Complete NOOB Here, Need help from anyone with experience!

[Rocketman919]

I know, i know, there have been tons of threads with people wanting to start developing. I want exact answers for these questions.

1. How do i begin? I was thinking of Learning C first and then transferring over to Obj C once i was ready.

2. Best book for Learning C? I was thinking about getting the Absolute Beginners Guide to C But it looks terribly old and possibly outdated. It has great reviews though.

3. Best book for Obj-C? I was thinking of getting Programming in Obj-C 2.0

And then getting Beginning iPhone Development

Now are these any good? If you know of any better ones what are they? Can i skip over Programming in Obj-C and go straight to Beginning iPhone Development?

Remember i am a complete noob with no programming experience whatsoever, so please help me.

[Rocketman919]

please, do any devs think that these would be good starting books?

[PoV]

Sure, if you stick with that, it can be done.

The problem most experienced people have is they may not remember an exact book that they learned from, or if the ones they did matter anymore.

C is an old language with origins back in the early 70's. Age of a book shouldn't matter if it's highly praised as a beginner book.

Practically speaking, you'll learn more by doing than reading. To really grasp it, expect to jump back and forth between reading something in the book and trying it on the computer.

You'll do yourself a service to get used to working in the Terminal. Learn how to browse your computer with "cd Directory", "ls", and the Tab key. The basics of C are based around the Terminal. printf( "Blah" ) writes to it, as most beginner books will likely start you with.

[Rocketman919]

Originally Posted by PoV

Sure, if you stick with that, it can be done.

The problem most experienced people have is they may not remember an exact book that they learned from, or if the ones they did matter anymore.

C is an old language with origins back in the early 70's. Age of a book shouldn't matter if it's highly praised as a beginner book.

Practically speaking, you'll learn more by doing than reading. To really grasp it, expect to jump back and forth between reading something in the book and trying it on the computer.

You'll do yourself a service to get used to working in the Terminal. Learn how to browse your computer with "cd Directory", "ls", and the Tab key. The basics of C are based around the Terminal. printf( "Blah" ) writes to it, as most beginner books will likely start you with.

Okay but as long as i start with C and then learn Obj C i should be fine right?

[PoV]

Yes. ObjC (and C++) are derivatives of C, so ObjC will make more sense with an understanding of C.

[wastedyuthe]

Hi people. I'll be honest, I am thinking of getting into it too. I used to program games in Basic (don't laugh please) on my Atari ST, Spectrum, and even the ancient Acorn Electron. But I know I am rather behind the times now.
I have a question- Will learning C before ObjC make you have to unlearn what you learnt with C? ie, are there many significant differences between them?
I don't want to have to learn something in C, then have to learn another way to do the same thing in ObjC.

Also if I want to learn these languages, is there anything else I need other than Xcode from the Leopard disk and the iPhone SDK? I spotted the iPhone Developer program on the Apple site, which you have to pay for. So what's the difference between that and the free SDK and Xcode?

[brewstermax]

Originally Posted by wastedyuthe

Hi people. I'll be honest, I am thinking of getting into it too. I used to program games in Basic (don't laugh please) on my Atari ST, Spectrum, and even the ancient Acorn Electron. But I know I am rather behind the times now.
I have a question- Will learning C before ObjC make you have to unlearn what you learnt with C? ie, are there many significant differences between them?
I don't want to have to learn something in C, then have to learn another way to do the same thing in ObjC.

Also if I want to learn these languages, is there anything else I need other than Xcode from the Leopard disk and the iPhone SDK? I spotted the iPhone Developer program on the Apple site, which you have to pay for. So what's the difference between that and the free SDK and Xcode?

The dev program allows you to use the program on an actual iPhone and to publish it to the app store. That's all.

[wastedyuthe]

Originally Posted by brewstermax

The dev program allows you to use the program on an actual iPhone and to publish it to the app store. That's all.

Thanks pal. I have just dl'd the SDK for the moment, and will be learning ObjC. I am only interested in basic 2D games atm so don't want to get into that whole Unity thing.
I won't bother with the developer program for the moment, as I think I'll need a couple of months playing about first.

[Diablohead]

No point paying premium prices while you are still learning so good choice

[wastedyuthe]

Originally Posted by Diablohead

No point paying premium prices while you are still learning so good choice

Thanks. Just hope I can get my head around learning this stuff now