Xcode - Linking against ApplicationServices.framework with SDK 10.9 causes 10.7 incompatibilites

Question

I'm having trouble running a Cocoa app on 10.7 even though it seems like I'm taking the correct steps. Here's a description of what I'm doing and what seems to be wrong:

I'm building on a 10.8 machine with XCode 5.0.2 and SDK 10.9 with a deployment target of 10.7. One of my dynamic libraries uses some CoreGraphics functions, so I linked that library against ApplicationServices.framework. (From what I understand, prior to 10.8, CoreGraphics was included within ApplicationServices, so I can't link against CoreGraphics directly or I'll have problems.)

After building, my library that uses CoreGraphics has references directly to CoreGraphics.framework at /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework/Versions/A/CoreGraphics, but that path doesn't exist on 10.7. When I run the application on 10.8+, it works fine, but on 10.7, it blows up trying to load that framework that doesn't exist.

My (hacky) Solution:

After banging my head against this for a while, I decided to go nuclear and add a new Build Phase to change the CoreGraphics reference in my library to a path that is compatible with 10.7, beneath ApplicationServices.framework. My script does the following:

install_name_tool -change /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework/Versions/A/CoreGraphics /System/Library/Frameworks/ApplicationServices.framework/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework/Versions/A/CoreGraphics myLibrary.dylib

This works, but it seems like a silly hack. Has anyone else seen this?

Answer 1

You have to test it, but maybe it is enough to just link against ApplicationServices.framework.

Otherwise you should be able to get it working with weak linking: In the Link Binary with Libraries Build Phase, change the Status from Required to Optimal. More details about weak linking can be found here.