Issue with cocoa pods on MacBook Air M1 chip, Big Sur OS v11.6.1

Question

I'm an app developer, and I have been having a hell of a time trying to get set up on my new Mac. I'm working on an app that has dependencies that require cocoa pods, but I keep getting Error running pod install errors when launching it for testing (I'm using VS Code and developing using Flutter).

Here's my main error from the app dev IDE:

Error output from CocoaPods:
↳
    /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/rubygems/core
_ext/kernel_require.rb:54:in `require': dlopen(/Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/
ffi-1.15.4/lib/ffi_c.bundle, 9): no suitable image found.  Did find: (LoadError)

so I tried installing cocoapods and fii from the terminal (I believe I have cocoapods itself installed, but cannot run pod install when building the app so idk). Here's a list of all the terminal commands I've tried:

sudo arch -x86_64 gem install ffi result: failure

arch -x86_64 pod install result: failure

sudo arch -x86_64 gem install ffi result: failure

arch -x86_64 pod install result: failure

Attempted to update command line tools with:

sudo rm -rf /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools
xcode-select --install

And then trying: sudo gem install ffi -v '1.9.18' -- --with-cflags="-Wno-error=implicit-function-declaration"

result: failure.

Here's the error I always get:

Building native extensions. This could take a while...
ERROR:  Error installing ffi:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

    current directory: /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.15.4/ext/ffi_c
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/bin/ruby -I /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0 -r ./siteconf20211114-28167-11dg101.rb extconf.rb
checking for ffi.h... *** extconf.rb failed ***
Could not create Makefile due to some reason, probably lack of necessary
libraries and/or headers.  Check the mkmf.log file for more details.  You may
need configuration options.

Provided configuration options:
    --with-opt-dir
    --without-opt-dir
    --with-opt-include
    --without-opt-include=${opt-dir}/include
    --with-opt-lib
    --without-opt-lib=${opt-dir}/lib
    --with-make-prog
    --without-make-prog
    --srcdir=.
    --curdir
    --ruby=/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/bin/$(RUBY_BASE_NAME)
    --with-ffi_c-dir
    --without-ffi_c-dir
    --with-ffi_c-include
    --without-ffi_c-include=${ffi_c-dir}/include
    --with-ffi_c-lib
    --without-ffi_c-lib=${ffi_c-dir}/lib
    --enable-system-libffi
    --disable-system-libffi
    --with-libffi-config
    --without-libffi-config
    --with-pkg-config
    --without-pkg-config
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:467:in `try_do': The compiler failed to generate an executable file. (RuntimeError)
You have to install development tools first.
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:585:in `block in try_compile'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:534:in `with_werror'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:585:in `try_compile'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:1109:in `block in have_header'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:959:in `block in checking_for'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:361:in `block (2 levels) in postpone'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:331:in `open'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:361:in `block in postpone'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:331:in `open'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:357:in `postpone'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:958:in `checking_for'
    from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/mkmf.rb:1108:in `have_header'
    from extconf.rb:10:in `system_libffi_usable?'
    from extconf.rb:42:in `<main>'

To see why this extension failed to compile, please check the mkmf.log which can be found here:

  /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/extensions/universal-darwin-20/2.6.0/ffi-1.15.4/mkmf.log

extconf failed, exit code 1

Gem files will remain installed in /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/gems/ffi-1.15.4 for inspection.
Results logged to /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.6.0/extensions/universal-darwin-20/2.6.0/ffi-1.15.4/gem_make.out

I've tried everything in this issue to no avail, and this one as well. Nothing but failure each time I try something.

Is anyone out there having the same issue I am? No clue how to fix this and I've been wracking my brain for the last 2 days on it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

So I finally found a fix. Apparently the Ruby that comes natively with Apple M1 is good for scripting, but not so much for development.

The fix is to first install HomeBrew, and then run a normal pod install from there.