The type qualifier IBOutlet is a tag applied to an instance-variable declaration so that the Interface Builder application can recognize the instance variable as an outlet and synchronize the display and connection of it with Xcode.
The code generator Accessorizer has an option to assign IBOutlets rather than retaining them. For example, compare these two generated …
objective-c iboutletIs it possible to to hard code the IBActions and IBOutlets in code, instead of drag-connecting them in Interface Builder?
objective-c cocoa-touch ibaction iboutlet