Insert Subversion revision number in Xcode

There's a much simpler solution: using PlistBuddy, included at /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy in Leopard. See my answer to a related SO question for details.

PlistBuddy can be used in a Run Script build phase from within Xcode, and can be used to only affect the processed plist file. Just put it after the Copy Resources phase, and you don't even have to clean the target for it to run each time. You don't even have to print the value to a header file and make SVN ignore it, either.

echo -n ${TARGET_BUILD_DIR}/${INFOPLIST_PATH} \    | xargs -0 /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Set :CFBundleVersion `svnversion -n`"

Assuming you add the build phase before code signing occurs, your plist should be signed with the substituted value.

For posterity, I did something similar to zoul for iPhone applications, by adding a revision.h to my project, then adding the following as a Run Script build phase:

REV=`/usr/bin/svnversion -nc ${PROJECT_DIR} | /usr/bin/sed -e 's/^[^:]*://;s/[A-Za-z]//'`echo "#define kRevisionNumber @\"$REV\"" > ${PROJECT_DIR}/revision.h

I did this to grab a simple revision number, as opposed to the more detailed string that svnversion produces in zoul's solution.

For Mac applications, I based my approach on this post, and instead created a buildnumber.xcconfig file. Under the build settings for the target, I changed the Based On value in the lower-right-hand corner of the dialog to buildnumber.xcconfig. Within the Info.plist, I edited the following lines:

<key>CFBundleVersion</key><string>${BUILD_NUMBER}</string><key>CFBundleShortVersionString</key><string>Version 1.0</string>

So that my About dialog would display a version string similar to Version 1.0 (1234), where 1234 is the Subversion revision number. Finally, I created a Run Script build phase with the following code:

REV=`/usr/bin/svnversion -nc ${PROJECT_DIR} | /usr/bin/sed -e 's/^[^:]*://;s/[A-Za-z]//'`echo "BUILD_NUMBER = $REV" > ${PROJECT_DIR}/buildnumber.xcconfig

This may not be the cleanest way, as it requires a clean cycle before building for the new revision to take hold in the application, but it works.

As a new user to Stack Overflow, I can't comment on Quinn's post, but I have a small change to make his solution a bit more accurate if you're using a SVN repository that has multiple projects going on at once.

Using his approach, the svnversion number that is returned is the last check-in for the entire repository, not necessarily your code base. This tweak allows for the update to be specific to your code base.

REV=`svnversion -nc | /usr/bin/sed -e 's/^[^:]*://;s/[A-Za-z]//'`/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Set :CFBundleVersion $REV" "${TARGET_BUILD_DIR}"/${INFOPLIST_PATH}

Using the -c flag will gather the last commit done in the active branch/tag/trunk for your codebase in the form of :, then chop off the bits you don't want to store as the Revision number.

Also, notice the double quotes around the ${TARGET_BUILD_DIR}. Those are needed for users that decide to place their project in a directory structure with spaces in the name.

Hope this helps others!