iPhone Documentation Access

During development, you may need fast access to reference for a particular symbol or high-level documentation about API usage or an iPhone OS technology. Xcode gives you easy access to such resources through the Research Assistant and the Documentation window.

The Research Assistant is a lightweight window that provides a condensed view of the API reference for the selected item, without taking your focus away from the editor in which the item is located. This window provides an unobtrusive way to consult API reference. However, when you need to dig deeper into the reference, the Documentation window is just a click away.

The Documentation window lets you browse and search the developer documentation installed on your computer. It provides access to a wider and more detailed view of the documentation than the Research Assistant, for the times when you need additional help.

To display the API reference for a symbol in a source file, you select the symbol in the text editor and choose Help > Find Selected Text in API Reference.

This command searches for the selected symbol in the API reference for your project’s SDK and displays it in the Documentation window. For example, if you select the UIFont class name in a source file and execute the Find Selected Text in API Reference command, Xcode opens the Documentation window and displays the API reference for the UIFont class.

While the Documentation window is a great tool to browse the iPhone documentation library, sometimes you may not want to take your focus away from the text editor while you write code, but need basic information about a symbol in a condensed way. The Research Assistant provides such information in a small and unobtrusive window.

The Research Assistant actively follows you as you move the cursor around a source file. When it recognizes a symbol for which it finds API reference, the Research Assistant displays that reference all you have to do is glance at the Research Assistant to get essential details about the symbol.

To display the Research Assistant, choose Help > Show Research Assistant.

From the Research Assistant you can quickly jump to more comprehensive reference for the symbol, or even view the header that declares it.