Xcode: What is a target and scheme in plain language?

Question

Yeah the title says it :-) What do they mean in plain English language? I really don't understand the explanation on Apple's website and I need to rename my target and I'm afraid that nothing works after that..

Answer 1

I've added in Workspace and Project too!

• Workspace - Contains one or more projects. These projects usually relate to one another
• Project - Contains code and resources, etc. (You'll be used to these!)
• Target - Each project has one or more targets.
  • Each target defines a list of build settings for that project
  • Each target also defines a list of classes, resources, custom scripts etc to include/ use when building.
  • Targets are usually used for different distributions of the same project.
    • For example, my project has two targets, a "normal" build and an "office" build that has extra testing features and may contain several background music tracks and a button to change the track (as it currently does).
    • You'll be used to adding classes and resources to your default target as you add them.
    • You can pick and choose which classes / resources are added to which target.
      • In my example, I have a "DebugHandler" class that is added to my office build
    • If you add tests, this also adds a new target.
• Scheme - A scheme defines what happens when you press "Build", "Test", "Profile", etc.
  • Usually, each target has at least one scheme
  • You can autocreate schemes for your targets by going to Scheme > Manage Schemes and pressing "Autocreate Schemes Now"