Learning backend development for iOS apps

Learn Python the Hard Way? (Google it, it's a free ebook. I've heard good things about it and I'm a big fan of another book in the series, Learn C the Hard Way.)

 

For most app back ends you're probably going to want some kind of REST API implemented to send data back and forth from your application. In my experience Ruby on Rails is a great framework to build these things on, as if you follow the standard Rails conventions you end up building everything in a RESTful way anyway.

It really depends on your application's requirements, but Rails will deal with most. I would strongly recommend Michael Hartl's book as a starting point, its freely avaliable on his site: http://ruby.railstutorial.org/

 

That looks helpful... I think I'll do some of those free exercises! Thanks!