Next for me is cataract surgery sometime later this year, then new glasses. Clearly, the warranty on my body has expired 
Mine just has a big label that says
No deposit. No return.
So here are my results:
Yes, getting the picture takes a lot of time. Caching it makes it within easy striking distance of the native Xojo method.
When cached in a local picture variable and drawing the picture 100,000 times:
Xojo: 880 ticks, Norman: 931 ticks
When cached in a dictionary and drawing the picture 100,000 times:
Xojo: 883 ticks, Norman: 905 ticks (892 if the dictionary already exists)
When not cached at all (16" MBP 2.3 GHz i9, 32GB RAM), drawing just 1000 times:
Xojo: 11 ticks, Norman: 1241 ticks
So this turned out to be a great solution, thank you SO MUCH for your help!
No problem
Now the question is did it / does it help at all with the gigantic resources file(thats still puzzling and disconcerting as well)
Nope, the resources file is big because there about 10 different kinds of filetypes, and all of the icon images are fully populated, including the 1024x1024. So Iām deleting the icon images from the Xojo project and using a build step to put them into the resources folder. I have to see how that works, I may also need to manually add the filetypes info to the plist.
At least thatās the plan for now. Iām planning on using your method for all of the other images, none of which are in the resources file.
I guess Swift/Xcode does something that Xojo doesnāt even attemptā¦
I just checked on of my macOS apps that I wrote and compiled in Swift.
The 1024x1024 logo image by itself is 1.2Megā¦ however the ICN file (which contains not only the 1024x1024 image but 3 other sizes as well) is only 172k ā¦ every single graphic image in this app (and there are over 100 of them) take up a much much smaller footprint in the app bundle than they do in the āprojectā file.
Interesting. Maybe I should try making a simple Swift app just to make the ICN files.
Oh yeah if you have lots of filetypes those images are in there
That will bulk that resources file up
Its not hard to do a plist entry & add it then copy the images in a build step as well
Are you working on an M1 Mac ?
Beatrix posted some info about post bulld steps breaking the ad hoc signatures which sort of makes sense as the ad hoc sign has to happn AFTER everything else (copy steps etc etc)
Its the use of the asset catalog more than anything Iām sure
We could mess with that - but also note me other post about ad hoc signing
My partner and I are going to work through the various possibilities tomorrow night, hopefully that will produce some forward motion. Thank you!