deploying app separately from data on iPad

Question

I'm working on an iPad app which is deployed manually from iTunes. The app requires a large amount of data (videos). The data is static, the app is being developed. It is inconvenient to deploy all the data each time the app is deployed.

What are my options to deploy the application itself separately from the data?

Answer 1

Use iOS file sharing to get the files into the Documents directory for your app. The documents directory will be preserved across upgrades as you develop the app, so you only have to copy it once.

If there's a lot of files, you can copy a zip file instead and unpack it on the first run of your app using SSZipArchive .

Another option would be to stick the data on a web server and retrieve it on the first run, again storing it in the Documents directory.

If you want to use any of these approaches in your final deployed app, be sure to make the files so that they're not backed up to iCloud.