xmake-objc

Building Objective-C / Objective-C++ with Xmake

Objective-C (.m) and Objective-C++ (.mm) are first-class in xmake. Primary use case: macOS / iOS / tvOS apps, Cocoa frameworks, and mixed C++ / Objective-C projects.

1. Minimal Objective-C project

add_rules("mode.debug", "mode.release")

target("hello")
    set_kind("binary")
    add_files("src/*.m")
    add_frameworks("Foundation")

// src/main.m
#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>
int main() {
    @autoreleasepool {
        NSLog(@"hello from xmake");
    }
    return 0;
}

2. Objective-C++ (mixing with C++)

Use .mm extension and set the C++ language level:

target("app")
    set_kind("binary")
    set_languages("c++17")
    add_files("src/*.mm", "src/*.cpp")
    add_frameworks("Foundation", "AppKit")

.mm files compile with the Objective-C++ front-end — you can freely mix @interface/@implementation with C++ classes and templates.

3. Frameworks

target("app")
    add_frameworks("Foundation", "Cocoa", "AppKit", "Metal", "MetalKit", "CoreGraphics")
    add_frameworkdirs("/Library/Frameworks", "$(projectdir)/vendor/frameworks")

• add_frameworks(...) — system or user frameworks (equivalent of -framework <name>).
• add_frameworkdirs(...) — additional search paths for non-system frameworks.

4. Flags

target("app")
    add_mflags("-fobjc-arc")                    -- Objective-C flag (.m)
    add_mxxflags("-fobjc-arc")                  -- Objective-C++ flag (.mm)

add_mflags / add_mxxflags target .m / .mm respectively; add_cxflags still flows through to both.

ARC is the default in modern Xcode; include -fobjc-arc explicitly if you want to be sure.

5. Apple platform targets

xmake f -p macosx  -a arm64
xmake f -p iphoneos -a arm64
xmake f -p iphonesimulator -a arm64
xmake f -p appletvos -a arm64
xmake f -p watchos -a arm64
xmake

Pin SDK version and minimum deployment:

xmake f -p iphoneos --xcode_sdkver=17.2 --target_minver=14.0