Avoiding PackForXcode task and using cocoapods instead

[Stegnerd]

When you create a new kotlin kmm project as it is today, in the shared module there is a task

val packForXcode by tasks.creating(Sync::class) {
    group = "build"
    val mode = System.getenv("CONFIGURATION") ?: "DEBUG"
    val sdkName = System.getenv("SDK_NAME") ?: "iphonesimulator"
    val targetName = "ios" + if (sdkName.startsWith("iphoneos")) "Arm64" else "X64"
    val framework = kotlin.targets.getByName<KotlinNativeTarget>(targetName).binaries.getFramework(mode)
    inputs.property("mode", mode)
    dependsOn(framework.linkTask)
    val targetDir = File(buildDir, "xcode-frameworks")
    from({ framework.outputDirectory })
    into(targetDir)
}

tasks.getByName("build").dependsOn(packForXcode)

I looked high and low in this repo and its commit history and I never saw this here. I understand using the cocoapods and pod file in the ios project. I was able to generate those same files in my own project. However when I delete the generated task above I get the following error:

Task 'packForXCode' not found in project ':shared'.

I read through the docs of following: https://github.com/touchlab/KotlinCocoapods https://github.com/touchlab/KaMPKit/blob/master/docs/IOS_PROJ_INTEGRATION.md

at first I thought it was due to not using: cocoapodsext in the build file but I found a similar repo : https://github.com/joreilly/PeopleInSpace/blob/master/common/build.gradle.kts that manages to do the same logic with the native plugin. I tried looking through the gradle tasks as well and I saw no discernible difference in that regard we well.

I was wondering if you could explain how you came to implement something like this from a purely learning perspective? What were the reasons you implemented this was as opposed the generated task mentioned above?

Thanks for taking the time to read this/ answer my questions!