Jump Right Into iOS Apps

Welcome

Writing your first iOS App? Working thru Apple Developer > Jump Right In?

Take our map of their pitfalls with you.

Jumping right in to their tutorial is a good idea, because Apple has solved the technical part of how to invite you in to win. They've picked out a quick simple path thru a huge swirling blizzard of details that could distract you. Work thru just 4 chapters and you have an app up and running. Work thru just 9 chapters and you have an app that remembers stuff even when you turn off the iPhone.

What they've left broken is a small flood of misleading details, placed to trip you up: things that scream and scream a lie: the lie that this is not for you. In reality, you'll soon be skilled enough. You won't need any more help from us after you begin to know more and more of what Apple imagines they told you to know, and actually forgot to mention. You might be good on your own as soon as the 3rd chapter. Tell us how it goes?

Apple has lost the knack of keeping discovery simple

Jump right in

iOS Apps for your phone should be easy to write, because free speech. Apple knows this truth so well as to invite you and me to jump right into their free tutorial.

Apple Developer > Jump Right In 

Here we tell you how they've set you up to fail. Read this blog, and you won't waste so much of your life on reverse-engineering every trap that they've laid for you.

We are strong, because public - they are weak, because corporate

Don't go learn Swift

Fair enough, you must go learn Swift first if you and all your friends don't already know Python or Java or C++ or some other object-oriented programming language of this 21st century. Fair enough, you should learn Python or Java or C before you learn something messier.

But if you do know about programming objects, then you don't have to go learn Swift before you ship your first app. You will find Swift quirky, but no more quirky than all the rest of Xcode: InterfaceBuilder, Cocoa, ObjC, and so on and on.

Some feel no shame in speaking of an "implicitly unwrapped optional variable of type"

Do download Xcode

Download the Xcode App from the App Store, into your Mac OS X.

If you have no Xcode, this is an easy and obvious choice, you are blessed. Otherwise, this choice is your first pitfall. For instance, the Terminal App you open in 2017 can fool you into downloading a 2015 Xcode 7.3.1 (7D1014) onto a 2016 macOS Sierra.

Ask me how I know.

The surprise is that you have to work to get the latest. The joy is that it's easy. Just go visit the App Store and pull it down. Don't settle for less than Xcode 9.0.1 (9A1004) in 2017, demand a new free Xcode 10 in 2018, and so on.

Many people know today as 2017, a proud few know today as the year of Xcode 9

Don't expect documentation will exist

All the pain of you running one Xcode while Apple talks of another, all that pain will be ours to share here.

Apple should show their respect for free speech by keeping up with the times. They should ship an insanely great tutorial as part of each Xcode. They did ship the Xcode tutorial for Sep/2015 in Sep/2015. They did ship the Xcode tutorial for Sep/2016 in Dec/2016. They still haven't yet shipped the tutorial for Jun/2017, and it's Nov/2017 now.

You can run the latest Xcode on the Mac you have, & talk out your pain with all of us here. Me, I first tried this on a macOS Sierra 10.12.16 with Xcode 9.0.1 (9A1004). But get this: I'm still happy to talk with you, no matter your choice of what version to run.

Apple hasn't found the discipline to write their doc before they ship the code

Don't match your version to theirs

Apple has somehow chosen to come off as dishonest. They lead with an unbelievable story. They pretend you can easily match your version to the version they bothered to document. They pretend you can then easily adjust to run something more current.

You can diss their nonsense, as quickly as you learn to pick it out

Get ready to spend money

Apple lets you write apps, run them, and screen-shot them on a good slow simulator of an iPhone. All for free, bundled into your Mac OS X.

But the Apple security on your iPhone will lock you out from running your own apps, except while you subscribe as an Apple Developer. That's like US$100 per year, plus sales tax, plus surrendering your anonymity.

Somehow they don't mention the full price up front



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