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iOS How long did it take you?!?

Metal Dice

Metal Dice

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 3, 2009
233
0
Denmark
I'm learning Objective-C, i have had no programming experience before this, and i have been reading for about 1 month. I really want to know how long it takes to learn it well. And i know its different for everybody.

So my question is:
How long did it take you from having no Obj-C knowledge,
to create your first fairly good app. And did you have any programming experience before learning Obj-C

Sorry if there is already a thread like this, i couldn't find one.
 
I learnt on and off over about 3 months, probably averaging about 5 - 10 hours a week. I've been able to build a quite sophisticated TV Guide app :)

I knew PHP and Javascript before hand, which helped a bit (a lot of the syntax for if statements, switches etc are the same as PHP).
 
Metal Dice said:
So my question is:
How long did it take you from having no Obj-C knowledge, to create your first fairly good app.
And did you have any programming experience before learning Obj-C
Click to expand...
I'd say it took me less than a month from having no Obj-C knowledge to my first published app, [app]a.k.a.[/app]. But I've had plenty of programming experience before, all the way back to writing BASIC apps for the Commodore PET in 1981. Since then my most widespread experience has been with the following languages: C, Nomad, PL/SQL, JavaScript, Java.
 
It took myself and Rob just under a month from having never touched a Mac and Objective-C to release the first version of iBinaryClock. Objective-C is a very quick language to learn if you have experience with anything similar to C. The main learning curve for us was getting used to cocoa and its conventions etc as its not like anything I'd ever touched before.

Previous to that I had experience with C, C++, C#, Visual Basic, Java and bits of x86 and ARM7 Assembler
 
dejo said:
I'd say it took me less than a month from having no Obj-C knowledge to my first published app, [app]a.k.a.[/app]. But I've had plenty of programming experience before, all the way back to writing BASIC apps for the Commodore PET in 1981. Since then my most widespread experience has been with the following languages: C, Nomad, PL/SQL, JavaScript, Java.
Click to expand...

God! You are loaded with knowledge!!! :)
 
For someone with programming experience, it might take only a few weeks to a couple months to be able to develop projects in Obj-C.

For someone with no programming experience, and who need to learn to program first, it might take several months to a few years before they can program themselves out of a paper bag of any thickness. There exist people with college degrees in IT who still can't.

IMHO.
 
firewood said:
For someone with programming experience, it might take only a few weeks to a couple months to be able to develop projects in Obj-C.

For someone with no programming experience, and who need to learn to program first, it might take several months to a few years before they can program themselves out of a paper bag of any thickness. There exist people with college degrees in IT who still can't.

IMHO.
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Thank you so much for letting me know. I have been reading for about 1 month and i have learned a lot, but not enough to make my own well written app. I though i was dumb lol. Since i have heard a lot of wonder stories on how people have learned Obj-C and made their apps in just 1 month.
Anyway that made me feel better lol. Thanks :)
 
It took me about 2 months to learn the basics, and I was creating a full app along the way. Now it has been 4 months, and I finally finished the app! The graphics and sounds too the longest though. Before that, I had NO experience with any language, except Visual Basic, but it was completely different from that, so technically I had NO experience at all!
 
simplymuzik3 said:
It took me about 2 months to learn the basics, and I was creating a full app along the way. Now it has been 4 months, and I finally finished the app! The graphics and sounds too the longest though. Before that, I had NO experience with any language, except Visual Basic, but it was completely different from that, so technically I had NO experience at all!
Click to expand...

Well at least you knew what programming was. You probably already knew what loops/functions... were. So you were already thinking like a programmer.
Let me know if i'm wrong. :)
 
Metal Dice said:
Well at least you knew what programming was. You probably already knew what loops/functions... were. So you were already thinking like a programmer.
Let me know if i'm wrong. :)
Click to expand...


Actually, I didn't know any of that. I was only doing VB for 2 months in a high school course. It was so boring, and we didnt learn anything. The only thing I learned was "if" statements, which actually helped me =) Nothing about functions or anything. VB is HORRIBLE!!!!
 
simplymuzik3 said:
Actually, I didn't know any of that. I was only doing VB for 2 months in a high school course. It was so boring, and we didnt learn anything. The only thing I learned was "if" statements, which actually helped me =) Nothing about functions or anything. VB is HORRIBLE!!!!
Click to expand...
Cool. I'm getting a bit inspired. Is your app already on the Appstore. If it is, whats the name? (Getting curios here.)
Sorry if i'm bugging you
 
Metal Dice said:
Cool. I'm getting a bit inspired. Is your app already on the Appstore. If it is, whats the name? (Getting curios here.)
Sorry if i'm bugging you
Click to expand...

Don't worry, you're not bugging me, it actually gives me something to do =) I just got my app approved about 3 hours ago (total 10 days from submission). The app is set to release this Friday, and it's called MindBlender Quiz. You can check it out here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG7t52JUU2w

Any other questions you have? Oh, and there's also tutorials on my YouTube channel, you can get to it through the video link above. Hope all that stuff helps you!
 
simplymuzik3 said:
Don't worry, you're not bugging me, it actually gives me something to do =) I just got my app approved about 3 hours ago (total 10 days from submission). The app is set to release this Friday, and it's called MindBlender Quiz. You can check it out here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG7t52JUU2w

Any other questions you have? Oh, and there's also tutorials on my YouTube channel, you can get to it through the video link above. Hope all that stuff helps you!
Click to expand...

Thank you so much. :)
 
simplymuzik3 said:
Actually, I didn't know any of that. I was only doing VB for 2 months in a high school course. It was so boring, and we didnt learn anything. The only thing I learned was "if" statements, which actually helped me =) Nothing about functions or anything. VB is HORRIBLE!!!!
Click to expand...

Why is VB horrible? Sure its not C, C++ or Objective-C but its by far the easiest and best Windows RAD programming language I have ever come across. If you want horrible try MFC with C++
 
mccannmarc said:
Why is VB horrible? Sure its not C, C++ or Objective-C but its by far the easiest and best Windows RAD programming language I have ever come across. If you want horrible try MFC with C++
Click to expand...

Sure, VB is easy to use. It's great for starting out programming, but when we started to do animation with VB in high school, it was dreadful. So many lines on code/loops etc just to animate a circle across the screen! I guess I have gotten used to how easy it is to do animations with the iPhone. It only takes like 3 lines of code, and it's so much easier to use (at least I think it is). Compared to iPhone programming, I consider VB to be horrible. I have only programming with those 2 platforms/languages, so Im not sure how it compares to everything else.
 
You can look at it that way. But i would think that you would chose a language for a specific project. I would use VB if i just wanted to make a data entry application. I mean its easy and quick in that respect.

I use visual FoxPro at my work and that is rough and very different to all other languages you should check that one out lol!

Or the other language I use, is not really a language at all. Its for warehouse management, you have to make an object for everything. I mean everything. There is no way to reuse code with ease. Basically looks like a data grid with gotos that go every direction. Modifying the old companies code is like hell on earth, their standards and naming conventions were terrible.
 
simplymuzik3 said:
Sure, VB is easy to use. It's great for starting out programming, but when we started to do animation with VB in high school, it was dreadful. So many lines on code/loops etc just to animate a circle across the screen! I guess I have gotten used to how easy it is to do animations with the iPhone. It only takes like 3 lines of code, and it's so much easier to use (at least I think it is). Compared to iPhone programming, I consider VB to be horrible. I have only programming with those 2 platforms/languages, so Im not sure how it compares to everything else.
Click to expand...

That is your opinion and if I'm honest not one of a qualified nature. Try not to slate a language in a forum full of programmers until you have had a real purpose to use it and a real reason why its rubbish. Using your logic, Obj-C & Cocoa on iPhone is crap because it takes a lot of code to write a frontend for a corporate MS Access database whereas in VB it's a walk in the park. See what I mean? I'm not trying to have a go at you but from a Windows programmers perspective VB can be a godsend compared to the dullness of Windows API programming in C/C++ or MFC in C++. .Net is a completely different ballgame so I will leave it out of this comparison
 
mccannmarc said:
That is your opinion and if I'm honest not one of a qualified nature. Try not to slate a language in a forum full of programmers until you have had a real purpose to use it and a real reason why its rubbish. Using your logic, Obj-C & Cocoa on iPhone is crap because it takes a lot of code to write a frontend for a corporate MS Access database whereas in VB it's a walk in the park. See what I mean? I'm not trying to have a go at you but from a Windows programmers perspective VB can be a godsend compared to the dullness of Windows API programming in C/C++ or MFC in C++. .Net is a completely different ballgame so I will leave it out of this comparison
Click to expand...

I didn't mean to upset someone, I was thinking/writing from a gaming perspective. I have never had experience with anything else, so Im sorry if I offended you. =)
 
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