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Need a good, modern book on Cocoa programming to dive into
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Los Angeles, California
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Hi!
As the title suggests, I need a good, up-to-date and modern book on Cocoa programming. My requirements are simple:
1) It covers all the changes and enhancements to the API that were made in Tiger, and covers creating universal binaries and programming for Intel processors. (IE at least Xcode 2.1)
2) it is simply and thoughtfully explained. I'm not a total idiot, and have been coding in Java/PHP/HTML/CSS/Javascript for many years, so I know the basics + more of OO programming. However, I suck at learning unless I know wtf they're talking about. I learn by repetative examples and explanation. After I grasp the concept, I'm very good to go.
I have an almost insatiable thirst for knowledge, and if I don't get stuck because I don't understand it, I can code for hours. And hours. And hours. My passion for computers and the immense satisfaction from squashing bugs + improving quality makes programming a very large hobby of mine, and I've been keen on programming for Mac OS X for months now.
I haven't been able to find any good beginner's resources on the net, so I thought I'd shell out for a book. But there are so many choices, and I'd really like some purchasing advice before I go spending wads of cash on these things.
Any advice is appreciated!!
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Linkinus is king.
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Senior User
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: USA
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MacBook 2.0 160/2GB/SuperDrive
Lots of older Macs
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Fresh-Faced Recruit
Join Date: Dec 2006
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As 'techtrucker' reponded, the Hillegass book on Cocoa is pretty much the gold standard. But, it doesn't cover your item 1, it addresses item 2 very well. It doesn't cover Tiger things like Core Data, etc. It does, however, cover Cocoa through 10.2, including the important area of 'Bindings'. Even if you want to learn the 10.4 new technologies, it's probably better to start with the fundamentals of Cocoa, in that book. Once you have that stuff down, the Apple docs on the Tiger (and upcoming Leopard) technologies should be sufficient.
It doesn't cover the Universal Binary stuff in Xcode, it's more specific to Cocoa API issues, not platform/compiler issues. There are a few Xcode books, "Step into Xcode", "The Mac Xcode 2 Book", and "Beginning Xcode". They should address the Xcode questions.
But, you really don't have to do anything special to build a UB. That is done by default when using Tiger & Xcode. In general, you really don't have to know anything about the underlying architecture for MacOS/Cocoa programming. Unless your app has endian issues (like dealing with raw network data), or uses Altivec/SSE, you should not need to do anything architecture specific.
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
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In general, I would recommend learning the basics from the book and then learning to rely on Apple's docs.
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Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Seattle, WA, USA
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Sorry to railroad the topic, but what exactly changed between 10.3 and 10.4? Hillegass's book on Cocoa covers up through 10.3, but does not cover anything new in Tiger. I've looked around but can't find anything other than Core Data. And if that's really all that's missing, then I definitely recommend this book for anyone wanting to learn Cocoa (with some previous C or Java knowledge).
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Any ramblings are entirely my own, and do not represent those of my employers, coworkers, friends, or species
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
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There's actually a bit more than changed in 10.4, but like I said, there generally won't be a book for the very latest and greatest when it comes out, so it's best to get used to reading the documentation anyway.
As for improvements in 10.4: - Core Data
- Core Image
- NSTreeController
- QTKit
- PDFKit
- Groundwork for resolution independence
None of this is really essential, and I would argue that having so much thrown at you in an introduction might actually be harmful. The Hillegass book is a good choice, in my opinion.
There are books that do cover 10.4, but they aren't necessarily more comprehensive overall — and like I said, I think it's the quality of the introduction that is really important. Replacing the documentation isn't really these books' job.
(Last edited by Chuckit; Dec 30, 2006 at 08:02 PM.
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Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: Los Angeles, California
Status:
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I agree that there won't be a book that covers the latest and greatest when it comes out, but the lastest and greatest (Tiger for Intel) has been out for a year now, and Tiger in general has been out for 1 year and 8 months. I don't find it unreasonable to expect a book on it to be out now. 
However, I shall relent. Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X it is.
Also, ChuckIt, I think you forgot one improvement in Tiger:
Spotlight.
Right?
Thanks for all the replies!
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Linkinus is king.
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