Communicating iOS apps on real devices was never a straight thing earlier. In this article we’ll collect available open source tools to communicate and debug with app on iOS Real Devices.
ios-deploy
Install and debug iOS apps from the command line. Designed to work on un-jailbroken devices. It can be installed from brew or npm and come up with following list of useful options,
Usage: ios-deploy [OPTION]...
-d, --debug launch the app in lldb after installation
-i, --id <device_id> the id of the device to connect to
-c, --detect only detect if the device is connected
-b, --bundle <bundle.app> the path to the app bundle to be installed
-a, --args <args> command line arguments to pass to the app when launching it
-s, --envs <envs> environment variables, space separated key-value pairs, to pass to the app when launching it
-t, --timeout <timeout> number of seconds to wait for a device to be connected
-u, --unbuffered don't buffer stdout
-n, --nostart do not start the app when debugging
-N, --nolldb start debugserver only. do not run lldb. Can not be used with args or envs options
-I, --noninteractive start in non interactive mode (quit when app crashes or exits)
-L, --justlaunch just launch the app and exit lldb
-v, --verbose enable verbose output
-m, --noinstall directly start debugging without app install (-d not required)
-A, --app_deltas incremental install. must specify a directory to store app deltas to determine what needs to be installed
-p, --port <number> port used for device, default: dynamic
-r, --uninstall uninstall the app before install (do not use with -m; app cache and data are cleared)
-9, --uninstall_only uninstall the app ONLY. Use only with -1 <bundle_id>
-1, --bundle_id <bundle id> specify bundle id for list and upload
-l, --list[=<dir>] list all app files or the specified directory
-o, --upload <file> upload file
-w, --download[=<path>] download app tree or the specified file/directory
-2, --to <target pathname> use together with up/download file/tree. specify target
-D, --mkdir <dir> make directory on device
-R, --rm <path> remove file or directory on device (directories must be empty)
-X, --rmtree <path> remove directory and all contained files recursively on device
-V, --version print the executable version
-e, --exists check if the app with given bundle_id is installed or not
-B, --list_bundle_id list bundle_id
-W, --no-wifi ignore wifi devices
-C, --get_battery_level get battery current capacity
-O, --output <file> write stdout to this file
-E, --error_output <file> write stderr to this file
--detect_deadlocks <sec> start printing backtraces for all threads periodically after specific amount of seconds
-f, --file_system specify file system for mkdir / list / upload / download / rm
-k, --key keys for the properties of the bundle. Joined by ',' and used only with -B <list_bundle_id> and -j <json>
-F, --non-recursively specify non-recursively walk directory
-j, --json format output as JSON
Repo link – https://github.com/ios-control/ios-deploy
libimobiledevice
A cross-platform protocol library to access iOS devices, it is one the oldest best available tool which comes up with a bunch of libraries and command-line utilities to control iOS devices.
Some popular libraries are,
idevicerestore Restore/upgrade firmware of iOS devices
ideviceinstaller Manage apps of iOS devices
libideviceactivation A library to handle the activation process of iOS devices
libusbmuxd A client library to multiplex connections from and to iOS devices
Repo link – https://github.com/libimobiledevice
idb – iOS Development Bridge
The “iOS Development Bridge” or idb, is a command line interface for automating iOS Simulators and Devices by Facebook.
idb is made up of 2 major components, each of which needs to be installed separately.
idb companion
Each target (simulator/device) will have a companion process attached allowing idb to communicate remotely.
The idb companion can be installed via brew or built from source
brew tap facebook/fb
brew install idb-companion
Note: Instructions on how to install brew can be found here
idb client
A cli tool and python client is provided to interact with idb.
It can be installed via pip:
pip3.6 install fb-idb
Repo Link – https://github.com/facebook/idb
