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Closed 10 years ago.
I'm a total noob working in basics of C++ right now; I enjoy it, but find myself wondering if I'm not (sort of) wasting my time learning something archaic that won't be applicable to my interest in programming for iphone/ipad.
Should I be starting out with Obj-C, or will I be able to write better programs/ have more perspective if I continue learning C++?
I am a patient man. But I also want to be investing my time wisely.
Thanks!
-Andrew
C++ and Objective C are not as closely related as either C and Obj-C or C and C++. Frankly, just start with Objective C if you know you want to do iPhone or Mac programming. Second most important is the corresponding libraries, Cocoa (for mac) or Cocoa-touch (for iphone). Knowing the language isn't enough to get you productive in the platform.
There is nothing wrong with starting with objective-C. From personal experience I recommed it. I learned to program in objective-C before any other language and now I've made/worked on some very successful applications. As you become a better objective-C programmer you will naturally become better at programming overall, and C++ will be easy to pick up along the way if it's ever needed. The resources for objective-C and iPhone are vast and the language is fun to learn. If you need recommendations for good objective-C resources ask.
If you are going to iOS, you could start by learning C and then go to Obj-C or just start at Obj-C.
Learn obj-c. That's what you are going to use to program. Its always fun to think you'll gain a deep knowledge by learning a low lvl lang. Once you get into building iPhone apps, you'll find the debugging skills you need and use are more high level.
Just learn Obj-C. It's similar to C++ in the OOP features it implements, but the syntax is quite different. Also, it's good to that you're a patient guy, patience is massively important. I can't stress enough to start slow and make sure you learn Obj-C inside and out in addition to Cocoa before jumping into something as big as iPhone deving, or you'll burn out in frustration. In addition to Cocos-2D, be sure to check out 71 Squared. It's a great resource.
Related
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Closed 10 years ago.
Recently I've started on a project which requires a Cortex M3 processor.
I have some previous experience with 8bit AVR microcontrollers, so I was hoping for a not to big transition.
So I've bought a STM32L-Discovery kit (since low power is an important point) and started looking at some examples.
However, I'm completely stuck at the beginning.
When programming with AVR it was all very straightforward, just by including 2 or 3 files it was possible to write a simple main.c for like say a blinking LED.
However the examples in IAR EWARM (which I'm using) all look very bloated, lots of files which make it difficult to start. I'm having the same problem with most online tutorials.
Does anybody know any (very) simple tutorials which might help me. I'm thinking about purchasing "The Definitive Guide to the ARM Cortex-M3" since it seems highly recommended.
This might be a very dumb question but I'm stuck for too long now and I'm feeling a bit desperate.
I completely agree with you. I am also starting out and I find it difficult to even scratch the surface! I have some good experience with PICs, but with ARMs the learning curve is really steep.
For the STM32F4Discovery I am using, ST provides a number of examples. Starting from simple pin toggling. I am going through the main.c file which for every example is well commented, and try to understand from there. They have a peripherals library, so locate that and look into the declarations of the functions. I learned a few things like that.
Also make sure you reference the actual manual of the ARM you are using.
I think it boils down to how much time you have to spend. Speaking for myself, I don't have the time to go through the manual and understand how everything works. If you do find some good sources please post them!
In closing I am pasting a couple of urls I am found useful information:
http://www.hitex.com/index.php?id=download-insiders-guides
http://www.micromouseonline.com/category/stm32/#axzz1wMO2VjAI
I would suggest using CMSIS and standard peripheral library for programming ARM Cortex. Here are some tutorials on how to set up things and start writing code:
http://www.embedds.com/arm-cortex-tutorials/
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Closed 11 years ago.
well lot of forums and even this site is full of questions where people don't use any framework(whetever language they use) and they are stuck on code for common tasks like logins,database accesses,etc while frameworks provide code that works correctly for these routine tasks. Then why do people still go without frameworks? i want to know this because i am trying to build something of substantial scale so i was deciding if i really need a framework or a homegrown solution would be better? a homegrown solution can be a great learning experience but is there something more to it?
Some reasons:
Some tasks are so small that it's easier to do them without a framework, which:
would have to be bundled;
would take up an order of magnitude more space than the app itself;
would impose a lot of requirements both for the app and the hosting platform;
would provide unnecessary overhead because of a lot of features which are unused in the particular app;
Wanting to find out about how things work;
Homework assignments;
Not being able to use the framework for some reason (constrained space, not enough permissions, etc.)
Not knowing about these frameworks;
Reducing dependencies on external libraries;
Legacy reasons (the app is old, it was started before any serious frameworks were out);
People go without framework for several different reasons, in my opinion the choice of developing in-house functionality is not always a bad choice.
Frameworks often don't implement all functionalities required but often add extra functionalities that will never be used making the code base unecessary "bloated".
Implementing a framework often requires a steep learning curve and often it is easier to implement certain functionality in house.
However often a framework can be the best choice but developers jump into coding without doing enough research beforehand.
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Closed 10 years ago.
I have started learning Objective C with no prior programming experience from the 'Become an X-Coder' eBook (http://download.cocoalab.com.s3.amazonaws.com/BecomeAnXcoder.pdf). My question is, if I want to be doing iPhone development, am I going in the right direction? Am I learning the wrong language, or should I be learning Cocoa Touch? As I said, I have no prior experience, and just need someone to point me in the right direction. Apoligies if I have put this in the wrong place. Thanks very much for your time.
The short answer is that Cocoa Touch is Objective-C. And now for the long answer...
Objective-C is the essence of Cocoa Touch, which refers to the frameworks which are built by Apple for iOS development. So basically, if you are learning Objective-C, you are learning part of Cocoa Touch. Cocoa touch refers specifically to the code libraries and frameworks written for the iPhone and iPad.
If you are starting out, you may want to learn C and then Objective-C. However, it's totally up to you. It may be helpful to know C, but not required.
If you decide to go with Objective-C as a first language, I recommend getting some books on the Objective-C language as well as some books on iOS development. I have read Head First iPhone Development (O'Reilly)Amazon | Google and Sams Teach Yourself iPhone Development in 24 hours (Amazon). Someone recommended looking into a publisher called Apress, but I haven't yet. There are also some great blogs to look at once you you get started. Matt Gallagher's Cocoa with Love is not a beginners blog, but it has some nice information there.
Finally, feel free to ask specific questions here on Stackoverflow and don't forget to use Google.
Good luck!
Personally, I started with Beginning iPhone Development by Jeff LaMarche. I liked the pace of the book and there were great relevant notes throughout the text as you went through sample projects.
After I felt a bit more comfortable with the language/platform, I dove into the three20 project. There's something super satisfying about being able to load up complex UI components, which three20 let's you do fairly easily. Plus, I found it a great way to find patterns on writing Objective-C.
Finally, I'd subscribe to a few Objective-C/iPhone blogs. Here are some that I read:
Able Pear: http://blog.ablepear.com/
Cocoanetics: http://www.cocoanetics.com/blog/
iPhone Programming Tutorial: http://icodeblog.com/
iDev Recipes: http://idevrecipes.com/ (really great idea)
Marco: http://www.marco.org/
Ole Begemann: http://oleb.net/
Ray Wenderlich: http://www.raywenderlich.com/
Jeff LaMarche: http://iphonedevelopment.blogspot.com/
Wish you the best of luck!
Objective-C is the place to start. I would suggest Programming in Objective-C by Kochan and then move to iPhone Programming The Big Nerd Ranch Guide by Conway and Hillegass. As mentioned by others, I wouldn't start with C... Go Objective-C then a focus on iOS.
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Closed 10 years ago.
I want to learn how to use core-animation for the iPhone in a more serious manner; instead of just ripping other people's code to move a box a few pixels, I want to be able to write that code myself, and engage in translation, transformation, and other things with an understanding of the code I'm using to achieve it.
Unfortunately, the online documentation is, at best, rather dense. And while I have a good book for general iPhone programming, coreAnimation is a very large, complex area and it doesn't cover it in any real depth. Are there any good books that cover the subject?
Try Bill Dudney's Core Animation for Mac OSX and iPhone. The book does a fine job of walking through a lot of CA -- not all of which is available in the iPhone (yet?)
See also #neror's CA git project for good examples. #neror updates the project frequently and is a solid learning resource.
I have personally read "Core Animation: Simplified Animation Techniques for Mac and iPhone Development". This is a colorful book and quite easy to follow. This book assumes that you have some iPhone programming knowledge, so you will also need your general iPhone programming book. This book covers topics such as basic animation, path, what can be animated. The author would present you some code fragments, illustrating their ideas.
I would like to give you another suggestion.
You are asking for a good reference book about Core Animation. As mentioned above, I recommend "Core Animation: Simplified Animation Techniques for Mac and iPhone Development". However, in my experience, the book and other books on Core Animation aren't sufficient. None of the CA book is very well-written, I would rate them about 6 to 7 out of 10. Your best bet is learn from a concrete open source project. I recommend you GeekGameBoard from Apple. GeekGameBoard has two versions, the Apple version is written for MacOSX. There is a modified version for iPhone, check http://jens.mooseyard.com/2008/03/geekgameboard-getting-closer-to-iphone-ready/. Personally, I studied the source while refreshing my understanding from the book.
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Closed 10 years ago.
Any online tutorial on lisp which can teach the basics (loop, condition and etc) of this language in a short time?
Common Lisp tutorial on Wikibooks,
for beginners, http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Common_Lisp/First_steps/Beginner_tutorial
, bit more advanced, http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Common_Lisp/First_steps/Experienced_tutorial
Not a tutorial but rather a full book (but good and straight forward): Practical Common Lisp, http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/
Steve Yegge's Emergency Elisp is not about Common Lisp, but I still find it quite good to get at feeling for the Lisp family of languages:
http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/01/emergency-elisp.html
If you can make it through it (I wasn't able to the first time I read it), reading Paul Graham's The Roots of Lisp gives a nice overview of the very basics of the language, and how to implement it in itself, with only a few primitives.
On Lisp is another, oft-recomended and not too out of date book, again by Paul Graham, that will definitely teach you what you want to know. It's online, for free.
Personally, though, I'd recommend Clojure to you over CL. It's got a fast-growing, welcoming, smart community making cool things. Not only that, but you've got access to everything that Java does, and you're running on the JVM (it's portable and damn fast).
Good luck!
http://www.psg.com/~dlamkins/sl/ is a good start - read up to chapter 3. Chapter 3 really gets you the feel. The rest of the book is good too, but I recommend reading .... http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/LispBook/ next. From there, you should read .... http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/
I chose these in order of importance and difficulty. SL being the easiest and most important, then Gentle, then PCL