NS is the prefix for Cocoa classes on OS X. It dates back to NextStep. NSFooView is a stand-in for various subclasses of NSView that are the basic UI componen

NS is the prefix for Cocoa classes on OS X. It dates back to NextStep. NSFooView is a stand-in for various subclasses of NSView that are the basic UI components in Cocoa. If you open an OS X nib (see below) in Xcode and select "Data Views" or "Layout Views" you'll have a choice of NSView subclasses to add to your UI: NSTableView, NSOutlineView, NSSplitView, and so on. Custom UI components usually subclass NSView. A nib is a file created by Interface Builder that contains serialized objects that can be reconstituted at runtime. An xib is an XML file that compiles to a nib. An xib is somewhat human-readable and (if you keep the target platform exactly the same) can be somewhat usefully diffed as you modify the interface. I'd like to explain more, but my lack of understanding of the precise nature and use of nibs is part of what makes me a noob.