Category: Miscellaneous

A phone by any other name would smell as sweet…

The general consensus is that there will be a new iPhone announced next week. I, like others, think it’s going to have new features and capabilities. But how is Apple going to label this new device?

iPhone 3G?

It’s entirely possible that Apple will keep the same name as the previous version. There’s precedence in the Mac product line: we’ve had MacBook Pros for several years now with various ways of distinguishing different product iterations (“Late 2008”, “Unibody”, etc.)

Given Apple’s reluctance to publish any of the device’s hardware capabilities, this would seem to make sense.

Except for one small problem. It’s likely that the new iPhone will have a faster processor and more memory. Some applications will be written to take specific advantage of these improvements. And that, of course, means that you need a way to let iTunes customers know if those applications are compatible with their device.

I don’t see Apple putting “iPhone 3G (2008)” and “iPhone 3G (2009)” anywhere in the iTunes UI. It’s just too confusing.

iPhone 4G?

What about having artificial product designations like they did with PowerPC desktop Macs: “G3”, “G4” and “G5.”

The problem here is that 3G refers to a network service, not a product generation. If this naming convention is used, customers are bound to wonder if a “4G” product works on their 3G network.

iPhone 3G Plus?

So maybe they do something like we’ve seen with the iPod product line. Using terms like “Classic”, “mini”, “nano” and “shuffle” to differentiate the products.

The problem here, of course, is that there’s only one product on sale. Unless Apple plans to keep the current product on sale (at a reduced price,) this just doesn’t make sense.

I’m not going to make any predictions on the device’s name, but I will be paying close attention. The ultimate choice is likely to offer some subtle clues regarding Apple’s plans to evolve this product in future revisions.

Written on June 4th, 2009 for Miscellaneous, Observation

Front Row To Go

Everyone and his brother has a prediction about Apple and the mythical “netbook.” This is mine.

Before I get into the actual prediction, let me say that I’ve come to this conclusion by looking at Apple as a business, not as a supplier of shiny gadgets for our technolust. As much as we love the things they make, their goal as a corporation is to make the stockholder’s happy. They do that by selling lots of products. We’re just a means to that end.

A lot of the speculation regarding the netbook says that it provides functionality in the price gap between a $200 iPhone and a $1000 MacBook. While that’s true, it misses the point.

Apple would rather sell you another device in addition to the ones they already sell. They’re not interested in cutting into (presumably healthy) MacBook sales with a netbook. Likewise, selling a bigger touch device could cut into iPhone sales: keep your crappy cell phone and buy the netbook to throw in your purse or backpack.

One of the things that saved Apple was a simplified product line based around professional and consumer uses. Does it really make sense to have more than one consumer-level device for laptop computing? The MacBook already kicks ass in that department: having another device in that category just muddies the water.

But what if there was a device that could work in conjunction with your other Apple products? Something that extended their capabilities. Something that made each product better for a few hundred dollars.

Apple and their shareholders would love this: you’d buy the iPhone and the “netbook”. And eventually the MacBook. And maybe an Apple TV. And probably an iPod, too.

So what are some of the problems with the current hardware lineup?

  • iPhone / iPod touch – Small screen, small keyboard.
  • Mac – No touch screen, running Front Row prevents using your Mac for other things.
  • Apple TV – crappy remote, no keyboard.
  • iPod – Very small screen with no touch screen or keyboard.

So what kind of product could fill in these gaps? I call it “Front Row To Go.” Think of it as a second screen for the current hardware. Something that could:

  • Display photos on a larger screen than on the iPhones and iPods. It would also be effective as an adjunct to iPhoto on the desktop: Microsoft’s Surface prototype shows how effective it is to display pictures on a horizontal surface that can be manipulated by multiple viewers.
  • Provide a touch screen keyboard for the iPhone and Apple TV: a better input mechanism than hunting and pecking on chiclets. (Maybe this is the reason Bluetooth keyboards aren’t available for the iPhone.)
  • Show movies on a larger screen: anyone who’s taken a transoceanic flight knows that looking at the iPhone/iPod screen for more than a couple hours can be quite tiresome. An added benefit is that the player’s battery wouldn’t be consumed by the display’s power needs.
  • Provide touch input to desktop applications. Multi-touch is never going to happen on a vertically oriented display, so make a separate device that works horizontally. An obvious benefit to developers is that they don’t have to rewrite code: if it makes sense, multi-touch can be added to enhance current applications.

As with all other Apple products, Front Row To Go could obviously work as a standalone device. Sync your content onto the device and take it with you: no more dragging a laptop to a family reunion just because Aunt Bessie can’t see the tiny photos on the iPhone. Get your bookmarks and feeds from the Mac and surf the web using Front Row To Go’s version of Safari while you’re listening to music or watching TV.

As far as how these features would be implemented, that’s anyone’s guess. There might be an API for developers, or maybe it’s a closed system. The device might be able to play iPhone games or run multiple iPhone applications at once (much like the current Dashboard works in Mac OS X.) With a common base of OS X running throughout the product line, pretty much anything is possible.

And that gets to the real point of this essay: think about what Apple has learned from the halo effect surrounding the iPod (and now the iPhone.) If you have any doubt that this effect is alive and well, drop into an Apple Store on any weekend and take a look around: plenty of customers who are happy with one product and looking at others.

In my opinion, these consumers are the ones that Apple will target with a “netbook,” not the ones that are jonesing for a sexy little machine that fills a perceived gap in the product range. I hope I’m right, because I’d love to be one of those customers lining up to buy Front Row To Go.

Written on March 16th, 2009 for Miscellaneous, Observation, Opinion

Open sesame

Here’s a simple little script that saves me a lot of time:

#!/bin/sh 

if [ -z "$1" ]; then
  echo "usage: $0  [ Preferences |  ]"
else
  base=~/Library/Application\ Support/iPhone\ Simulator/
  apps=Applications
  app=`ls -1td "$base/"*"/$apps/"*"/$1.app" | head -1`
  if [ -n "$app" ]; then
    dir=`dirname "$app"`
    if [ "$2" = "Preferences" ]; then
      open "$dir/Library/Preferences"
    else
      open "$dir/Documents/$2"
    fi
  fi
fi

Put this script somewhere on your PATH and name it opensim. Use it to find the most recent application loaded in the simulator and open the Preferences, Documents or a named document in the Finder.

For example, to open the current Documents folder for an application in the iPhone Simulator, just do this:

$ opensim Thunderbird

To open a document within that folder, you can do this:

$ opensim Thunderbird chockenberry.db
$ opensim Thunderbird accounts.plist

You can easily get to your preferences folder with:

$ opensim Thunderbird Preferences

Notice how I haven’t mentioned a GUID in this essay? That’s the feature…

Written on March 3rd, 2009 for Development, Miscellaneous

Bootstrap

A lot of people stumble upon this website because they’re looking for information about developing applications for the iPhone. If this is your first time here, welcome!

I have been developing applications for the iPhone since it was released (using both the Jailbreak and official SDK.) My company is currently selling several applications in iTunes. I also have many years of experience with the underlying technologies on the device (Cocoa, the predecessor to Cocoa Touch.) I’d like to share some of my experiences and give you some pointers that will help get you started.

The first thing you need to know is that learning how to develop applications for a mobile device isn’t easy. But it’s worth the effort, ask any seasoned iPhone developer about seeing their work run on the device for the first time: it’s fricken’ amazing.

Get a Feel for the Device

Some of you may want to target the web with your application. If this is the case, you’ll want to start looking at a series of articles I wrote for A List Apart: Put Your Content in My Pocket (Part 1 and Part 2.)

Even if you’re going to be writing a native application, knowing how to develop web pages for Mobile Safari will be helpful. A product information website and other ancillary information about your app will work best when your new customers can view it on their device.

Working with the web is also a good way to start understanding how a mobile device is so much different than a desktop. Using HTML and CSS can be an excellent way to begin thinking about your application design and doing prototypes—we’ve used this technique in many of our own products.

After getting a feel for the web capabilities of the iPhone and iPod touch, you’ll want to look around the Apple Developer Connection (ADC) site for more in-depth technical documentation for developing web applications.

Which leads to our next topic…

Buy a Mac

There’s no two ways about it. If you’re going to develop iPhone applications, you’re going to do it on a Mac. The whole toolchain is Mac-only: you can’t do it in Visual Studio or Eclipse or anything else that runs on Windows.

Don’t think that this is some evil plan by Apple to make you use a Mac. It’s no more nefarious than Microsoft requiring Mac developers to purchase Visual Studio in order to develop Windows versions of our products.

Buying a Mac can be an expensive proposition: if you’re just getting started and on a shoestring budget, here’s some advice on doing it on the cheap:

  1. Buy a used machine. A lot of perfectly good hardware can be found on Ebay. New models of the Mac Book Pro were recently introduced, so many people are selling hardware after they upgrade. This older hardware is perfectly fine for doing iPhone development: the apps you’re going to develop are small and compact and don’t need a lot of processor power to build and test.
  2. Buy a Mac mini. Even though you’re buying new hardware, you’ll save money because you’re supplying your own display, keyboard and other peripherals. If you’re like me, you have plenty of this stuff lying around.

If you’re having a hard time justifying the hardware expenditure, remember that you can run Windows or any other x86 based OS on this machine.

The only thing to keep in mind as you’re buying hardware: make sure that the Mac has an Intel processor. The development tools won’t run on the older PowerPC processors.

The good news is that once you buy the Mac, all the development tools are free. Think about all the money you spent buying Visual Studio and MSDN and you’ll feel much better about spending a thousand bucks for the hardware :-)

So how do you get all these free development tools? Read on…

Join Up and Download

There are two things you’ll need to do before you can start writing applications: sign up for ADC and register to become an iPhone developer.

Neither of these things costs money. Everything is free until you want to put your code onto the device. At that point, you’ll need to pay $99 to get a certificate that allows you to sign the binary and put it on the device.

The first step is to create an Apple ID; it’s an email address that you’ll use to access the developer site. You may already have one for your iTunes account. These pages guide you through the sign-up process.

Once you have an application that you want to test on a device and distribute on the App Store, you need to apply to the iPhone Developer Program.

After you have the keys to the ADC kingdom, there is a wealth of additional information available…

Sit Back and Watch Some Movies

Before you start diving into coding, I highly recommend spending a few hours watching the “Getting Started Videos” in the iPhone Dev Center.

(Note: if the links on that page are grayed out, it’s because you’re not logged in yet. Sign in using the Apple ID that you obtained above.)

As I said earlier, I came into iPhone development with a fairly extensive background in the technologies used on the device: even so, I learned a lot from these videos. Make sure you take advantage of this valuable resource.

And make sure you do it before rushing off and hacking on code…

Start Playing

If you’re like me, you’ll want to start playing around with code as soon as possible. The best way to do this is with the excellent sample code that Apple provides on its developer site.

(Note: Again, that link is behind a login, so you’ll need an Apple ID before you can download the samples.)

Since you’re new to iPhone development, it’s likely that you’ll have some problems going beyond a simple build and run of the projects you download. (If you’re having problems running the sample projects, make sure that you have “Simulator” selected in the drop-down menu at the top of the project window.)

When you start to get confused by Xcode or the syntax of Objective-C, you’ll want to move onto the next step…

(Note: I said “when”, not “if”. Trust me on this.)

Crack a Book or Two or Three

You’re lucky that there are a lot of great books about iPhone development available now. It’s a luxury that those of us who worked on iPhone apps during the NDA are very jealous of :-)

If you’re just starting out, I’d highly recommend Beginning iPhone Development: Exploring the iPhone SDK by Dave Mark and Jeff LaMarche. The best thing about this book is the step-by-step approach it takes to working with Xcode, Objective-C and the iPhone APIs. They’ll lead you through the basics and you’ll be building your own apps in no time at all.

As you get more comfortable with the tools and AppKit/UIKit frameworks, I’d recommend you take a look at Erica Sadun’s iPhone Developer’s Cookbook: Building Applications with the iPhone SDK. This book presumes a bit more knowledge about the SDK, but is a very handy reference both to the official and unofficial APIs. (Go ahead and play with the undocumented features, but do not use them in an application that you want to put on the App Store.) You may want to read my in-depth review of this book.

Since you’re going to be working with Cocoa Touch on the iPhone, you’ll also want to start thinking like a Cocoa programmer. Every great iPhone and Mac developer has nothing but wonderful things to say about Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X by Aaron Hillegass. Don’t be misled by the “for Mac OS X”—you’re going to be working with classes and design patterns that are identical on both platforms. You’ll also have a Mac that you’re using for development, so building the samples and test code isn’t a problem.

If you have previous development experience with C, C++ or Java, you’ll want to read this mailing list post by Erik Buck that enumerates some of the difficulties that you’ll have coming up to speed with Objective-C and Cocoa. Make sure to take some time and read the replies to that post: many of the people commenting on that post are fellow developers whose work I hold in high regard.

And while we’re talking about Erik’s writing: there are a lot of experienced Cocoa developers waiting for this book. You won’t need it for awhile, but you will need it.

As you’ve probably figured out by now, this whole learning process is going to take awhile. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t mention that there is a pretty steep learning curve. I’ve built products in assembly code, BASIC, C/C++ on Unix, X11, Win32, Java and a whole bunch of other technologies. Objective-C and Cocoa weren’t the easiest to pick up, but they’re definitely the ones that I plan on sticking with. Try not to get discouraged: once you “get it” developing with this language and framework is a joyous experience.

Other Resources

I’ve been coding long enough to remember a time when we didn’t have the Internet as a source of information. Thank God those days are behind us: here are some online resources that I use often:

  • cocoabuilder.com There are two mailing lists where other Cocoa developers and Apple engineers hang out: Cocoa-dev and MacOSX-dev. The archives for both of these lists can be searched using CocoaBuilder: extremely handy when you come up against a problem that someone else has already solved.
  • cocoadev.com A wiki that is maintained by the Cocoa developer community. This is the first place I look when I need to learn some new part of the framework. As an example, check out this entry about the string class.
  • cocoadevcentral.com A beautiful site maintained by Scott Stevenson. So many great tutorials and links to other sites and blogs that focus on Cocoa development. Spend some time exploring those links and you’ll learn a lot about our developer community.

Apple recently launched another great resource: Developer Forums. It’s currently in beta, but is still an excellent place to ask fellow developers questions about iPhone SDK topics.

But wait, there’s more!

You’ll find a lot of iPhone content on this site. Here’s proof.

To save you some time, here are some quick links to some of the more popular essays on this site:

Memory management issues (part 1.)

Memory management issues (part 2.)

How to run a beta test.

Extracting information from crash reports.

Final release testing.

What to expect on release day.

Debugging with customer backups.

How to deal with expired certificates.

And, of course, source code for you to use in your own projects:

[REDACTED]

Fancy UILabels

Or just have fun with:

Lights Off

And if you aren’t already completely bored with me crapping on about the iPhone, there are videos.

Conclusion

I hope this information has been helpful and gotten you started in the wonderful world of iPhone development. Don’t forget to subscribe to this site’s RSS feed since I have a lot more I’d like to write about :-)

Good luck!

Written on February 19th, 2009 for Development, Miscellaneous, Observation, Opinion

Macworld famous

As much as I hate watching and listening to myself talk, I’m sure some of you will enjoy seeing the interviews I did at Macworld. At least my Mom will.

The first interview on Monday was with Christina Warren at TUAW who has an unhealthy attraction to one of our products. Also notable is the world premiere of the official CHOCK LOCK T-shirt.

Next up was Robin Rhys from Apple iPhone Apps. We talked about some of the history behind our iPhone apps and explored my thoughts about “ringtone apps” in more detail. 

Next up, was a conversation with a true giant in the Mac community, Merlin Mann. We talked about how I got hooked on the iPhone, started developing apps, and how it all fits into our lives. And, of course, drinking.

On the last day of the conference, it was my pleasure to be a part of Macworld PULSE. I truly enjoyed the chance to sit down with Jason Snell and have a long and in-depth chat about this new technology we call the iPhone. In the comfort of a living room with thousands of seats :-)

Finally, could someone please get my friend Cabel some of those growth hormones that Merlin is using?

Written on February 2nd, 2009 for Miscellaneous
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