title: Workflow to create Xcode groups as file system folders
body: <p>I like organizing my classes into groups, in the Xcode 4 project navigator pane. I also use GIT versioning via the terminal, which works better for me than the Xcode 4 integration. To me it makes the most sense when the groups I create in Xcode correspond to real folders on my file system. </p>
  
  <p>However, Xcode seems to not care about where a file (e.g. Objective-C .h/.m file) is on the filesystem, and every time you add a group (<code>Option+Command+N</code>) it's purely cosmetic, for any files you put in there will share the same location on your hard drive as the rest.</p>
  
  <p>The weird thing is, that if you first create a folder on your hard drive, and then drag it to Xcode, you have created a group with its own location on your file system. Every file you create in there will be created in the folder on disk. I love that, but I'd love it even more if Xcode would do that for me at <code>Option+Command+N</code>. The workflow of switching to Finder for every group you want to create and then dragging it back to the right place in your project navigator is just plain silly.</p>
  
  <p>It feels like something a setting would fix, but I can't find it! Is there a better way?</p>
  
  <p><strong>Update:</strong> When dragging a folder to Xcode, you'll get a dialog window where you can choose "Folder Reference". That looks promising, however my Xcode 4 doesn't accept the files in there as classes and keeps telling me it can't find any files. Maybe the answer lies here somewhere, but I still can't find it.</p>
  
  <p><strong>Another update:</strong> I've changed my main editor environment from Xcode to AppCode. The latter supports actually creating folders to back the project groups, while maintaining 100% compatibility with Xcode. Those AppCode guys sure know what they're doing.</p>