We just had a hard drive replaced. Prior to replacing it I backed up all of Xcode’s *.xarchive files. These are the archives that you get after building and before signing for distribution.
After the new harddrive was setup I moved the archives back and re-imported them into Xcode and made a distribution .ipa from one to see if they were still working. But when I try to install the new .ipa it complains that “A signed resource has been added modified or deleted”.
(I do realize that there are many threads on the “Signed resource modified” error but in this case I’m more interested in knowing if there is a correct way to move archive files or repair them.)
the *.xarchive is not really a file, it’s a bundle folder that is displayed as a file. It contains your binary and all ressources from your application, and if one is altered it might be the problem.
because of that we zip the xarchive folders before backing them up.
also the binaries in the archive are signed and contain the provisioning profile. It’s possible to replace the profile to resign with a different key or for a different profile.