So, this week I began writing my first application with Cocoa in Objective C. To say the least, it was an experience.

I began first by checking out Apple’s Reference Library and Cocoa tutorials, found here, which gave me a decent understanding of how Objective-C in particular works and gave me a real preview of XCode. Truth be told, however, I’ve already learned a fairly decent amount of programing (having have started learning C at some point around 2005). So, to be fair, this tutorial is not for beginners; if you lack this amount of experience, however, This PDF tutorial (PDF linked) will get you started – it’s one I’m currently browsing, mostly because, while I have programming experience, I’m honestly no expert.

To be fair, the major amount of programming knowledge I have is a spotty knowledge of Java, some JavaScript (though I tend to prefer jQuery), and I’m about mid-level as far as scripting PHP goes (though I can hack the advanced techniques). Web development is something I’ve kind of learned as I feel my way around design; it’s damn hard to be a web designer and not learn some development, at least for a person with tastes such as myself.

The tool I’m working on… well, let’s just say that it’s aimed more at the freelancers out there. There’s an app very similar to the one I’m brewing up, but I’ve found it to be inefficient and decided it doesn’t quite do what I’d like it to do. It’s more my way of experimenting and learning; I feel that the best way to learn anything is to simply do it. So, once I finish beginner and intermediate tutorials, and once I feel confident in myself, most likely I will begin the work on this application. I don’t think I’ll release it, however; first I need to check with the legal agreements concerning the application that does something similar so as to not step on somebody’s toes (though to be fair, it seems that the application I’m looking at is no longer in development, and I’d be writing the code myself and looking at methods of implementation on my own).

Either way, I’ve found I much prefer using XCode and Mac’s development tools than Visual Studio or any of the Microsoft ones I’ve used in the past, and I definitely prefer it well above Java (though to be fair, I’ve done a very minimal amount of interface with Java, but I’ve helped friends with it and we all decided it was a pain in the ass, pardon my brazen statements). I feel that developing an interface for a simple application such as this should be fast, user-friendly, and flexible like this. The major issue I had (and perhaps my version was outdated) with Visual Studio is (well, other than it doesn’t work on my Mac and I have to use my laptop) that it didn’t feel like it had as strong of a flexible interface as Interface Builder.

But enough of that. However, some points I’d like to convey to Apple if I could:

• A lot of your products need updates. For example, iTunes has become a hunk of crap. I like it and all, but you really need to figure out why it’s creating multiple files whenever it indexes a library and fix it.
• Get Safari caught up. I really like many things about it; however, it really needs to be able to open the tabs I had open last session, especially if I magically manage to crash it. Also, figure out a way that users can more easily implement addons to it the way that Mozilla did; one of the reasons Firefox is so popular is because of the different addons that can be used with Gecko (and personally I dislike Firefox). Please, PLEASE open this venue with Safari the way you did with iPhone and iPod. It really can’t hurt.
• Check over your tutorials. You don’t even really mention how to export the application a user creates when they follow it; if you really wish for it to be a thorough tutorial, then you need to make sure that every step is covered with a fine-tooth comb. Further, it feels to me like the interface you use in XCode for your images either is not the default user interface, or is not the interface of 3.2.1, which is the current version of XCode upon the writing of this post. Please edit it; there were moments when I became confused because I was not sure I was following everything properly.
• While I’m discussing that tutorial, allow me to also point out that whenever you add your icon to your Currency Converter application in XCode, you also need to change the icon in info.plist, otherwise it doesn’t work. Just to let you know.

Either way, if you’re looking to become an XCoder, you can find some great materials in MacApper’s blog post, here.