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Mac OS X Leopard - ARCAism

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CHAPTER 25 MAC <strong>OS</strong> X DEVELOPMENT: THE TOOLS<br />

Figure 25-8. Your first <strong>Mac</strong> application in action<br />

That’s because any graphical application doesn’t really get going in Xcode until we take a<br />

detour to Interface Builder. Quit your application like any other—by selecting Quit from its<br />

menu or typing Cmd+Q. Then, from the project’s smart group in the sidebar, find the Resources<br />

group and double-click MyDocument.nib to open it in Interface Builder.<br />

Interface Builder<br />

It’s fitting that the first development tool for <strong>Mac</strong> <strong>OS</strong> X, back when it was still NeXTSTEP, was<br />

not a code editor, but an interface editor. Interface Builder made the process of creating a graphic<br />

user interface into a graphical experience.<br />

Even though drag-and-drop user interface editors are now common, Interface Builder is<br />

unique in that it doesn’t produce code. Rather, it creates freeze-dried interface objects in<br />

NeXTSTEP Interface Builder format, more generally known as nibs. These nibs are literally your<br />

application’s interface. The same nibs you create in a project today will be deployed with your<br />

shipping application tomorrow.<br />

Later, Interface Builder was joined by a younger sibling, Project Builder, now known as<br />

Xcode. Interface Builder remained separate, which is handy for interface designers, translators,<br />

and hackers who want to create or alter an application’s interface without having to know or<br />

care about its source code.<br />

While Xcode went through several iterations of improvement, Interface Builder was largely<br />

left as is, until now. <strong>Leopard</strong>’s version of Interface Builder is completely rewritten from the<br />

ground up, breathing new life into this amazing tool. Interface Builder has four components, as<br />

shown in Figure 25-9.

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