I’ve written a small parallax calculator utility in ApplescriptObjC. It is working perfectly in Mac OSX with outlets and actions bound to the interface.
Now I want to take the next step and convert it into an iphone app. The only problem is that the iPhone SDK obviously does not support ApplescriptObjC and I have no true understanding of Objective-C (but I own lots of books on the subject.)
So this is my question: As an Applescripter who has learned enough ApplescriptObjC to bind outlets and actions to IB, where can I find some resources to learn how to convert my ASOC script into true Objective-C?
I’ve used a some Applescript parlance like “item x” of {list} and metric conversion “as meters as feet” but everything else is straight up algebra.
Thanks in advance.
Hi,
I don’t want to discourage you, but you must understand the basics of object oriented programming and the handling of classes, objects, instance variables, messaging and maybe a bit memory management before you could start to write code in Objective-C. As you own some books, I strongly recommend to read them, or at least one of them.
I learned both AppleScript and ObjC and In my experience it took approx. 50 times longer to understand the basics of ObjC than the basics of AS
Thank you Stefan. It is difficult to discourage me!
I have read all my obj-c books once so far and I can grasp OOP but as someone who comes from an exclusively BASIC and Applescript background I find that most of the Objective-C books assume you already are a master of C. I am now learning C from a couple different books but it is difficult to regress my brain backwards from an easy-to-use language like Applescript to a language from the early 70’s. This is the task at hand right now.
The obj-c books I currently own include:
Learn Objective-C on the Mac
Learn Cocoa on the Mac
iPhone Application Development in 24 hours
and I recently ordered Rory Lewis’ “iPhone and iPad Apps for Absolute Beginners.” However, I have read the google preview of Mr. Lewis’ book and I’m not sure if the head-first approach is going to be the best for me and my simple calculator project. I’ll find out in a few days when it arrives.
I’ve pre-ordered Gary Bennett’s “Objective-C for Absolute Beginners” and I have high hopes for it being the book for me but it won’t be released until August 2010.
I learned Applescript from Sal Soghoin and Bill Cheesman’s Applescript 1-2-3. That book was so well written and the flow was so awesome that I feel that all other books have been spoiled for me. I wish Sal and Bill would write a follow-up book that takes us into ApplescriptObjC and then eventually into Objective-C. I also own the very thick “Learn Applescript” and it has been useful for an introduction to ApplescriptObjC and as a reference to details not mentioned in Sal & Bill’s book but I’m glad I learned Applescript from “1-2-3” first.
Craig Williams’ tutorials on Macscripter have also been helpful and I am feeling quite comfortable with IB and IBoutlets and IBActions now.
So I guess what I’m actually looking for is a resource for iphone development that is written for people coming from an Applescript or ASOC background only. I suspect it doesn’t exist…yet.
Thanks again,
Tim
You can learn Objective-C without knowing C.
I learned it with Steve Kochan’s “Programmimg in Objective-C” book.
It’s very comprehensive and describes the “grammar” from scratch.
It touches C only as far as you need the basics.
Although I knew AppleScript very well it took a few months to understand the basics of object orientated programming
Thanks again Stefan. I just read the first couple pages of the Amazon preview and I can already see this author has taken the approach I’ve been looking for. There are only 5 copies still available at Amazon so I’m placing my order now!
While that’s true, for me, I only really got anywhere with Objective-C after I took a step back and studied the basics of C first. Apart from anything else, I found too much of the stuff on Objective-C assumes some knowledge of C.