Friday, October 2, 2009

iPhone for Programmers: An App-Driven Approach

Is a soon-to-be-released book reviewed by one of our own, Retronyms co-founder Zach Saul. iPhone for Programmers is aptly described by its title, being a book that teaches iPhone development to experienced programmers. It's geared specifically towards those who have extensive experience in a C-based/object-oriented language like Objective C, C++, Java, or C#, and it takes a unique approach to instruction by describing the technologies needed to build the apps themselves instead of just providing an Objective C tutorial.

It starts out with the basics: a description of Objective C in the context of iPhone development and an explanation of Xcode, the Cocoa frameworks, and Interface Builder you'll need to be familiar with for any app you develop. What's particularly helpful is that iPhone for Programmers goes beyond the coding skills you need to successfully build an app. There's a section detailing everything else that goes along with the process: setting up a dev account, selecting the price, testing, marketing, etc.

The book goes on to cover all the technologies needed to build apps of any type, and the App Store examples used in the book range from utility,
navigation, and business apps to games, entertainment, and productivity apps. Check out the preface and table of contents for the complete list of the types of apps and the technologies they implement.

iPhone for Programmers is also designed to make it easier for programmers to read as they're going through. Syntax is shaded in the code to distinguish comments from keywords from constants from all other code. New key code is highlighted when it demonstrates the new technology presented in the chapter. Fonts distinguish code that is displayed on the screen from background processes and frameworks. And all the source-code examples are available online!

Many thanks to Harvey and Paul Deitel for putting this together! It is an excellent tool for any programmer who wants to start developing for the iPhone, really well-written, comprehensive, easy-to-understand, and an all-around quality work. Highly recommended for anyone who already has programming experience and wants to expand their expertise into the iPhone realm. In addition to all their iPhone resources, the Deitel site has additional tutorials on programming languages, software development, web 2.0, internet business, and open-source projects.

We'll be getting
in a few copies of iPhone for Programmers, and since we won't really need them, already being all-star iPhone developers and all, we'll be passing on the books to you! Send us a (brief) statement on why you'd like this book, how it'd be beneficial to you, etc. and we'll sort through and pick the ones we like best. The release is slated for October 30, so let's have your submissions in by then. I don't know how many books we'll have or when they'll be at our office, but I'll update with those details as soon as I have them. If you don't really want to write anything up and would rather shell out the cash to get it yourself, go ahead and preorder at Amazon or Safari Books Online.

2 comments:

  1. I have gone through this book, it's not only good for newbies but intermediates too who needs that last bit of side positioning so that they are willing to pace out on there own and become an expert.

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