From where do I learn Interface Prototyping? - interface

I am interested in prototyping and developing gadgets and devices using arduino board and other stuffs, however I only get tutorials on arduino but not in interface prototyping. I found a book but it is in other language not in English
(link is :http://prototypinginterfaces.com/)
I also don't know the exact term to look for in Google, for tutorials. That might be the reason why I'm not getting the suitable results. Basically what I want to learn is the same as the book says.
I have no idea from where do I start, and what to look for at first. If anybody can help me, please.

from the software perspective, I'd recommend getting into Processing. It's the programming language Arduino is derived from, and with both of them, in tandem, you can code and build interactive prototypes. O'Reilly has some excelent books and video lessons to tackle those:
Learning Processing (book and website)
Getting started with Processing
Arduino and Processing in tandem, video series
With these two references, most of what the link you provided says, is covered.
From the hardware perspective, you might also enjoy the following:
Making things Move
Making thins Talk
Arduino Cookbook
Sorry for the extreme focus on one editorial house, however, they rock!. Best luck.

Related

How can I make a website that takes GPIO input and runs programs on the server?

I got a Raspberry Pi the other day and thought it would be fun to set up a web server. I was wondering how I could make a website that took input, such as button clicks, and based on that input run a specific program/script.
I'm very new when it comes to programming, what would be the best approach to learn how to create a website / server?
Andy your question is very vague so let me try to address it the best I can. You obviously seem new to this and that is great! However, questions like these are generally too broad to be answered.
First off, you seem very new to programming and if you are interested in creating a website I would recommend learning HTML. It isn't that complicated of a language and you can find tutorials on Code Academy linked here.
Second, if you are looking for help with button presses on a Raspberry Pi there are dozens of guides online such as this one to help you get on your way.
Finally, it seems you are very interested in running scripts and using a Raspberry Pi. One of the easiest languages to learn is called Python which is commonly used along side a Pi. It is a powerful language with tutorials on how to get started here on Code Academy.
What you are failing to realize is how powerful Google is, when you start programming you will realize how useful it really is. For the Raspberry Pi button push question, all you have to search is raspberry pi detect button press. The internet is your greatest resource to solving problems.
Good luck on all of your projects and don't forget that Google is your new best friend.

Has anyone had much success recently using the Cappuccino Framework?

I'm just creating my first project in Cappuccino without a lot of success. Looking for examples and documentation, there isn't a lot out there...
The differences from real Objective-C and the lack of libraries mean you cannot easily convert code directly from say a OS X desktop app. to Cappuccino.
As an experienced PHP, and RoR developer (besides the Java, VB, VC.....) I can't quite see the logic of abstracting/wrapping JavaScript in another language.
Any comments or suggestions for a more efficient framework?
If you have specific questions that can't be answered in the IRC channel (it just depends who's in there) you should post the question to the mailing list and someone will help you.
As for why you would want objective-j I'll point you to this blog post which contains several reasons why objj exists. http://cappuccino.org/discuss/2008/12/08/on-leaky-abstractions-and-objective-j/
I have converted several Objective-C classes nearly line for line into Cappuccino. Mostly it's a matter of changing NS to CP and changing pointers to non-pointers. What differences between Objective-C are you thinking about?
Indeed you could even take your existing XIB files from your Cocoa desktop app and convert them to Cappuccino using nib2cib. Here's how to work with Interface Builder using XCode 4: http://groups.google.com/group/objectivej/browse_thread/thread/786331dbcbc9c7b1.
I also recently started a project in Cappuccino and what I could say is: definitely it worth it. I'm used with javascript as well as (but less) cocoa (which helps). In short, the javascript is very fine, probably one of my favorite language because of it's flexibility. But it does lack of structure. For example there is no class in javascript and you have to trick with object inheritances, prototyping and so on. By using the Cappuccino framework at first you have all those very convenient facilities but also you do not reinvent the wheel each time. This is cross browser standardized so that you only have to focus on your code and not on the IE whims. As it is based on cocoa, cappuccino also comes with the MCV scheme in mind which again let you structure your project in an efficient way.
Ok you probably already know all this. What I could tell now about the learning curve is that I had to find the right tools to really get in. i.e.Installing cappuccino (sudo Starter/bootstrap.sh), creating a simple nib application (capp gen -t NibApplication YourApplication) then using xcodecapp-cocoa to listen, convert and open the project into Xcode what probably the hardest part of this learning curve to me…
Now if you are still not satisfied with cappuccino, I can only suggest to look at another framework like http://javascriptmvc.com/ , www.grooveshark.com used it to do their amazing webapp-site but I personally would never go back to html for building a web application. (conversely I would not use cappuccino for a webpage neither, "The cobbler should stick to his last")
I began writing cappuccino a couple of months ago and had a lot of difficulty when it came to setting up the proper development environment. I also had numerous problems writing working client server code that worked well.
I eventually broke through and started doing better with Cappuccino and then I found these video tutorials that would have helped so much earlier on. They did cost me $30 but I really wished I had watched these at the start because they help you get set up properly as a developer and get you started on the right learning curve.
I actually discovered these videos when using Cappuccinos IRC which has helped me a couple of times when I couldn't find an answer.
Info on the videos here: http://cappuccino.org/discuss/2011/10/19/cappuccino-training-course-ideveloper-tv/

Resources how to architect a iPhone application?

What resources can you recommend for learning how to architect a iPhone application?
Background of the question is that most of the resources explain the usage of a single class or concept (and i appreciate that a lot to learn something about the specific topic) but as far as i can see they lack unfortunately to describe how to put things together for typical real world applications.
This won't give you a ton of help with architecting large applications, but I found this site to be really useful for finding good examples for working with animations and all the ViewController stuff: http://appsamuck.com/
You should focus your search on best practices, as a lot of the details that go behind proper architecture are found in getting those general fundamentals right.
Otherwise, if you want to know how "typical real world applications" are designed, you should go and find some open source projects and download them. There will undoubtedly be a variation in quality but it should give you a general idea of how apps get built.
Overall I don't think you'll see a general tutorial on how to build an iPhone app because all applications are different. They solve different problems under different requirements for different kinds of users. You'll probably find that the answer to your question can only be found by trying to build something on your own.

Which technologies/concepts do you suggest I learn before creating an iPhone game?

Sorry if this is a broad question, but other than Objective-C, Cocoa, and OpenGL ES, what technologies or concepts would you suggest I read up on before writing a game for the iPhone? I'm a beginning game developer and need all the help I can get :)
MATHS - I would advise this topic
Some example areas of interest for applications in Game Development
Calculus, Geometry,The Cartesian Co-ordinate System, Vectors, Matrices, Transformations etc...
Sorry, my answer is not computing related.
A game tells a story, a great game tells a great story. So I would suggest to learn principles of storytelling.
Not going as scholar as Aristotle's Poetics, I recommend more modern Story by Robert McKee. It focuses on movie making, but I am pretty sure that many of the concepts he develops can be applied to game making.
You should read some articles on GameDev. Obviously, learning some of the fundamental concepts in computer graphics would be very helpful. But really, once you get to where you can write Objective-C and understand the APIs, go ahead and get started. You will learn a lot in the process; of course, keep learning and reading about these things I mentioned, but start coding. Find some books on game programming, particularly AI and so forth. Go ahead and get your feet wet programming though. Of course, be sure you learn your language thoroughly.
Quite frankly, I have found that I never know what I need to know until I actually get my hands dirty. That's why I suggested here that someone looking to jump into designing a 3-D iPhone game start with some simpler, targeted projects. These targeted projects can teach you core concepts as you put them to practical use. OpenGL seemed like this impossible-to-understand black box until I made myself perform some simple tasks with it. In a few weeks, I had an application based on it.
In college, I would spend weeks trying to understand the theory behind an aspect of thermodynamics, but then I would see one practical application for it and the whole thing would fall into place. Since then, I've focused on finding specific applications for concepts before spending too much time with the pure theory behind them.
A solid understanding of what makes a good gaming UI especially on the iPhone would be key, especially with the options it provides, be it accelerometers, or onscreen touch inputs.
I'd be sure to try out existing games and see what works, what doesn't, and what gets good feedback. You may also want to look at Flash and DS based games to see what works on other small screens/devices.

Beginner guide to OpenGLES on iPhone

Does anyone know a good beginners guide to using OpenGLES on the iPhone? I have found some but they all require assumed knowledge which I don't have.
Simon Maurice has some great tutorials on the very first steps. Take a look: http://www.cocoachina.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category%3aSimon_Maurice_iPhone_OpenGL_ES. Do them from the beginning and you'll have a good sense of the basics.
EDIT:
Backup link
Source code
You need only one reference:
http://www.khronos.org/opengles/sdk/1.1/docs/man/
Yeah, some of the documentation doesn't make a lot of sense the first time you read it, but really, read the sentence/paragraph/page again, and again. It really does make sense, and it's very accurate. Which is something you really can't say from tutorials. Tutorials are almost always written by people that don't seem too fussed about leaving out important details while documentation like that is usually written by very nitpicky people that cram every little important fact into (possibly overly-complex) sentences.
Oh, and one golden tip: Add a search function to your browser that does this:
http://www.google.com/search?q=%s+site%3Awww.khronos.org%2Fopengles%2Fsdk%2F1.1%2Fdocs%2Fman%2F&btnI
(replace %s by whatever your browser's search term replacement string is, the above example is for Opera)
I've bound it to the o prefix, so whenever I need to look something up on OpenGL/ES, I just type o glDrawElements in the address bar and instantly get the documentation page on it.
Once again, if I may plug my own work, I have a short writeup on what I learned while writing Molecules for the iPhone. I came into this having no experience with the 3-D side of OpenGL (I had done a little 2-D hardware acceleration before), so I have a bit of a different perspective on the subject. The source code to Molecules is available, so you might be able to learn something from poking around inside it. I also have written a post on how to use Core Animation structures and functions to accelerate OpenGL ES rendering, if you want something a little more technical.
Bill Dudney has a post here about how he started getting into OpenGL ES, and then a follow-on here where he provides code for a Wavefront OBJ loader for the iPhone.
I believe that I've seen a few more good resources around Stack Overflow in various answers, so you might search around and see what else you can find here.
For OpenGL NeHe is a great tutorial. Though, it doesn't specifically cover OpenGLES, it should still be pretty helpful. Just be prepared to run into things now and again that won't work on the iphone.
Also you can get v1.1 if "The Red Book" online.
Simon Maurice's tutorial can be found here
"The Red Book" is not recommended to OpenGL/OpenGLES beginner. It is book for professionals.
The first step is should try to run downloaded simple programs or simple codes from OpenGL web sites.
Here's a good (non-Chinese) link to Simon Maurice's tutorials:
http://web.me.com/smaurice/iPhone_OpenGL_ES_Blog/iPhone_OpenGL/Archive.html
His tutorials are excellent; they're what I used to learn OpenGL ES.
In addition to "The Red Book", another useful book -with tutorials and reference- is OpenGL SuperBible.
Again not OpenGLES specific, but I believe it is useful to learn OpenGL features in general, then filter out the ones you don't need.