocoaPods) and prefers the workspace next to a project.
• Every Apple platform. iOS, Mac Catalyst, macOS, tvOS, watchOS, visionOS and their simulators. FrameGen reads the scheme's SUPPORTED_PLATFORMS and only offers what the framework supports.
• Code signing. Optionally signs the XCFramework with a certificate from your keychain, with a secure timestamp, before the checksum is computed.
• Ready for SwiftPM. Zips the XCFramework, computes its checksum and writes a .binaryTarget(...) snippet next to it.
• Publishing anywhere. Uploads to a GitHub release with the GitHub CLI, or runs your own upload command for GitLab, Bitbucket, S3, Artifactory, Nexus or an internal server. The snippet then uses the real download URL.
• Same pipeline in CI. The framegen command-line tool ships inside the app; Product › Copy Build Command copies the equivalent invocation.
• Privacy manifest check. Warns when a slice ships without PrivacyInfo.xcprivacy, which Apple requires in commonly used third-party SDKs.
• Live progress. Shows each step with its status and duration, the current xcodebuild action and the full build log.
• Readable failures. Shows which step failed and pulls the compiler error: lines out of the log.
• Remembers your choices. Keeps the scheme, configuration, platforms and output folder of every project, plus a list of recent projects.
• A native Mac app. Menu bar commands with keyboard shortcuts, a toolbar, drag and drop, notifications when a build finishes in the background, Dark Mode, VoiceOver labels, English and Russian.

Screenshots

Start	Building

Install

With Homebrew, which also puts framegen on your PATH:

brew install --cask ramiz69/tap/framegen

Or download FrameGen-<version>.zip from Releases, unzip it and move FrameGen to Applications. Releases are signed with a Developer ID and notarized by Apple.

Requirements

• A Mac with Apple silicon running macOS 27 or later.
• Xcode 27 or later, selected with xcode-select.
• A project with a shared framework scheme.

Usage

1. Open a project with File › Open Project… (⌘O), pick one from Recent Projects, or drop an .xcodeproj, an .xcworkspace or their folder onto the window or the Dock icon.
2. Choose the scheme and configuration. The supported platforms appear and are all turned on; switch off the ones you don't need.
3. Optionally pick a signing identity and a distribution: a download URL, a GitHub release, or a custom upload command.
4. Press Build XCFramework (⌘B). Stop a build with ⌘. or Esc.
5. When the build finishes, Publish (⌘U) uploads the zip, or use Show in Finder and copy the checksum and the binaryTarget snippet.

FrameGen writes these files to build/ next to the project. You can choose another folder per project, or set a shared default in Settings (⌘,).

build/
├── SampleKit.xcframework
├── SampleKit.xcframework.zip
├── SampleKit.binaryTarget.txt
└── Archives/            # one .xcarchive per platform; optional, see Settings

Archives are built with SKIP_INSTALL=NO, BUILD_LIBRARIES_FOR_DISTRIBUTION=YES, SWIFT_ENABLE_LIBRARY_EVOLUTION=YES and SWIFT_EMIT_MODULE_INTERFACE=YES, so Swift frameworks get the module interfaces that -create-xcframework needs.

Distribution

Publish	How it works
Upload manually	Optionally set a download URL template, e.g. https://cdn.example.com/{name}/{version}/{zip}, so the snippet has the final URL.
GitHub Release	Uses the GitHub CLI (gh auth login once). Creates the release for the tag, e.g. v{version}, or replaces its asset.
Custom command	Runs your command in zsh -l with {path}, {zip}, {name}, {version} and {checksum} filled in and shell-quoted. Presets cover the GitLab Package Registry, Bitbucket Downloads, Amazon S3 and JFrog Artifactory. Define tokens such as $GITLAB_TOKEN in ~/.zprofile.

{version} is the scheme's MARKETING_VERSION unless you set one in the project options. SwiftPM downloads from private hosts with credentials in ~/.netrc.

Command-line tool

framegen runs the same pipeline as the app, so a build configured in FrameGen behaves the same in GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins, TeamCity, Bitbucket Pipelines or Xcode Cloud. Install it with the cask, or use /Applications/FrameGen.app/Contents/Helpers/framegen.

framegen list --workspace Kit.xcworkspace
framegen build --workspace Kit.xcworkspace --scheme Kit --platform ios,ios-simulator,macos \
  --sign "Apple Distribution: Company" --version 2.1 \
  --download-url 'https://cdn.example.com/{name}/{version}/{zip}' --output build --json

Without --platform it builds every platform the scheme supports. --publish github or --publish command --publish-command '…' uploads after building. Progress goes to stderr and the result to stdout, as text or JSON. Exit codes: 0 success, 1 build failure, 2 usage error, 130 interrupted. Run framegen help for every option.

Keyboard shortcuts

Action	Shortcut
Open Project	⌘O
Close Project	⇧⌘W
Build XCFramework	⌘B
Stop	⌘.
Publish	⌘U
Copy Build Command	⌥⌘C
Show Output in Finder	⇧⌘R
Settings	⌘,

Building from source

Open FrameGen.xcodeproj in Xcode 27 and run the FrameGen scheme, or build it from the command line:

xcodebuild -project FrameGen.xcodeproj -scheme FrameGen -configuration Release build

Run the tests (Swift Testing). The engine and the tool are tested as a package, the app with Xcode:

swift test --package-path Packages/FrameGenKit

xcodebuild test -project FrameGen.xcodeproj -scheme FrameGen -destination 'platform=macOS,arch=arm64' CODE_SIGNING_ALLOWED=NO

CI runs both on every pull request to main (see .github/workflows/ci.yml). During development, swift run --package-path Packages/FrameGenKit framegen-dev help runs the tool without Xcode.

The app runs xcodebuild on your projects, so it can't use the App Sandbox. That also means it can't ship on the Mac App Store; releases are signed with a Developer ID and notarized instead. See docs/RELEASING.md for the release process.

Architecture

FrameGen uses AppKit with Apple's Model-View-Controller pattern and Swift 6 concurrency. The build engine lives in a local Swift package that both the app and the tool use.

Part	Contents
Packages/FrameGenKit — FrameGenKit	The engine, with no UI: XCFrameworkPipeline runs a BuildRequest and reports PipelineEvents. Also ProcessRunner, XcodeCommand, XCFrameworkBuilder, ProjectLocator, ProjectInfo, SchemeBuildInfo, SigningIdentity, Template and Publisher.
Packages/FrameGenKit — FrameGenCLI	The framegen commands and the BuildArguments parser, which also prints the app's "Copy Build Command".
FrameGenCLI/main.swift	The Xcode target that builds the tool into FrameGen.app/Contents/Helpers.
FrameGen/Models	Workspace, Project and BuildState are @Observable classes; settings persist per project.
FrameGen/Controllers	NSViewController subclasses for every screen, plus BuildController, which adapts pipeline events to the UI and publishes results.
FrameGen/Views	Reusable NSView subclasses: form sections, step rows, log view, callouts, drop target.
FrameGen/Services	Preferences, open panels and build notifications.
FrameGen/Window, Application	The main window and its toolbar, the menu bar and the app delegate.

View controllers follow their models with withObservationTracking (see Support/ObservationLoop.swift), so the UI updates whenever the state changes.

License

FrameGen is available under the MIT license. See LICENSE.