13. Accessing Directories and Files

If you’re using AppKit, you have two options for most filesystem-related tasks. The NSFileManager class, from the Foundation framework, provides a lot of low-level methods for manipulating files and directories. The NSWorkspace class from the Application Kit provides more abstract forms.

A number of the functions of NSWorkspace are delegated to the workspace process. On old NeXT systems, this was a single program, whereas on OS X, various bits of its functionality are implemented by the window server and the Finder.