Take the 2-minute tour ×

I've been interested in iPhone development since the release of the iPhone, however, I am on a limited personal budget. I've never been willing/able to fork out the money necessary for an iPhone and a Macbook. I know, some may argue that it's not that expensive, but for a hobby it hasn't been worth the price.

By some twist of amazing fortune, the company that I work for is wanting me to develop an iPhone and iPod app. This means I am getting pretty much all the hardware you would want to develop on-- an awesome Macbook, Thunderbolt display, an iPhone, an iPad, a few accessories. In short, it's basically my "wish list" that I have dreamt of one day owning.

In my free time, I will be allowed to use the hardware to develop whatever software I desire but since my development laptop will primarily be used for my employing companies project I need assurance that any work I do under my own developer license will not affect my developer license associated with my work account.

Can I easily switch between two developer accounts when developing and publishing applications? What if one account is a standard one and the other is an enterprise?

As of yet, I don't have any hardware or any developer licenses and I'm asking in complete ignorance. Can I do this or will the accounts collide?


Thanks to mouviciel for promptly answering this question with a straight-forward response. However, I've been working with with XCode for quite a while and I've also had experience with downloading sample projects and modify them so that I can run them on my iOS device.

This lends me to believe that answering my initial question might involve tweaking PList files and other project settings, but should still be doable without having to create a separate account on my Macbook.

So I ask again, can I easily switch between two developer accounts when developing and publishing applications, strictly using one account on my Macbook?

If the answer is, yes, (which is what I assume is the case) how must I redefine my personal projects which may initially inherit user setting associated with my business account and credentials?

share|improve this question
add comment

1 Answer

up vote 4 down vote accepted

The simplest way is to get two user accounts on the Macbook and switch between user sessions whenever you want to switch between work project and hobby project.

share|improve this answer
Will I need to install XCode under each user account instance on the machine? –  RLH Aug 31 '11 at 14:56
No, Xcode is installed once for all users of the laptop. But each user has its own settings, just like iTunes or MS Word. –  mouviciel Aug 31 '11 at 15:02
Great. Thank you! –  RLH Aug 31 '11 at 15:05
mouviciel: I appreciate the answer you had originally given, however, after using XCode (but not yet having published anything to the iTunes store) I've begun to wonder if this could be simplified. I'm asking for second opinions or, in your case, additional information involving not having to create another OS X account. Just wanted to let you know since you were the provider of the first answer. Update your answer accordingly and I'll return your check. –  RLH May 14 '12 at 13:23
add comment

Your Answer


