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Spaceman Spiff · 09:33 PM

Hi, I'm new to software development so I was wondering, which programming language would be the best for Mac development, C++ or Objective-C. I will be programming in xCode, so which one will be the most expandable for my needs (I won't be programming games), will be the easiest to learn, and will be the most compatible. Thanks in advance.

Spaceman Spiff · Jan 30, 2006, 10:14 PM

Where should I go to learn (for the complete noob) about either one? After reading a few web pages, I kinda leaning towards Objective-C, but I can't find any that don't already require you to know C.

Brass · Jan 30, 2006, 10:33 PM

In either case you should really learn plain C first. But for Mac-specific programing, Objective-C is the language of choice. It has the best integration with the Mac APIs (eg, Cocoa). It is also far simpler syntax-wise than C++.

For resources for learning, just do a search of this forum. The same question is asked and answered a zillion times a week... well almost.

Spaceman Spiff · Jan 31, 2006, 08:35 AM

Originally Posted by Brass

In either case you should really learn plain C first. But for Mac-specific programing, Objective-C is the language of choice. It has the best integration with the Mac APIs (eg, Cocoa). It is also far simpler syntax-wise than C++.

For resources for learning, just do a search of this forum. The same question is asked and answered a zillion times a week... well almost.

Ok, I'll start with C first, long road ahead I guess.

Sorry about repeating a post...
Will Xcode compile plain C?

PBG4 User · Jan 31, 2006, 12:00 PM

Yes, Xcode will compile ANSI compliant C code.

Chuckit · Jan 31, 2006, 12:19 PM

Xcode can compile C++, Objective-C and plain old C. So you've got a compiler no matter which you go with. And yeah, a search would probably turn up better recommendations than you'd get re-asking the question.

jamil5454 · Jan 31, 2006, 03:51 PM

Definitely spend most of your time learning C first. It helps to take a class in it. Then Objective-C will come easily.

smitty825 · Feb 1, 2006, 10:35 AM

Good luck making your decision. Like everyone, I agree that you should try and learn C first (or use the Cocoa bindings from a language like Python if learning C isn't your desire) Once you do that, learning C++ & Obj-C isn't that hard.

Just a few thoughts on language selection. If you're planning on developing for Macs only, then Obj-C would certainly be your best bet. However, if you want to use this experience to get a software engineering job, then your best bet would be to learn C++, as that is probably the most used language in computing. Either way, once you learn one, learning the other isn't too difficult.

I personally disagree with Brass' statement that Obj-C syntax is far simpler than C++. IMHO, C++ more closely follows the C language behaviors, while Obj-C has different syntax to call functions and methods to help out the compiler.

smitty825 · Feb 1, 2006, 10:38 AM

Originally Posted by PBG4 User

Yes, Xcode will compile ANSI compliant C code.

Wow! I thought that there was no way that XCode supported ANSI C, as I can't imagine anyone has written anything in ANSI C in at least 10 years! I'm quite impressed. My ANSI C syntax isn't quite up to par, so I didn't write a "Hello World" type function to see if it worked, though...

I would hope that most C programmers are using the C99 standard by now! It has support for naming variables anywhere in the function block (not just on the top of the function), and a few other nice changes.

Catfish_Man · Feb 1, 2006, 02:16 PM

Originally Posted by smitty825

Wow! I thought that there was no way that XCode supported ANSI C, as I can't imagine anyone has written anything in ANSI C in at least 10 years! I'm quite impressed. My ANSI C syntax isn't quite up to par, so I didn't write a "Hello World" type function to see if it worked, though...

I would hope that most C programmers are using the C99 standard by now! It has support for naming variables anywhere in the function block (not just on the top of the function), and a few other nice changes.

You joke, but Xcode defaults to C89

Thankfully it's easy enough to change.

Chuckit · Feb 1, 2006, 04:21 PM

Originally Posted by smitty825

Wow! I thought that there was no way that XCode supported ANSI C, as I can't imagine anyone has written anything in ANSI C in at least 10 years!

You don't think anything has been written in C89 since 1995? What do you reckon all the C programmers were using in 1996?

Brass · 07:00 PM

Originally Posted by smitty825

I personally disagree with Brass' statement that Obj-C syntax is far simpler than C++. IMHO, C++ more closely follows the C language behaviors, while Obj-C has different syntax to call functions and methods to help out the compiler.

1. Obj-C uses exactly the same syntax to call functions (but not methods, which don't exist in C at all). They are standard C, and Obj-C and C++ are merely alternative extensions of C.

2. For a complete description of the Obj-C extensions to C, see the documentation.
I think any description of the C++ extensions to C would be a lot longer (and a lot more difficult to understand) than this. However, that is subjective, and different people think in different ways, and what suits one person better may not suit another person better.

This link explains that Obj-C only has one syntactic extension to C (presumably they mean the use of square brackets for calling methods). Personally I'd say it has a couple of other extensions, such as method definitions. But the point is that there are very few additions to plain C.

This link explains that C++ is not even a true extension of C as it actually breaks some compatibility with C. I haven't looked into this, and the "brokenness" looks very trivial to me.

Chuckit · Feb 1, 2006, 05:39 PM

Objective-C has more than one syntactic extension to C. It adds keywords such as @implementation…@end and @try, and the <ProtocolName> syntax for indicating conformance to a protocol.

Spaceman Spiff · Feb 1, 2006, 09:02 PM

Originally Posted by smitty825

Good luck making your decision. Like everyone, I agree that you should try and learn C first (or use the Cocoa bindings from a language like Python if learning C isn't your desire) Once you do that, learning C++ & Obj-C isn't that hard.

Just a few thoughts on language selection. If you're planning on developing for Macs only, then Obj-C would certainly be your best bet. However, if you want to use this experience to get a software engineering job, then your best bet would be to learn C++, as that is probably the most used language in computing. Either way, once you learn one, learning the other isn't too difficult.

I personally disagree with Brass' statement that Obj-C syntax is far simpler than C++. IMHO, C++ more closely follows the C language behaviors, while Obj-C has different syntax to call functions and methods to help out the compiler.

I will defiantly be writing Mac software 99.9% of the time, but if I want to write a Windows (or Linux) program, does a Obj-C compiler exist for Windows? I doubt I'll write a Windows program, but... will it be hard to write one if I settle into writing Objective-C code? This may be a stupid question, but can you write a full featured Mac app with C++, because under Xcode, C & C++ shows up as a command line application, not one with a GUI.

Brass · Feb 1, 2006, 09:36 PM

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

I will defiantly be writing Mac software 99.9% of the time, but if I want to write a Windows (or Linux) program, does a Obj-C compiler exist for Windows? I doubt I'll write a Windows program, but... will it be hard to write one if I settle into writing Objective-C code?

Apparently you can, although I've never tried it, using GnuStep. It is an open implementation of the old NextStep (and now Apple's Cocoa) frameworks, including development tools.

This may be a stupid question, but can you write a full featured Mac app with C++, because under Xcode, C & C++ shows up as a command line application, not one with a GUI.

Yes, but I've never done it. I've only ever used Cocoa/Objective-C. I believe Carbon applications are usually done in C++, but others here could give you better information on that than I.

Chuckit · Feb 1, 2006, 09:48 PM

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

I will defiantly be writing Mac software 99.9% of the time, but if I want to write a Windows (or Linux) program, does a Obj-C compiler exist for Windows? I doubt I'll write a Windows program, but... will it be hard to write one if I settle into writing Objective-C code?

They do, but it would likely be a lot more than a simple recompile —�but that's true of porting a C++ Mac program as well.

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

This may be a stupid question, but can you write a full featured Mac app with C++, because under Xcode, C & C++ shows up as a command line application, not one with a GUI.

The only project type with "C++" in the name is a command-line tool, but that isn't the only one you can use C++ with. Most actual Mac apps written in C++ are Carbon applications, so that's the project type you'd use. Even an Objective-C Cocoa program can incorporate C++ code to a certain degree.

smitty825 · Feb 2, 2006, 01:02 AM

Originally Posted by Chuckit

You don't think anything has been written in C89 since 1995? What do you reckon all the C programmers were using in 1996?

Whoops...I mistook ANSI C for the original K&R C!

I had forgotten that ANSI C and C89 were essentially the same thing!

heh...good or K&R C... (yes, I had to look up the syntax)

Code:
int myFunc(x,y)
char* x, y;
{
...
}

Spaceman Spiff · Feb 2, 2006, 04:28 PM

Originally Posted by Chuckit

They do, but it would likely be a lot more than a simple recompile —�but that's true of porting a C++ Mac program as well.

The only project type with "C++" in the name is a command-line tool, but that isn't the only one you can use C++ with. Most actual Mac apps written in C++ are Carbon applications, so that's the project type you'd use. Even an Objective-C Cocoa program can incorporate C++ code to a certain degree.

So, if I used Carbon, would there be a difference (other than a checkbox or something?) I think that Carbon is/was for developers switching from OS 9 to OS X, so are some things impossible or harder done in Carbon than Cocoa?

Chuckit · Feb 2, 2006, 04:48 PM

Carbon and Cocoa are very different. It's not that one is necessarily less capable than the other, they're just different. To generalize a lot, I would say Cocoa is "easier." Carbon is fairly massive and doesn't have as much of the friendly OO abstraction you get with Cocoa.

Brass · Feb 2, 2006, 05:26 PM

I think that Apple originally inteded Carbon to be a "transition" technology from Classic Mac OS to Mac OS X. However, this is certainly not the case now. It is not the poor cousin to Cocoa, and I think it may even be faster than Cocoa in some some ways (Obj-C's ease-of-use implementation of OOP is not the speediest).

Having said that, I still prefer to use Cocoa/Obj-C.

flanders · Feb 5, 2006, 05:16 PM

If you're writing new code, then cocoa is probably the best way to go since you're starting fresh. Carbon does have it's applications though and certainly could be used. IMO, carbon gives you a much "closer" feel to the operating system/hardware than cocoa does. There's a lot of abstraction in the cocoa frameworks. Most of the time, carbon applications are written in C++ but could also be in other languages as well. Carbon simply refers to the library you use and link to when you compile your app. Contrast that with using the cocoa frameworks which are all obj-c .

Chuckit · Feb 5, 2006, 05:40 PM

Cocoa is meant for Objective-C, but you can use other languages with it. Java, Perl, Python, Ruby and probably several others I haven't thought of all have Cocoa bridges.

Angus_D · Feb 5, 2006, 09:58 PM

Note that the Java bridge is deprecated, though.

Chuckit · Feb 5, 2006, 11:43 PM

I thought the bridging technology was deprecated (Bridgette or whatever it was called), but Cocoa-Java was still alive. Did they deprecate the whole thing?

Catfish_Man · Feb 6, 2006, 12:14 AM

They've said that no future API will be added to Cocoa-Java, but existing ones will continue to work.

parallax · Feb 11, 2006, 03:10 PM

Definitely go with Cocoa/Objective-C. You can find plenty of information on how to do so in the archives.

C++ is a terrible language. Never learn it if you can help it.

Spaceman Spiff · Feb 11, 2006, 03:45 PM

Originally Posted by parallax

Definitely go with Cocoa/Objective-C. You can find plenty of information on how to do so in the archives.

C++ is a terrible language. Never learn it if you can help it.

I've started on C, and I plan to go onto Cocoa/Objective-C, but what makes C++ a terrible language?

MacG33k · Feb 21, 2006, 11:52 PM

Go to http://cocoadevcentral.com and read C tutorial. It gives you enough C to move on to ObjC. Whatever language you choose to learn, just remember that the languages aren't that difficult to learn, it's the APIs and framework that's really important.

BTW, C++ is not a terrible language. There should be only two languages in computing, C/C++ and SmallTalk. I also can't stand any language that tries to manage memory for you. I'm hoping for the day when the garbage collector disposes itself.

Detrius · Feb 22, 2006, 01:30 AM

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

I've started on C, and I plan to go onto Cocoa/Objective-C, but what makes C++ a terrible language?

C++ is a strongly typed language, while Objective-C is a weakly typed language. Type errors get caught by the compiler with C++, but type errors get caught by paying users with Objective-C. This means that Objective-C is easier to program with, as you don't get as many compiler errors. With Objective-C, it's significantly easier to add common functions to unrelated objects. This can make it easier to program with. However, C++ makes sure you absolutely meant to do what you typed.

On the other hand, Cocoa is a far cleaner API than Carbon. Objective-C is heavily tied to Cocoa, while on the Mac, Carbon gets tied to C++ (though technically, it's a C interface). Since Cocoa is a much better API than Carbon, some people make the conclusion that C++ is terrible. (I'm not trying to say that anyone here is making this conclusion... that's just my two cents.)

parallax · Feb 27, 2006, 06:49 PM

In short, C++ is a hack of an object-oriented system. There are places where it's just broken (search the web for details). Debugging errors with templates is a nightmare.

MacG33k, LISP is another language that should be in computing.

leperkuhn · Feb 27, 2006, 07:05 PM

Originally Posted by MacG33k

Go to http://cocoadevcentral.com and read C tutorial. It gives you enough C to move on to ObjC. Whatever language you choose to learn, just remember that the languages aren't that difficult to learn, it's the APIs and framework that's really important.

BTW, C++ is not a terrible language. There should be only two languages in computing, C/C++ and SmallTalk. I also can't stand any language that tries to manage memory for you. I'm hoping for the day when the garbage collector disposes itself.

I've gotta admit, this is one of the most ignorant posts I've ever read. Garbage collection is the greatest thing to be added to a programming language, ever.