I believe i can learn thing or two if i can see the implementation files (.m files). Is there any way the i can view NSString.m or NSNumber.m files? and others? If i try to find these files using spotlight, i get nothing.
+1
A:
I would guess they are already compiled into libraries.
I just did a quick check on my mac and could not find a NSString.m file as well. Are you utilizing Xcode's documentation? I find it has most everything I need.
J.J.
2009-01-07 06:12:47
+5
A:
No, most (all?) of the Cocoa library implementations are only distributed in a compiled binary form. You could disassemble them, but that's probably against the Mac OS X EULA, and it also wouldn't help you understand them at all.
You could take a look at Cocotron, which is an open-source implementation of Cocoa. It won't be exactly the same, but at least for the core classes, it will be virtually identical.
Adam Rosenfield
2009-01-07 06:16:52
+1
A:
Also worth looking at the mySTEP sources.
This helped me when doing something that subclassed NSMatrix some time ago.
Matthew Schinckel
2009-01-07 07:38:01
+5
A:
Many of the basic cocoa classes, like NSString and NSNumber, are implemented in core foundation and "toll-free bridged" to objective-c classes. Core foundation is a C (not ObjC) API and the source is available as part of the Darwin open-source project.
So, to see how NSString or NSNumber is implemented under the hood, follow the link above and take a look at CFString and CFNumber, respectively (you'll need an Apple developer account, but registration is free).
dvenema
2009-01-07 08:08:22