iPhone App Development: The Missing Manual Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I've been looking to get into iPhone OS development this spring, and most books I've come across have fallen into one of two categories:
1) they expect you to have a background in Mac OS X's Objective-C development frameworks or...
2) they're written like a reference book and thus make it difficult to learn the ropes in a step-by-step fashion.
Craig Hockenberry's iPhone App Development: The Missing Manual changes that frustrating pattern. By introducing the world of developing an iPhone app in a way that requires just a bit of programming experience, Hockenberry makes instantly accessible the Objective-C language, the XCode IDE, and the design processes that go into taking your app from notepad sketch to App Store success and beyond. The text is clear and approachable, and Craig's jolly writing style makes grasping important concepts and following along with examples both fun and memorable.
I highly recommend this book to anyone with any C-like programming experience who is interested in writing apps for the iPhone OS.

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Anyone with programming experience can learn how to write an iPhone app. But if you want to build a great app, there's a lot more to it than simple coding: you also need to know how design and market your creation. This easy-to-follow guide walks you through the entire process, from sketching out your idea to promoting the finished product.

Get to know the tools for developing your iPhone app
Design a great app before you start coding
Build a complex app with Xcode and Interface Builder
Decide how to brand your app-then beta-test that brand in the real world
Learn the inside scoop on how to get your app into the App Store
Promote your product, track sales, and build a strong customer following

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iPhone SDK 3 Programming: Advanced Mobile Development for Apple iPhone and iPod touch (Wiley) Review

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(More customer reviews)this is a really good book. but be warned...advanced users only. it does take you from the beginning but the approach i must say...is not for absolute beginners.

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Get the expert guidance you need to begin building native applications for Apple's new iPhone 3G as well as the iPod Touch

Apple's iPhone is the hottest mobile device on the planet. More than one million iPhone 3G phones were sold in the first three days of release and millions more are sure to be in the hands of iPhone fans each year. Apple's iPhone SDK has been updated and includes more than one thousand new APIs that developers will want to get their hands on.
iPhone SDK 3 Programming shows you how to build great applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Inside, veteran mobile developer and Bell Labs scientist Maher Ali begins with a foundational introduction to Objective-C and Cocoa programming, and then guides you through building programs with Apple's iPhone SDK 3.
Covers the complete application development process, and highlights all the key device features including the camera, location awareness, and more
Completely revised and redesigned with more than 100 new pages of content
iPhone's new SDK release contains more than one thousand new APIs you will want to use right away
Includes a focused introduction to the Objective-C language and Cocoa frameworks that new iPhone developers need

With this advanced resource, you'll get the expert guidance you need to begin building native applications for Apple's new iPhone 3G as well as the iPod Touch.

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Sams Teach Yourself iPhone Application Development in 24 Hours Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I've read through the first nine or so chapters and tried a couple of examples - fairly impressed so far.
Good:
+ loads of color screenshots.
+ strong on UI description and diagrams.
+ easy read and good flow, without compromising content or making silly jokes all the time.
+ technically most of it is correct, with a few caveats.
+ quite strong on application lifecycle and the authors have an ability to put some points over (sometimes fairly complex points) in a surprisingly efficient and straightforward way.
Not as good:
- some typos/errors (missing pointer asterisks, diagrams that don't display what is discussed in the text).
- some fundamental errors related to properties (@property/@synthesize are not in any way required in order to make use of dot syntax), also the book declares properties and then doesn't use them, but makes the mistake of thinking they're needed in order to access properties of a pre-existing class. Interestingly - and I suspect not entirely unrelated - Mark and LaMarche made the exact same error in the first edition of their Apress iPhone dev book.
- ok Objective-C coverage but by no means great (though the authors stress the need to read up on it elsewhere).
The good points outweigh the bad and I'd recommend the book with the provisos: get an Obj-C book to go with it, and you'll probably want to read it with another iPhone dev book to get a different viewpoint (eg. Apress or Pragmatic Programmers).

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&>A clear, easy-to-understand tutorial for developers who want to write software for today's hottest market: iPhone, iTouch, and App Store!


The start-to-finish, hands-on introduction to iPhone programming for every developer, regardless of experience
Introduces the iPhone development environment and teaches every essential Objective-C concept with fully-documented, carefully-explained code
A complete tutorial package: step-by-step instructions, examples, Q and As, quizzes, exercises, tips, shortcuts, and more
iPhone is the world's hottest application market: more than 500,000 developers have downloaded Apple's iPhone software development kit in just one year. Now there's a friendly, accessible guide to iPhone development for every programmer, regardless of experience. In just 24 lessons of one hour or less, Sams Teach Yourself iPhone Application Development in 24 Hours will help beginning iPhone and mobile developers gain true mastery, so you can construct virtually any iPhone application. Each lesson builds on everything that's come before, helping you learn all they need to know without ever becoming overwhelmed. Coverage includes: preparing for iPhone development; navigating the development environment; mastering Objective-C and the MVC paradigm; using widgets and webviews; implementing multiple views; reading and writing data; building user interfaces; generating graphics; playing media; using maps; networking; using the touch interface; sensing motion; pushing application updates; debugging; optimization; distributing software via the App Store; and more. By the time you are finished you'll be comfortable enough to write real-world apps that sell.

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Sams Teach Yourself iPhone Application Development in 24 Hours (2nd Edition) (Sams Teach Yourself -- Hours) Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)This book inspired me to write my first-ever review on Amazon (after being a customer since virtually day one). The reason I was so "inspired" is that this book has some real problems. If you are not a reasonably accomplished programmer in other languages/platforms, stay clear. Typos, omissions and flat-out wrong code abound. I downloaded the errata and that doesn't even cover it all. My book is full of notes. Chapter 16 seems to be particularly bad. For example, they have you enter:
newCard.question = thisQuestion;
When the correct code is:
[newCard setValue:thisQuestion forKey:@"question"];
The other problem I have with it is that the authors (particularly whoever wrote the first 14 to 15 chapters make horrible variable and object naming choices. Sometimes the only difference between the type and the instance is a difference in capitalization:
int Int;
Not an actual example (don't care to go through the book to find a real one) but they are all over the place.
An extension of this is when they use similar names for different things and get them confused. For example: "wrongCount" and "wrongCounter".
They also call out for editing the wrong files at times and even confuse prior chapters' projects with current projects. Probably a cut-and-paste thing while writing.
There's a real difference in style between the two authors. Starting around chapter 14/15 the tone and approach changes. The second author tells you to "right click" all the time...when Macs don't have but one mouse button. Lucky for me the first thing I do to a Mac is throw away the useless mouse and replace it with a Logitech trackball...so, in my case, right-clicking works just fine.
I am just getting past chapter 16 and I will finish the book but it made me so angry for wasting so much of my time that I had to post a review.
Should you buy it? I don't know. If you are an accomplished programmer you might look at the above problems as an opportunity to learn more because of having to debug the code and figure out where they screwed-up. That's how I am taking it. I don't like it because I wanted to push through this book quickly and move on to more advanced books, but you play the cards you are dealt. Happy debugging!

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Sams Teach Yourself iPhone® Application DevelopmentSecond EditionJohn RayFigures and code appear as they do in XcodeCovers iOS 4.0 and up, and iPhone 4Additional files and updates available onlineIn just 24 sessions of one hour or less, learn how to build powerful applications for today's hottest mobile device: the iPhone! Using this book's straightforward, step-by-step approach, you'll master every skill and technology you need, from setting up your iPhone development environment to building great user interfaces, sensing motion to writing multitasking applications. Each lesson builds on what you've already learned, giving you a rock-solid foundation for real-world success!Step-by-step instructions carefully walk you through the most common iOS development tasks.Quizzes and Exercises at the end of each chapter help you test your knowledge. By the Way notes present interesting information related to the discussion. Did You Know? tips offer advice or show you easier ways to perform tasks. Watch Out! cautions alert you to possible problems and give you advice on how to avoid them.Printed in full color—figures and code appear as they do in Xcode Covers iOS 4.0 and up Learn the features of Xcode 3.2 and Interface Builder Prepare your system and iPhone for efficient development Get started quickly with Apple's Objective-C and Cocoa Touch Understand the Model-View-Controller (MVC) development paradigm Design highly usable applications with interactive widgets and web-connected interfaces Use Table views to navigate structured data Build rotatable and resizable user interfaces Read and write data and create System Setting plug-ins Use the iPhone's media playback and recording capabilities Create map and location-based (GPS) services Sense motion and orientation with the iPhone's accelerometer and the iPhone 4 gyroscope Create universal applications that run on the iPhone and iPad Write background-aware multitasking applications Distribute your applications through the App Storehttp://teachyourselfiphone.com

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iPhone and iPad Apps for Absolute Beginners Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)First, to all the people giving low ratings because of a few typos - Get Over It! Any first printing of a technical book like this will have them, especially when things like the OS, SDK and dev tools are updated all the time. You have to judge the book on it's content, not a few mistakes in printing.
As for the book, this is EXACTLY what I needed. I've never programmed anything before in my life, but like everyone else I want to learn iPhone programming & make a million dollars. :P
I started with a few other "beginning iPhone programming" books and every one of them was way too out of my league. Inevitably the first chapter would say "You need to know Objective-C first...". So I'd grab a book on Objective-C for beginners and that would be over my head & the first chapter of those would say "You need to know C first..." So I'd grab a book on C for beginners. The one thing all of these books had in common was THEY DIDN'T EXPLAIN WHY THINGS WORK. So after reading a couple books on C, a couple on Objective-C, I was still completely lost when I started on the iPhone books.
Then I found this book. It is really the start I needed. Things are explained quite well and I was finally able to actually understand what I was doing, not just memorizing code. When learning something this foreign, it is much more helpful to have it explained thus; "This piece of code controls... and make the program do this..." or "This bit of code makes... happen because...". Analogies are used in a terrific way so you can understand the mechanics behind it all.
To use an analogy, if you never worked on a car engine,it would be far more helpful if someone explained what a spark-plug does than just telling you you need to have them. That is the kind of teaching Dr. Lewis provides in this book. I can't praise it and thank him enough for writing it & can't wait for more from him.
As for the typos (and there are really only a few), I actually benefited because it gave me a bit of a crash course in debugging and figuring out how things should really work. If you get confused or lost because of them, don't fret it, just come to the forum for this book and one of us will be happy to help out. [...]
If you are like me, "An Absolute Beginner", then you'll be hard pressed to find a better book to get you started. Trust me, I wasted many months trying.

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There have been over 1 billion downloads on the App Store so far, and by the end of 2009 there will be 45,000,000 iPhones in use. Clearly, this is not a market purely for a few expert programmers. That's like having millions of hungry people, and only letting a couple hundred Michelin-starred chefs prepare the food for them - what's there is nice, but it's nowhere near enough. The aim of this book is to open the floodgates and let anybody get cooking.iPhone is incredibly hot, and everybody wants to get their own apps up on the App Store and start making their millions. This book empowers readers to do just that. It also leads directly on to our iPhone development line for those who want to take things a step further.

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