C++ Compiler & XCode :: Something is going wrong

You are telling the compiler whether you want to build in debug or release configuration, as well as the architecture. You can access a lot more settings by selecting your target on the left and clicking "info". For example, you can set it to only build the active architecture or you can build a universal binary with 2 or more architectures.

 

I don't know the best place to point you in terms of documentation of these things. I can't tell you where I learned about debug symbols, etc. specifically... probably around the first time someone showed me a debugger as an alternative to endless print statements in a program, and how to compile with debugging symbols. Basically a debug build is one that you, and perhaps a limited audience of testers, will use while you are developing the application. It builds your program in a way that makes it easier to track down problems. Some if this is the specific file and line number associated with a particular instruction. Generally this extra information is not needed or desired when deploying the application to an end user, so you will switch to a release build which will omit these extra symbols and information, resulting in a smaller and at times faster (if you use debugging macros, etc.) application.

As for architecture... I probably learned that in-depth in a university course. I may have known about it tangentially before that in regards to there being SPARC machines, PowerPC machines, etc. along with x86 machines, but I probably really didn't know the nuts and bolts until the course I took. There are about 4 architectures that I am aware of in-play in Apple's wheelhouse right now, PPC, ARM, x86, and x86_64. With all of these available, you have to be able to build binaries that target one or many of these. Apple allows for creation of "Universal Binaries" that contain the executable code for multiple architectures along with other resources in a single application package. This way a user doesn't need to be concerned with getting the right version for their machine. There's also Rosetta, a technology apple licensed to allow for fast(ish) execution of PPC code on Intel machines. What the message is telling you is that you have an x86 machine, and the debugger in-use in XCode is not capable of debugging PPC code on an x86 machine.

-Lee

 

What you should do is describe precisely what immediate goal you want to achieve. We may be able to provide step-by-step instructions for that specific goal.

Otherwise you seem to be asking for an impromptu yet thorough tutorial on all aspects of software development using Xcode, including such principles as CPU architecture and Xcode build configurations, as a series of questions provided by you and answers provided by others. That approach is completely impractical.


The Xcode reference guides will tell you about Xcode build configurations. They are accessible under Xcode's Help menu. If those are too complex, then you should at least start with the Xcode tutorial.
http://developer.apple.com/mac/libr..._Tour_of_Xcode/000-Introduction/qt_intro.html

You can find more links with these google search terms:
xcode tutorial site:developer.apple.com


If you intend to learn programming, there are any number of books that would work, although doing it in Fortran is going to be a significant limiting factor. If you don't intend to learn programming, then you should hire someone who can do it for you.