How to Learn to Develop iPhone Apps
- 1). Purchase a Mac computer or acquire access to a Mac computer, if you don't own one. Using Apple's software developer kit (SDK) and executing Apple's in-house programming languages such as Objective-C and Cocoa, which are both essential to develop iPhone apps, requires a computer that runs the Leopard version of MacOS X.
- 2). Register for the iPhone Developer Program on the Apple Developer website, then download the iOS SDK. Apple's iOS SDK includes simulators and tools required to develop iPhone apps. Once you sign up for a developer account and download the SDK, you will gain access to technical resources, such as the iOS Reference Library, which includes sample code you can manipulate to create your own apps, and how-to guides which directly explain how to execute functions, such as playing sound or detecting motion within an iPhone app.
- 3). Learn programming languages such as Objective-C, Cocoa and OpenGL, which are all pertinent to learning and developing iPhone apps. While Objective-C and Cocoa are programming languages developed by Apple itself, learning OpenGL, which is a cross-platform programming language for creating high performance graphics, may require learning resources outside of the Apple iOS Reference Library and technical resources. You can access an OpenGL programming guide, reference manual and recommended OpenGL tutorial books from the organizations website to learn the programming language.
- 4). Take a course designed specifically for teaching iPhone app development. Universities such as Stanford have courses that teach potential iPhone app programmers how to code and develop iPhone apps. Search for courses that cover Objective-C and Cocoa, as well as graphics development for iPhone apps. Some of these courses only last a few weeks or months and require some programming knowledge.
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