macOS Xcode on external hard drive

[ronin510]

I would like to know if Xcode runs on an external hard drive.

I currently don't have a usable mac and won't be getting one for another several months, but my university has several Mac labs. Unfortunately, they're tied down to the point where we have very limited user access and hard drive space.

So the main points are:

- Will Xcode run on an external drive?
- Does it require administer access to certain Mac OS X system folders? (i.e. Placing files in system folders I won't have write access to)
- How big is the install? (Can I use a flash drive?)
- Anything else I'd have to worry about?

A not so important question, since I can always create partitions, but...
Can I run Mac applications on FAT32/NTFS formatted drives? I constantly jump between Windows and Mac systems for work and availability reasons.

I'd really like to get into Mac programming, even though I don't have a Mac of my own right now. Hopefully someone can point me to the right direction.

 

[kainjow]

- Will Xcode run on an external drive?

I'm not sure about this. It installs a lot of stuff, like gcc and other libraries and system tools through your system.

- Does it require administer access to certain Mac OS X system folders? (i.e. Placing files in system folders I won't have write access to)

Yes.

- How big is the install? (Can I use a flash drive?)

My /Developer folder (where it installs applications, tools, documentation, examples, etc) is over 1.6GB.

Can I run Mac applications on FAT32/NTFS formatted drives?

Fat32 yes, but NTFS can't be written to from Mac OS X, so I've never tried executing an app from it before.

 

[iBert]

So the main points are:

- Will Xcode run on an external drive?
- Does it require administer access to certain Mac OS X system folders? (i.e. Placing files in system folders I won't have write access to)
- How big is the install? (Can I use a flash drive?)
- Anything else I'd have to worry about?

1) Could be possible, don't see the problem Xcode running of an external Hard Drive.
2) Not sure what say here, I guess it's possible but you'll be finding about this if you get this idea to work. Can always use the space on the device you use to Xcode off.
3) Don't remember how big of an install Xcode is, if you got a big enough flash drive then it shouldn't be a problem. most problems will be the libraries or Frameworks as they are used/called in OS X
4) The main worry you should are the Frameworks. Not sure if running Xcode from an external HD will have access to the frameworks that easy.

A not so important question, since I can always create partitions, but...
Can I run Mac applications on FAT32/NTFS formatted drives? I constantly jump between Windows and Mac systems for work and availability reasons.

No. OS X uses a different file system, most you'll be able to do is read Fat32 external hard drives on a Mac but not the other way around. I believe!


Here's another idea, do you know if the Mac labs have Xcode installed? You can create your projects in your storage device and travel with that. But you'll need to have a Mac with Xcode installed to be able to do it. Might be more hassle probably.

 

[andy5000]

I wanted to put xcode on my usb lacie but you get the error "one or more items have special permissions and cannot be copied. Do you want to skip them?" Stop or Continue, so doesnt look like you can.

 

[ronin510]

Thanks for the replies!

The Macs don't have Xcode installed and after asking the people in charge of what software is allowed on the computers, I pretty much got the response that it's too much trouble for them to approve (paperwork?) just for one person's request.

They suggested that I just the Unix/Linux/Sun labs to work on instead.

My only option now seems to be learning Objective-C through gcc first.

Again, thanks for the feedback.

 

[kainjow]

You should be able to get a copy of GCC, put it on a thumb drive, and compile your programs directly off that. It's not Xcode, but you could still learn.

 

[scrod]

Xcode 3.0

If you can wait a few more months it may possible to do this With Xcode 3.0. That is, the developer installation will be self-contained and relocatable to any volume. However I think it still installs some (mostly non-version-specific) files into /usr, so bringing your disk into a random lab machine at school could still be an iffy proposition.