I’m developing ios B2B app and I have several questions regarding app modularization.
Firstly i need to understand main difference between bundles and frameworks. When to use bundles and when frameworks.
Another question is. Is it possible for bundle to contain a .framework inside in it and vice versa.
Is it possible to create a plugins for ios app and load them dynamically, if yes then what it should be? bundle framework or library?
Is it possible for library to contain a resource files ?
Is it possible to create a resource bundle and dynamic library and then load them dynamically at runtime.
No
No
No
A Bundle is a type of Directory, a folder. A Framework is a bundle. So is an Application and so is a Plugin.
A Static Library is a single file code archive you can compile into your app at build time
The Xcode build option ‘Bundle’ means ‘Place the compiled Dynamic Library in a Bundle’ – this is what you do when you want to create a Plugin.
Static libraries are the only option for modularising your code on iOS.
On the desktop..
Typically a Framework is for sharing code and resources between multiple apps. You want your app to behave as though the code was actually compiled into it. You want loading to happen transparently and you don’t want to do anything special to use the methods, functions, etc. contained in it.
A Plugin (a Bundle containing compiled code and resources) is for optional, dynamically loaded code, e.g. a software extension that you can choose to load or not. You want to carefully architect your app so that it isn’t dependent on the Plugin but acquires new behaviour if you manually locate and load it at Runtime.
A Framework and a Plugin are very similar, but a Framework has a strict file layout to facilitate locating and loading code and resources. With a plugin, these jobs are your responsibility so you can structure the Bundle contents however you want.
Because loading code is so easy in Cocoa on OSX (but not iOS) Frameworks can contain Plugins which contain Frameworks which contain more Frameworks, etc.
On iOS some people put Static Libraries in Bundles with resources and call them Frameworks. This has none of the benefits and all of the drawbacks of a real framework.