Automatic build number incrementing in Xcode

by Matt Sephton — Sat, 28 Jun 2025 16:01:00 +0000

Note: these days I mostly let App Store Connect manage version numbers.

There are many ways to do automatic build version number incrementing in Xcode. I don’t know of any really easy universal way of doing it, so this is simply my preferred way of doing it. I just added it to a new project so thought I’d document if only for my own future reference!

1. Create a .xcconfig

Add a file BuildNumber.xcconfig to your project
Add a Pre-Action Script to your Scheme:
- In Xcode, edit your scheme (Product > Scheme > Edit Scheme).
- For both “Run” and “Archive” actions, add a Pre-action with a script like the one below
- Here I’m using a sort of reverse notation timestamp format, you can use whatever works for you
- Make sure to set “Provide build settings from” to your project

#!/bin/sh
BUILD_NUMBER=`date '+%y%m%d.%H%M'`

PROJECT_NAME=$(basename "$PROJECT_FILE_PATH" .xcodeproj)
echo "CURRENT_PROJECT_VERSION = $BUILD_NUMBER" > "${PROJECT_DIR}/${PROJECT_NAME}/BuildNumber.xcconfig"

echo "Updated build number to: $BUILD_NUMBER"

2. Reference the .xcconfig in your project

In your project set the base configuration file to your BuildNumber.xcconfig
- In the main editor, you’ll see two sections: PROJECT and TARGETS
- Click the name of your project and make sure Info tab is selected
- You can set the base configuration at the project level (as here) or for each target individually

3. Set the version to use the config variable

In the target build settings, set: Current Project Version to: $(CURRENT_PROJECT_VERSION)

It will show the version number in place

4. Confirm by displaying the value in your app

Use CFBundleVersion for the build version number

Building BasiliskII for iOS

by Matt Sephton — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve had numerous requests for a guide to building BasiliskII on iOS. Let me know of anything is unclear or would benefit from more details!

February 2024: Updated for building with Xcode 15.2 on macOS 14.3 to iOS 17.3. YMMV.

Building

Install Xcode from Mac App Store
Clone project source from GitHub
Switch to the ios branch
Open .xcodeproj file
Set Product > Destination to point to your device
Run

Optional Changes

These are changes I made that give a better experience on my specific iPad.

Adding chunky screen resolutions

I added chunky “half resolution” screen modes to increase the size of user interface elements so that buttons, menu items and so on are all around the 44pt recommended in the Apple iOS HIG.

For iPad Pro 12.9” these changes were:

[self addVideoMode:CGSizeMake(512, 496) to:videoModes]; // portrait minus keyboard
[self addVideoMode:CGSizeMake(512, 672) to:videoModes]; // portrait "full" screen
[self addVideoMode:CGSizeMake(683, 502) to:videoModes]; // landscape "full" screen

Enter those after line 61 in file B2ScreenView.mm

Disabling graphics smoothing

My personal preference is to disable filtering/smoothing on all graphics scaling, but only because I’ve dialled in resolutions that fit exactly so there will be no scaling happening anyway:

NSString *filter = kCAFilterNearest;
videoLayer.magnificationFilter = filter;
videoLayer.minificationFilter = filter;

Make this change at line 108 in file B2ScreenView.mm

Custom Keyboard Layouts

These are defined in JSON and compiled to a custom format:

source file location on GitHub
several regional layouts are already provided
you don’t have to make your own!

Here’s one that I made, based on the British layout, for use with Deneba artWORKS/UltraPaint. To install it you should copy the file artWORKS.nfkeyboardlayout to BasiliskII’s Keyboard Layout folder using the Files app on your iPad.

Enable Split View Support

This can be enabled by changing BasiliskII-Info.plist: UIRequiresFullScreen should be false in BasiliskII-Info.plist but be wary of the following problem:

the very top of the screen (where you’d expect the iOS status bar to be, and where part of the System 7 menu bar is) will become unresponsive to touch due to the Slide Over indicator

This would need to be managed/avoided by the screen layout of BasiliskII, but when I attempted this it raised more issues.

However, you can still use Slide Over to position Safari, Files, etc. along the edge of your screen.

Notes

There are additional capabilities that come with the emulator integration. I go further into these, and more besides, in a additional posts listed at the bottom of the page.

Keyboard

Swipe up/down with two fingers to show/hide the on-screen keyboard

Settings

Spread 4 or 5 fingers to show the BasiliskII Settings pop-up
Tap outside of the BasiliskII Settings pop-up to hide it
Settings can also be invoked through the app menu, long press the app icon

Custom screen size

Pinch with 2 fingers to dynamically resize screen
Separate tracking for horizontal and vertical resizing
Double-tap for full size screen

A drive appears on the desktop that is mapped to the iOS file sharing folder of the app.

You can use Files to transfer files into or out of the emulated machine
Share Sheet also works for getting files into the emulated machine
You can organise the files into folders using the Files app

Apple Pencil

This is supported the same way as regular touch so it acts as a mouse. Drawing works well and is very responsive, even at lower Hz.

Palm rejection is missing
Pressure sensitivity is missing
Multi touch seems to be missing

Turning an iPad Pro into the Ultimate Classic Macintosh
How to install BasiliskII on your iPad
Exploring Custom Keyboards and Automation
Optimising Macintosh app toolbars for touch
Macintosh drawing software compared
Mixing External Tools across Deneba software
My System 7 software choices
About the interoperability of System 7 and iOS

Get Info: #xcode