How to create IPA for Ios device without macbook or xcode

 

We are working on hybrid mobile application . Demand of hybrid mobile application is increasing as it is great alternative for the development of mobile application for their native platforms. Because creating mobile applications for all native platform is time consuming.

There are lot of platform available for hybrid mobile application but we chose Ionic for this.

Ionic is the beautiful, free and open source mobile SDK for developing native and progressive web apps with ease. When we develop mobile application it is very easy to create apk for testing and use it in any android device but it is very complicated when it comes to creating IPA for Ios device. To create an IPA for your application in iphone's or Ipad's we require xcode or macbook. But what if you don’t have a macbook or xcode available.

 

We are providing easy steps to create IPA  for Ios devices.

First thing we required is developers account at developers.apple.com so that we can create ios certificates like .mobileprovision, .pem, .p12 certificates.

To create certificates you need openssl installed in your ubuntu or windows system. I'm using ubuntu so i'll telling you according to ubuntu but it is quite similar for windows system also.

 

Using a command line window:

1. cd C:OpenSSL-Win32in (or path to where you installed SSL)

if you are a linux user then open terminal with sudo su and start from step 2

2. openssl genrsa -out ios_distribution.key 2048
3. openssl req -new -key ios_distribution.key -out CertificateSigningRequest.certSigningRequest -subj /emailAddress=YOUEMAILADDRESS, CN=YOUR NAME, C=COUNTRYCODE
4. Go to https://developer.apple.com/ios/manage/certificates/team/distribute.action218  and sign in. Go to “certificates” under iOS.
5. Under the Certificates menu on the left, click “All”, and then the “+” button aka: Add
6. Pick either a Development “iOS App Development” or a Production “App Store and Ad Hoc” certificate. Note: You will need to go through the process twice to have a development and a production version of the app.
7. Download the “Wordwide Developer Relations Certificate Authority” (AppleWWDRCA.cer) file from the same page
8. Click Continue until you get to the “Generate your certificate” screen. Upload the .certSigningRequest file you created earlier and click generate. Download the generated ios_development.cer file.
9. Create a Provisioning Profile by clicking on “All” under “Provisioning Profiles” on the left menu, and then clicking the “+” symbol, aka: add.
10. Again, you will need to create both Development and a Distribution (App Store) versions.
11. Create the Provisioning Profile for the App using the new .cer file (ios_development.cer)
12. Download the .mobileprovision file
13. In Command Prompt: openssl x509 -in ios_distribution.cer -inform DER -out ios_distribution.pem -outform PEM
14. openssl pkcs12 -export -inkey ios_distribution.key -in ios_distribution.pem -out ios_distribution.p12 -passout pass:PASSWORD
15. .key, .pem, and .p12 files will be generated

 

You will be required .p12 and .mobileprovision file.

 

1.Go to http://build.phonegap.com/ and login to it or create account.

 

 

2.  Go to https://build.phonegap.com/people/edit and click signing keys tab and click “add a key” button under Ios platform

3. Create a title for it and upload .p12 file and .mobileprovison file

4. Set this key as default and click the lock button on right side of the key generated. And enter the same password  you entered at step 14 above.

 

As we are working on Ionic2 we created a zip file of  www folder of our project  and upload it to phonegap website.

5. Go to https://build.phonegap.com/apps and upload zip file of your project

 

And its done. It will take some time and will generate Ipa of your project. But still the problem will be how you will install that ipa in your mobile device. It will not work if you try to install directly in your device.

Upload your Ipa on https://www.diawi.com/ and it wil create a link.

 

Open that link in your device. But make sure open this link in safari only. It will not work on chrome or other browsers.

When you click on that link it will give you option to install the application.

Just click install and enjoy your own created ios app.

 

Contributed by: Birbal Kumar (Software Engineer)