Sparx Systems Forum

Enterprise Architect => Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools => Topic started by: captainc on March 12, 2013, 04:55:13 am

Title: Objective-C
Post by: captainc on March 12, 2013, 04:55:13 am

Hi,

In 9.2 it was specified that EA supports debugging with GDB including Objective-C, see http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/products/ea/9.2/index.html

Does EA support reverse engineering of Objective-C code?
I am working on an iPhone and iPad App and I'd like to use EA for modelling but instead of starting from scratch I want to start with reverse engineering my current code.

Title: Re: Objective-C
Post by: qwerty on March 12, 2013, 11:02:52 am

You mean you're debugging Objective C code with EA? How do you do that? AFAIK OC only runs on a Mac. And EA is all windoze.

You're not the first to ask for OC support, but I guess they are glued to windoze. So far there was no reaction from any Sparxian.

q.

[eit] Just saw the reference to OC in the link you mentioned. That's likely an oversight from Sparx. Of course we debug OC with GDB, but in our Mac environment. Can't imagine the windozers will touch OC even with pliers.

Title: Re: Objective-C
Post by: captainc on March 14, 2013, 12:08:44 am

Yes, EA is Windows only but I run it in VMWare and CrossOver.
Using a Share to the XCode code in my Mac OS X file system is not the problem.

I use Doxygen to maintain documentation, but using EA would be better.

Title: Re: Objective-C
Post by: Eve on March 14, 2013, 10:35:43 am

Programming/debugging Objective-C on windows isn't the problem. You just can't use the Cocoa API on windows at all.

The GDB debugger help also describes how to connect to a remote computer. I don't see any reason why that couldn't be a mac (such as your vm host) that you can use the Cocoa libraries from.

Title: Re: Objective-C
Post by: qwerty on March 14, 2013, 08:32:20 pm

If you manage to get that running, let us know. However, debugging Cocoa under XCODE is not that easy since Cocoa means user interface. It makes me shudder to think of a remote debug session for a user interface (which is the main reason for debugging, more than "usual" code).

q.

Title: Re: Objective-C
Post by: qwerty on March 20, 2013, 08:55:19 am

Quote

Programming/debugging Objective-C on windows isn't the problem. You just can't use the Cocoa API on windows at all.

The GDB debugger help also describes how to connect to a remote computer. I don't see any reason why that couldn't be a mac (such as your vm host) that you can use the Cocoa libraries from.

The way you argue does not contain a statement "we will not implement it". Now I'm using OC a bit more for my personal projects. Indeed it would be nice to have an OC importer. Is there anything in the pipeline or should I write something for myself?

q.