Mac and iPhone Programming Books

The introduction of Apple’s iPhone Software Development Kit has lead several friends to ask me for book recommendations to help them get started developing for the iPhone and Mac.

While the selection is not huge at the moment, the few books that do exist are actually quite good.

There are two primary technologies used to develop iphone and Mac software. Objective-C is the programming language and Cocoa is the framework that provides the building blocks for building applications.

Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X (3rd Edition), by Aaron Hilegass, is probably the most recommended Mac programming book published. The current edition is outdated, but serves as a very good teaching aid for the beginning Cocoa programmer. But, if you can wait until this summer, the 3rd edition of this book will cover the additions and improvements to the Cocoa framework that Apple has added in Tiger and Leopard.

Cocoa uses the Objective-C language and
Programming in Objective-C, by Stephen Kochan, teaches the fundamentals you’ll need to get your work done.

Alternatively, you may want to look into the eBook Learn Objective-C on the Macintosh, By Mark Dalrymple and Scott Knaster. I haven’t read this one, but have heard good things.

One of the cool things about Objective-C is that it’s basically an extension of the C programming language. While programming in straight C is not usually required, it does come up from time to time and it can be very helpful to know what you are doing. If you don’t know C, you many want to check out the eBook Learn C on the Macintosh, By Dave Mark.

The books listed above will get you started programming for the Mac and iPhone, but if you are interested in advanced topics or event Apple Script, the following books might be helpful.

I’ve read most of these books, but the few that I haven’t were recommended to me and have very good reputations.


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5 responses to “Mac and iPhone Programming Books”

  1. […] my previous post, Mac and iPhone Programming Books, I briefly mentioned the eBook Core Animation for OS […]

  2. Henry forrester Avatar

    What type of RSS feed do you use here, because i can’t seem to get it working with my reader… 🙁 hopefully I’ll figure it out because I like this place!

    1. Jon Trainer Avatar

      Henry: The news feed link is in the upper right corner of the page. Currently, I use feedburner as a feed providers.

  3. vishwa Avatar
    vishwa

    Programming in Objective-C is a good book.