How to run xcode from terminal?

Question

My question is very simple: suppose there is an xcode project a.xcodeproj, could I open it with the command: xcode a.xcodeproj?

If I try this, I receiv

Answer 1

incase, if you want to open a Xcode project from a workspace use the following command line.

user$ open -a xcode ProjectName.xcworkspace/

Answer 2

I just type open *xcw*. This command looks up a workspace in the current directory and then opens is with Xcode.

Answer 3

Following command should do it:

open a.xcodeproj

Answer 4

Can't remember where I came across this script, but I use this ruby script for finding either a *.xcodeproj or *.xcworkspace file in the working directory and opening that file (without Xcode opening any previous projects)

#!/usr/bin/env ruby

# Open xcode without any previous projects being opened as well.
# We first look for a workspace, then a project in the current directory, opening the first that is found.

f = []
f.concat Dir["*.xcworkspace"]
f.concat Dir["*.xcodeproj"]

if f.length > 0
  puts "opening #{f.first}"
  `open -a /Applications/Xcode.app #{f.first} --args -ApplePersistenceIgnoreState YES`
  exit 0
end

puts "No Xcode projects found"
exit 1

Answer 5

You could also simply run xed . in the project's root directory, apparently it will try to load a project in a hierarchical manner, i.e. the first that exists:

1. the folder, if it's a Package (Xcode 11+)
2. xcworkspace
3. xcodeproj
4. playground

which means you don't need to verify yourself the existing file structure in order to choose the best one to open.

Answer 6

Xcode should be the default application for .xcodeproj files, so this should work:

$ open a.xcodeproj

If that opens a different application, you can force it to use xcode:

$ open -a Xcode a.xcodeproj

If you want the command xcode to work, you can just alias it:

$ alias xcode="open -a Xcode"

then you can just xcode a.xcodeproj (and add this to ~/.bash_profile)