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macOS What next to get familiar with ObjC?

I

idevelopr

macrumors newbie
Original poster
I have finished the Obj-C Tutorial with the Currency Converter example program.Now,Obj-C seems better.And Iam comfortable with Xcode. But Im still not 100 % sure or confident of the syntax.Would like to know where should I head next?

What should be the next thing I should do to get familiar with ObjC? Please suggest.
 
I have more than 50000 lines of plain c code converted to 64-bit clean and it compiles reliably as .m files. No objective c, plain Carbon. I guess i have to get used to Graphics Contexts and Cocoa windows. Plääh. Luckily i have a Mac Pro and so i could use double booting with Lion and Snow Leopard as secondary (internal hard disk). 🙂
 
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I intend to learn Obj C.Hence would like to the best possible learning route.Your suggestions are welcome 🙂
 
If you're remotely serious about this, get a book. Online tutorials and video tutorials won't go deep enough. And when you're into your first serious project, you'll need to have that deep enough understanding, else you'll spend all your time asking questions on forums that you would have already known the answers to. (Not that I'm saying you shouldn't ask question on forums.)

For your learning style, which I'm picking up from your posts, I don't think Kochan would be a good fit for you.

Perhaps Clair (2010) Learn Objective-C 2.0 : a hands-on guide to Objective-C for Mac and iOS developers. Addison-Wesley Professional. Be sure to do all the exercises and take the time to understand what you're reading. Don't rush.

Or perhaps Istead (2010) Beginning Mac programming : develop with Objective-C and Cocoa. Pragmatic Bookshelf. Personally, I like the style of the Progmatic Programmer's books.

Neither of these will teach you Cocoa (at all or extensively), but you will have an a good foundation in Objective-C and the Foundation framework. So you could then move to Hillegass to learn Cocoa GUI programming.
 
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jiminaus said:
If you're remotely serious about this, get a book. Online tutorials and video tutorials won't go deep enough. And when you're into your first serious project, you'll need to have that deep enough understanding, else you'll spend all your time asking questions on forums that you would have already known the answers to. (Not that I'm saying you shouldn't ask question on forums.)
Click to expand...

Another key reason you need a book. As the author puts it at the beginning of "Cocoa in a Nutshell"
You don't remember Cocoa, you look it up.
Click to expand...

You need to have a couple of good resources to turn to besides the Apple documentation, and the random-access nature of books makes them good as reference material.

I haven't read either of the books jiminaus suggests, so I can't comment on them myself, but I agree with him that Kochan probably isn't a good choice for you. Another project oriented, "get it done" type book that might also suit your style is Objective-C: Up and Running. Check out http://cocoadevcentral.com/ to get an idea of the style.

The Stanford iPhone course (video via iTunes U) is an excellent resource, but really needs to be used in conjunction with a book.

B
 
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jiminaus said:
If you're remotely serious about this, get a book. Online tutorials and video tutorials won't go deep enough. And when you're into your first serious project, you'll need to have that deep enough understanding, else you'll spend all your time asking questions on forums that you would have already known the answers to. (Not that I'm saying you shouldn't ask question on forums.)

For your learning style, which I'm picking up from your posts, I don't think Kochan would be a good fit for you.

Perhaps Clair (2010) Learn Objective-C 2.0 : a hands-on guide to Objective-C for Mac and iOS developers. Addison-Wesley Professional. Be sure to do all the exercises and take the time to understand what you're reading. Don't rush.

Or perhaps Istead (2010) Beginning Mac programming : develop with Objective-C and Cocoa. Pragmatic Bookshelf. Personally, I like the style of the Progmatic Programmer's books.

Neither of these will teach you Cocoa (at all or extensively), but you will have an a good foundation in Objective-C and the Foundation framework. So you could then move to Hillegass to learn Cocoa GUI programming.
Click to expand...


I would like to pick a book and get through it.Now after this post and post by balamw. I would like to short list between book by Clair and Stevenson before moving onto Hillegaas .Now I decided to keep video tutorials off for the time being.Please help me pick the better of these books.

This forum has been tremendous.Really helpful.I owe back similar help once i get some expertise in mac programming.Thanks a lot for really valuable guidance. 🙂🙂🙂
 
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idevelopr said:
I would like to pick a book and get through it.Now after this post and post by balamw. I would like to short list between book by Clair and Stevenson before moving onto Hillegaas .Now I decided to keep video tutorials off for the time being. Please help me pick the better of these books.
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Which book by Stevenson? This is the first mention of Stevenson in this thread.

But we can't pick a book for you. The better book is entirely subjective. It will depend on you.

While I haven't bought a physical book in quite a long time — outside of work — nothing beats going into a bookshop, picking up a book, and thumbing through it to get a feel for its style.

And this is what I would suggest to you. Find a copy in a bookshop, thumb through, and see if the book clicks with you.

If you can't decide between them, and they both click with you, get both. It's been suggested on other threads like this that having multiple books can actually be best way to go. Different book have different approaches in presenting the same material. So if some material in one book is causing you trouble, you can read the same material in the other book in the hope that it's approach will help.
 
jiminaus said:
If you're remotely serious about this, get a book. Online tutorials and video tutorials won't go deep enough. And when you're into your first serious project, you'll need to have that deep enough understanding, else you'll spend all your time asking questions on forums that you would have already known the answers to. (Not that I'm saying you shouldn't ask question on forums.)

For your learning style, which I'm picking up from your posts, I don't think Kochan would be a good fit for you.

Perhaps Clair (2010) Learn Objective-C 2.0 : a hands-on guide to Objective-C for Mac and iOS developers. Addison-Wesley Professional. Be sure to do all the exercises and take the time to understand what you're reading. Don't rush.

Or perhaps Istead (2010) Beginning Mac programming : develop with Objective-C and Cocoa. Pragmatic Bookshelf. Personally, I like the style of the Progmatic Programmer's books.

Neither of these will teach you Cocoa (at all or extensively), but you will have an a good foundation in Objective-C and the Foundation framework. So you could then move to Hillegass to learn Cocoa GUI programming.
Click to expand...
Kudos for the sage advice. I concur.
 
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jiminaus said:
Which book by Stevenson? This is the first mention of Stevenson in this thread.
Click to expand...

balamw said:
Another project oriented, "get it done" type book that might also suit your style is Objective-C: Up and Running. Check out http://cocoadevcentral.com/ to get an idea of the style.
Click to expand...

That's the book by Stevenson I brought up earlier. Either I'm on your ignore list (in which case you won't see this either 😉 ) or you just missed it.

I make extensive use of Amazon.com's "Look Inside" and Google Books to virtually browse books much in the way you describe for the physical thing. If a few "Surprise me" hits don't give me a flavor for the book, I'll use the Kindle or Nook apps to get the first chapter or so as a sample.

I used that to take a look at Clair and, as compared with Stevenson, it seems quite a bit more "formal." I couldn't assess if it make use of a common unifying project or not though. By comparison Stevenson's book gives a decent enough "overview" of themes in Cocoa to build some familiarity with the concepts, so that when you do go use a more formal book (Kochan, Hillegass or Clair) you won't be so lost.

Again, only the individual reader can assess whether the tone of the material resonates with them by perusing it.

B
 
balamw said:
That's the book by Stevenson I brought up earlier. Either I'm on your ignore list (in which case you won't see this either 😉 ) or you just missed it.

B
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I guy with your knowledge on my ignore list?!

Sorry, I did miss it. It's the up and running one.
 
balamw said:
That's the book by Stevenson I brought up earlier. Either I'm on your ignore list (in which case you won't see this either 😉 ) or you just missed it.

I make extensive use of Amazon.com's "Look Inside" and Google Books to virtually browse books much in the way you describe for the physical thing. If a few "Surprise me" hits don't give me a flavor for the book, I'll use the Kindle or Nook apps to get the first chapter or so as a sample.

I used that to take a look at Clair and, as compared with Stevenson, it seems quite a bit more "formal." I couldn't assess if it make use of a common unifying project or not though. By comparison Stevenson's book gives a decent enough "overview" of themes in Cocoa to build some familiarity with the concepts, so that when you do go use a more formal book (Kochan, Hillegass or Clair) you won't be so lost.

Again, only the individual reader can assess whether the tone of the material resonates with them by perusing it.

B
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Good.Stevenson will be my book guru.

Even demi-gods sometimes miss...lol.May be I should have mentioned the book title.
 
One thing I like to do is when I am learning something new I pick something I don't think I will be able to make and research to make it.

A small example would be to make tetris in Objective-C and Cocoa. (Ok maybe tetris isn't a good example since its trickier to make than it looks, but maybe a simple level similar to Mario or something that is only one screen long).

I always learn a ton by making micro games using different API's and such.
 
The Tetris idea is a good one. I really like Tetris and it's relatively easy to implement. I implemented Tetris in Windows C API a long time ago. Then, more recently, I implemented it in Perl-Tk. Yes, that's right... Perl-Tk. That version works on Mac, too BTW. 🙂

I should try it in Cocoa because I love that game so much. Hmm, maybe iPhone, too.
 
idevelopr said:
Even demi-gods sometimes miss...lol.May be I should have mentioned the book title.
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My librarian gene has been triggered. But I'll stifle a rant about correctly citing books and not unleash it on this forum. I'll save it for some poor unsuspecting student instead.

BTW Don't read anything into the demi-god thing under my name. I unintentionally bought that status. I'm embarrassed every time I see it because I've not earned it.
 
idevelopr said:
I have finished the Obj-C Tutorial with the Currency Converter example program.Now,Obj-C seems better.And Iam comfortable with Xcode. But Im still not 100 % sure or confident of the syntax.Would like to know where should I head next?

What should be the next thing I should do to get familiar with ObjC? Please suggest.
Click to expand...

Oh...I didn't catch that part. My "making micro games" suggestion isn't going to quite work in the way I wanted it to. (Although when you get to graphics try it. It works awesome. I've done it for C, C++, and Objective-C, you just need a graphics API. I learned a ton about how to use the Corona SDK in one night simply by writing microgames.)

To get familiar with syntax you just have to code. Don't try and remember every little thing, people do that and they get hung up and frustrated and quit. Always know that something exists and where to find it. I'm always looking up syntax for Objective-C because I always accidentally write C++ code since I've used C++ longer than any language and its what I'm used to.

You could try making small games like hangman, black jack (this is a good one), palindrome verifier, madlibs, etc. By creating more programs the syntax will come.

EDIT: YAY! My status is Premium Grilled Chicken!
 
chrono1081 said:
Oh...I didn't catch that part. My "making micro games" suggestion isn't going to quite work in the way I wanted it to. (Although when you get to graphics try it. It works awesome. I've done it for C, C++, and Objective-C, you just need a graphics API. I learned a ton about how to use the Corona SDK in one night simply by writing microgames.)

To get familiar with syntax you just have to code. Don't try and remember every little thing, people do that and they get hung up and frustrated and quit. Always know that something exists and where to find it. I'm always looking up syntax for Objective-C because I always accidentally write C++ code since I've used C++ longer than any language and its what I'm used to.

You could try making small games like hangman, black jack (this is a good one), palindrome verifier, madlibs, etc. By creating more programs the syntax will come.

EDIT: YAY! My status is Premium Grilled Chicken!
Click to expand...

Thanks.Thats a good idea - to work on something real in the process of learning.Im not into games at this moment .I would love to get into them at a later stage.Are there any firms or individuals that offer something like an internship in this domain.
 
idevelopr said:
Thanks.Thats a good idea - to work on something real in the process of learning.Im not into games at this moment .I would love to get into them at a later stage.Are there any firms or individuals that offer something like an internship in this domain.
Click to expand...

There isn't any internships or anything I know of because games are very complex and take a long time to learn. The reason they are so good for helping to learn programming is because you have to deal with a lot of things in a game that you don't normally have to deal with in a regular program. (Timers, graphics, animation, sound, performance, etc.) You also have to be well versed in the basics of programming to make games. They are great practice.
 
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