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Ship an iPhone build from your phone

You can ask Coder, from your phone, to build an iPhone app on your Mac and upload it to TestFlight. Then you install the new build on the same phone. This is how we ship OpenAgents for iPhone: build 44 was made and uploaded from the phone. It works for your own app too, if its repository has a release script and says how to use it.

What you need on the Mac

  • OpenAgents for Mac, with your phone connected, the app's repository picked as the project, and Let my phone start Coder here on.
  • A coding agent signed in. See Coding agents.
  • Xcode, with your Apple Distribution signing identity in the login keychain and the App Store profile installed.
  • An App Store Connect API key in a file on the Mac. The OpenAgents repository reads it from ~/work/.secrets/appstoreconnect.env by default (ASC_API_KEY_ID, ASC_API_ISSUER_ID, ASC_API_PRIVATE_KEY_PATH).
  • Coder's default full access (coder.access set to full), so the build can use the keychain and Xcode.

Tell Coder how to ship

Coder's agents read the repository's AGENTS.md. Say there how a release works. The OpenAgents repository says, in short:

  1. Raise the build number in bins/openagents-ios/host/project.yml.
  2. Add that build's entry at the top of the app's changelog.
  3. Commit and push to main.
  4. Run scripts/release/testflight.sh start, then run scripts/release/testflight.sh wait again and again until it says it's done or failed. Each wait returns within a few minutes, so no single command runs too long.
  5. Report the build number and the script's last line.

The script refuses a checkout with uncommitted changes and a build number App Store Connect already has. --validate-only does a dry run: it builds and validates the app without uploading.

Ship

  1. On your phone, open a chat and say what to ship: "Ship build 45 to TestFlight with the new chat menu in the changelog."
  2. Coder starts on the Mac. Follow its steps in the chat; a release takes 15 to 25 minutes.
  3. When Coder reports the build is in TestFlight, open TestFlight on the phone and install it.
  4. In the app, Account → Changelog shows the new build first.

If something fails, Coder reports the script's last line. Ask it to fix the cause and try again in the same chat.

Next: Connect a computer.