Hello,
I’m look for options I have to build native application on IPhones. I already know and love Ruby and, at first glance, I don’t like the Objective-C’s synthax.
I’m interested to have your opinion on those alternatives. What is your preference. Do you have a better alternative?
Thanks!
Hi,
RubyMotion and Objective-C are the 2 best choices. I would stick to one of those because of the great support that exists for them. I’m an Objective-C developer so I don’t mind the syntax but I know it’s very different than Ruby. I’d say give Objective-C a try. It’s the language of Apple so you’ll find the most help with that when you hit bugs or try to figure something out. If it ends up being something you really can’t stand you can always go back to RubyMotion and you’ll have a better understanding of that from the time with Objective-C. Whatever you decide, good luck and have fun!
Tony
Objective C is very easy if u know some java.
Why? The synthax is very not similar. Do you mean it’s the same philosophy and the way to do objects is the same?
The syntax isnt the same but it is just like java. It is a compiled language, has the same concepts. I was an iphone programmer for 3 yrs and not am into the backend. Ruby and Rails are truly awesome but only when you have lots of memory on your side. You will learn how to free your memory when programing in objective c plus you will be the first one to play around with the the ios8 when it releases.
I wouldn’t think too much about Java, honestly. You should definitely use either native Objective-C or RubyMotion. If you’re comfortable with Ruby, RM isn’t a bad choice. No matter which you choose, you’ll spend more time learning the frameworks than the language. Objective-C actually isn’t that hard to learn.
Alright, I’ll bite.
I found that when jumping headfirst into building for iOS the challenge was getting familiar with the cocoa touch API and the “idea” of MVC in the context of a true GUI application.
With regards to the MVC thing - If you’ve been programming exclusively on the web for a while the request/response model can pretty much get thrown out the window. It doesn’t take that long to wrap your head around it but when you’re dealing with figuring out the api, the toolchain, the open source landscape - it’s a lot.
Apple’s API docs are good but it’s big. One thing I noticed, also, was that while the docs are GOOD there aren’t a whole lot of examples in the docs themselves. You’re left to google and search through SO - which helps.You should thank @mark for a lot of that good stuff.
So where would I come down on the answer for this?
If you’re in a rush and under a deadline - go with rubymotion.
If you have time and a support system (coworkers, consultants, etc) - go with Obj C.
I’m, personally, in a tight development window so I went with Rubymotion and I’ve been happy with it.
One thing @gfontenot and @tonyd256 neglected to bring up is Xcode. Guys how awesome is Xcode, right?!?
Last thought - I don’t think there’s a wrong answer here. Just pick one and go with it and be happy with it.
Xcode is the least bad IDE out there, in my opinion, but it’s still an IDE. Take that as you will.
+1 for RubyMotion.
I recommend the following resources:
https://motioninmotion.tv/
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/rubymotion
Also, RMQ http://infinitered.com/rmq/ is awesome. Pixate initially seemed awesome but we removed it because of performance issues.