Build an iOS app without owning a mac? [closed]

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On Windows, you can use Mac on a virtual machine (this probably also works on Linux but I haven’t tested). A virtual machine is basically a program that you run on your computer that allows you to run one OS in a window inside another one. Make sure you have at least 60GB free space on your hard drive. The virtual hard drive that you will download takes up 10GB initially but when you’ve installed all the necessary programs for developing iOS apps its size can easily increase to 50GB (I recommend leaving a few GBs margin just in case).

Here are some detailed steps for how install a Mac virtual machine on Windows:

  1. Install VirtualBox.

  2. You have to enable virtualization in the BIOS. To open the BIOS on Windows 10, you need to start by holding down the Shift key while pressing the Restart button in the start menu. Then you will get a blue screen with some options. Choose “Troubleshoot”, then “Advanced options”, then “UEFI Firmware Settings”, then “Restart”. Then your computer will restart and open the BIOS directly. On older versions of Windows, shut down the computer normally, hold the F2 key down, start your computer again and don’t release F2 until you’re in the BIOS. On some computers you may have to hold down another key than F2.

  3. Now that you’re in the BIOS, you need to enable virtualization. Which setting you’re supposed to change depends on which computer you’re using. This may vary even between two computers with the same version of Windows. On my computer, you need to set Intel Virtual Technology in the Configuration tab to Enabled. On other computers it may be in for example Security -> Virtualization or in Advanced -> CPU Setup. If you can’t find any of these options, search Google for enable virtualization (the kind of computer you have). Don’t change anything in the BIOS just like that at random because otherwise it could cause problems on your computer. When you’ve enabled virtualization, save the changes and exit the BIOS. This is usually done in the Exit tab.

  4. Download this file (I have no association with the person who uploaded it, but I’ve used it myself so I’m sure there are no viruses). If the link gets broken, post a comment to let me know and I will try to upload the file somewhere else. The password to open the 7Z file is stackoverflow.com. This 7Z file contains a VMDK file which will act as the hard drive for the Mac virtual machine. Extract that VMDK file. If disk space is an issue for you, once you’ve extracted the VMDK file, you can delete the 7Z file and therefore save 7GB.

  5. Open VirtualBox that you installed in step 1. In the toolbar, press the New button. Then choose a name for your virtual machine (the name is unimportant, I called it “Mac”). In “Type”, select “Mac OS X” and in “Version” select “macOS 10.13 High Sierra (64 bit)” (the Mac version you will install on the virtual machine is actually Catalina, but VirtualBox doesn’t have that option yet and it works just fine if VirtualBox thinks it’s High Sierra).

    It’s also a good idea (though not required) to move the VMDK file you extracted in step 4 to the folder listed under “Machine Folder” (in the screenshot above that would be C:\Users\myname\VirtualBox VMs).

  6. Select the amount of memory that your virtual machine can use. Try to balance the amount because too little memory will result in the virtual machine having low performance and a too much memory will result making your host system (Windows) run out of memory which will cause the virtual machine and/or other programs that you’re running on Windows to crash. On a computer with 4GB available memory, 2GB was a good amount. Don’t worry if you select a bad amount, you will be able to change it whenever you want (except when the virtual machine is running).

  7. In the Hard disk step, choose “Use an existing virtual hard disk file” and click on the little folder icon to the right of the drop list. That will open a new window. In that new window, click on the “Add” button on the top left, which will open a browse window. Select the VMDK file that you downloaded and extracted in step 4, then click “Choose”.


    When you’re done with this, click “Create”.

  8. Select the virtual machine in the list on the left of the window and click on the Settings button in the toolbar. In System -> Processor, select 2 CPUs; and in Network -> Attached to, select Bridged Adapter. If you realize later that you selected an amount of memory in step 6 that causes problems, you can change it in System -> Motherboard. When you’re done changing the settings, click OK.

  9. Open the command prompt (C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe). Run the following commands in there, replacing "Your VM Name" with whatever you called your virtual machine in step 5 (for example "Mac") (keep the quotation marks):

    cd "C:\Program Files\Oracle\VirtualBox\"
VBoxManage.exe modifyvm "Your VM Name" --cpuidset 00000001 000106e5 00100800 0098e3fd bfebfbff
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/efi/0/Config/DmiSystemProduct" "iMac11,3"
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/efi/0/Config/DmiSystemVersion" "1.0"
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/efi/0/Config/DmiBoardProduct" "Iloveapple"
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/smc/0/Config/DeviceKey" "ourhardworkbythesewordsguardedpleasedontsteal(c)AppleComputerInc"
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/smc/0/Config/GetKeyFromRealSMC" 1
VBoxManage setextradata "Your VM Name" "VBoxInternal/Devices/efi/0/Config/DmiSystemSerial" C02L280HFMR7

  10. Now everything is ready for you to use the virtual machine. In VirtualBox, click on the Start button and follow the installation instructions for Mac. Once you’ve installed Mac on the virtual machine, you can develop your iOS app just like if you had a real Mac.

Remark: If you want to save space on your hard disk, you can compress the VMDK file that you extracted in step 4 and used in step 7. To do this, right click on it, select Properties, click on the Advanced… button on the bottom right, and check the checkbox “Compress contents to save disk space”. This will make this very large file take less disk space without making anything work less well. I did it and it reduced the disk size of the VMDK file from 50GB to 40GB without losing any data.

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