Xcode 4.3: where do xcode-select, xcodebuild, xcrun, etc, come from?

[James Berry]

On Feb 17, 2012, at 2:45 PM, James Berry wrote:

> The idea behind Xcode 4.3, as I understand it, is that it can be a first-class App Store app: it doesn't need to install anything as root, or outside of its sandbox: it uses external installers for this (witness the Command Line Tools installer, etc).
> 
> So if that is indeed the case, I have a question about some of the tools of Xcode that are installed in /usr/bin: xcodebuild, xcode-select, xcrun, etc.
> 
> My questions are these:
> 
> 	(1) Do these tools exist on a machine if Xcode has never been installed? (i.e., are they part of the core os?)
> 
> 	(2) Are these tools installed when Xcode 4.3 is first run? (or at some later time?)
> 
> 	(3) Are these tools installed only when the Command Line Tools installer is run?
> 
> I don't have a virgin machine to use to get to the bottom of that, but if anybody can help with answers it would be useful…

As a partial answer to my own question, it appears that these files are installed at least as part of the 10.7.3 update:

pkgutil --file-info /usr/bin/xcodebuild

shows that Xcode build was in the com.apple.pkg.update.os.10.7.3.11D50b.combo update, along with some other packages, such as com.apple.pkg.InstrumentsSystemSupport. (xcrun and xcode-select are in those packages too). So my early conclusion is that Apple saw Xcode 4.3 coming, and snuck these tools into the 10.7.3 update; this may be an oversimplification.


> James