How To Fix Fabric Crashing On Startup When Installed Via CocoaPods

TL;DR

If the version of the Fabric and Crashlytics SDK installed via CocoaPods is crashing on you throwing a SIGABRT like this:

Screenshot of the crash from within Xcode

Then chances are you forgot to add the information Fabric needs to your app's Info.plist.

Add this code to your Info.plist, clean and run again.

<key>Fabric</key>
<dict>
    <key>APIKey</key>
    <string>YOUR_API_KEY</string>
    <key>Kits</key>
    <array>
        <dict>
            <key>KitInfo</key>
            <dict/>
            <key>KitName</key>
            <string>Crashlytics</string>
        </dict>
    </array>
</dict>

The Fabric section of the Info.plist from the editor in Xcode

TS;WR

I recently spent a too long amount of time puzzled by the Fabric iOS SDK crashing at startup for no apparent reason.

The line of code crashing was taken from their setup guide, and the only Fabric related instruction I added in the project yet. The only difference between the guide and mine setup was that I used CocoaPods, which is listed as one of the supported methods of installation.

Since their SDK is closed source, who knows what kind of evil user tracking code is in there, I had no way to get more information on the crash.

The solution to my issue came from my friend and fellow developer Vlas Voloshin.

Vlas was able to look at the problem from a higher point of focus than mine, and rightly point out that Fabric and Crashlytics need an API key to work, and that I wasn't setting it anywhere in the app.

Once somebody tells you it sounds obvious doesn't it? 😳

When you setup Fabric using their annoying Mac app, the Info.plist is automatically updated with the required information. When using a less magic approach the file is not updated, so you have to do it yourself.

Many thanks to Vlas for, once again, helping me out realising the obvious.

Leave the codebase better than you found it.

mokacoding