iPhone Dev 101: Introduction

@Mike

Wow... Could you perhaps be any more arrogant?

If you're reading this post, ignore his comments. If you've never written a line of code in your life, Objective-c will seem a bit overwhelming. If you have a programming past, you'll find many common threads that are similar across programming languages, but still be faced with the challenge of putting all the pieces together.

I look at it like learning a foreign language... There are similarities in your native language as with a foreign one, but that doesn't mean you're going to pick it up immediately. Typically only after classes, books, or time in country will you fully grasp the language.

Don't let jerks like Mike get you down!

There's an iPhone developer conference in March in San Jose CA, that might also be a good place to start. I'm schilling for it, it's my conference :) but we're aiming to have some good hands on training. Worth seeing if it's a fit for you.

www.360idev.com

To - Oliver Heart

The iPhone SDK actually requires an Intel-based Mac running Mac OS X Leopard, but yes that should have been mentioned above.

Programming in C, C++, Objective C, etc., all are setup like some Rube Goldberg device which a lot of unnecessary complexity.

It's ridiculous that a lot more stream lined method for creating complex programs hasn't been developed yet. Heck, you can't even create an easy iPhone app without spending 90% of your time doing things have nothing to do with the actual code of what you want the program to do.

Visual Studio isn't it either.

Programming today is stuck in what I call the pre-Model T stage.

Programming is like having to set the magneto, set the advance, set the choke, then crank start the car. Nobody average person in the 1930s, let alone today, would stand for that for a normal car that has to get them around town.

Yet we still put up with this today with programming. I know it won't be easy. It's as big and as hard as writing an operating system. We need someone to stand up to do this and create a revolution in programming. We need compilers that figure out the redundant boring parts of programming.

There is a reason why we don't program in assembler anymore. Besides not being able to run on different kinds of CPUs, it was too hard to modify code.

It's time to take the next step. I just wish I was up to the task to start and lead it. I'm not. Someone else is. I just don't know who.

Thanks for the post, I'm looking forward to the continuing series.

If you could add a quick note to just explain how to make a web app or web page install as an iPhone application, that would be a great start for a lot of people! (Although I am sure Apple has some example apps, it would be great to read a quick overview without having to install all of the tools first).

I just wrote an article dealing with how I wrote my first iPhone app:

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/30712/87/

A few notes here:

1) I feel it's a necessity to constantly test your app on the actual device, as the Simulator can be misleading. For example, I'm working on an app that has to handle large amounts of XML data. In the simulator, it processes super fast, however on the iPhone it was painfully slow. It's important differences like that which cannot be allowed to go overlooked.

2) If you've never written a line of code before, iPhone programming is not the place to start. It's tempting because of how intriguing it is, but the reality of it is that it's not an easy language to pick up. I've been programming PHP and JS for 5 years now, and it took me a solid 3-4 months on my own to get objective-c down. I'm not saying it's impossible, however you're throwing yourself into the lion's den.

I don't mean to sound negative, rather quite the contrary... It's good to be excited about wanting to learn, however you also have to go about it in the right way, else you'll find yourself frustrated and giving up!

http://www.mndcreative.com

You should add that the iPhone emulator is only available to machines running leopard. No help for us tiger folk.

There are some great iPhone programming books just out, here are the best:

http://www.markj.net/iphone-development-programming-books/

Mark

Hey, For all those people asking "I've never programmed, is it easy?" etc.
Well here's the answer: Objective-C is based off of C, so for instance I knew C++ when I started Obj-C, and all the logic type stuff is the same (methods, basically everything to do with OOP)
I believe you need that groundwork before learning Obj-C because it's a little harder, even the fact that it has interface builder and all that. The best way to learn is to get the basics in C (for a month or whatever) in an IDE that is really simple, and just programming text based programs (which will help you learn how more complex programs work) Then slowly ease into Obj-C. Hope that Helps!
-Max Tkacz, Head of Programming, Polyhedron Group.