[GD-Windows] RE: [GD-General] Eiffel

[Brian H. <bri...@py...>]

> Hey Brian you're selling this pretty well. I'm about ready to 
> go out and buy a Mac. :) Seriously though if you're this 
> excited about something, and it's got Apple's full weight 
> behind it, I'd like to check it out, if for no other reason 
> than to have something to copy in my own designs.

Go check out developer.apple.com for all the blurbs and background
information on Cocoa and Obj-C.  Pick up a book like "Learning Cocoa" or
something similar.  The book "Object Oriented Programming and the
Objective-C Language" is a good place too, and I think it's in PDF form
on their Web site.

I'll warn you now though, you won't be able to copy much of the designs
because much of Cocoa's power comes from the way IB, Cocoa and Obj-C
interact, and Obj-C is just a radically different way of thinking than
C++ (dynamic typing with optional static type checking).

> How did you get into Cocoa/Obj-C and what tools do you need
> for it?

I've been a NextStep fan boy for ages, but Cocoa was the first time I
got to really use it.  By the time I had the means and time to use NS,
OpenStep was out and not very stable or fast on NT.

Since our games are going to be running no a Mac, I had to buy a
PowerMac anyway.  Just for grins I loaded up PB and tried to write a
little OpenGL visualization tool.  With NO prior Cocoa/Obj-C programming
experience, I got a fractal terrain generator visualization tool, with
UI, working in about 6 hours.  If I had to do it again, more like 45
minutes.

I haven't had much time to mess with it anymore, but I plan on getting
back into it on our later projects that will require tools.

> to give any specifics? Or should I simply go to the Apple dev 
> site and read some glossies? :)

Here's the best part -- the dev tools are FREE.  ProjectBuilder, the
compiler (gcc), Interface Builder, libs, everything are freely
downloadable (and come with the OS X retail CDs, although not with OS X
on pre-installed machines).

It's a Better Way of Doing Things.  Unfortunately, it's limited to OS X.

Brian