Filed under: Audio, Developer, Video, Macintosh, Commercial, iPhone, Education
Review: Coding in Objective-C 2.0 screencasts
by Victor Agreda, Jr. Mar 24th 2009 at 4:00PM
Last month Grant, Christina and I checked out a couple of screencasts from Pragmatic Programmers' Bill Dudney. Specifically, we watched "Coding in Objective-C 2.0." We took a look at part one mostly, which is an introduction to the Objective-C syntax and structure, culminating in a basic application. Part two covers memory management in depth. Since then they've added a part 3 on debugging, and the plan is to continue adding more. Part one covers classes, objects and messages and, like the other portions in the series, costs $5. One thing I love about Pragmatic Programmers is that they offer a wide choice of formats, including versions tuned for iPhone viewing and Theora Ogg format.It's important to note that while Objective-C is the language you'll use for iPhone development, these screencasts alone won't make you an iPhone developer. For one, there are differences in memory management on the iPhone versus desktop apps (iPhone apps don't do garbage collection). Also, iPhone interactions require the use of Cocoa Touch, and that isn't covered in these. If you are looking to move from another OOP language to Objective-C, however, this is a great way to get started. Plus, you really need to understand Obj-C to make solid iPhone apps. The side bonus is that you will also be able to write Mac desktop apps.
These screencasts are particularly useful if you are an audio-visual learner and have some background in programming. Don't expect to come up to speed if you have a slight understanding of a basic scripting language. That said, these are very clearly explained and the structure is great. If you watch the videos and do the exercises, I have little doubt you'll be learning the basics of Objective-C in no time. Listen to the audio as we discuss who these are for and what could be done better.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
info guy said 8:03PM on 3-24-2009
nice screencast.
Reply
lucas said 8:43PM on 3-24-2009
you got to be kidding me, charging for this.
Reply
Victor Agreda Jr said 10:10AM on 3-25-2009
No... I think it is well worth the $5 per episode IF you need to get up to speed on Obj-C fast. That's pretty reasonable cost given the time and effort and information, especially for those of us who do better by seeing and hearing the information instead of reading pages of documentation.
Are you saying this should all be free and Dudney should go live in a cardboard box?
lucas said 11:42PM on 3-26-2009
@victor are you slow or something?