The free web-based tool offers a breakdown of what parts of your app are compatible with the bridge. It gives developers a good estimate of how much work would be required to turn an iOS into a UWP app.
As noted by Microsoft in an blog post, “The App Analysis tool will examine your project and cross reference the frameworks and classes used with the ones currently supported by the bridge, and return the results right in your browser. The tool will also identify third-party libraries and SDK packages used in your project and let you know if they – or equivalent libraries – are available on Windows 10.”
To use App Analysis tool, export an unencrypted IPA from Xcode:
- In Xcode, choose a generic iOS device or a connected device from the Scheme toolbar menu. You can’t create an IPA from a simulator build.
- Choose Product > Archive.
- In the Archives Organizer, select the archive and click Export.
- Select Save for Development Deployment and click Next. The resultant IPA will be code signed with your development certificate.
- Follow the Xcode prompts until you come to another Export button. Click Export.
- Finder will now open a folder containing your app IPA.
When the analysis is complete, the tool gives a breakdown of all of the frameworks and middleware used in your app and their corresponding statuses in the iOS. It also provides actionable feedback for unsupported items where possible.
Until now, finding out if your app was a good match for the bridge was a multi-step process. It included downloading the SDK from GitHub, setting up Windows 10 and Visual Studio 2015, generating a Visual Studio project for your iOS app, and finally running your code. App Analysis tool makes all of it easy.
The app analysis tool comes a few months after Microsoft said it was ending development of the Windows Bridge for Android. In April, the company also released a preview of the Desktop App Converter for bringing Win32 apps to the Windows Store.
If you’re working on a PC, get Windows Bridge for iOS from GitHub and start analyzing your app here.
