You've survived another journey with us, huh? Great! At this point, you know a lot more than you knew when you first opened this book. We would love to tell you that you now know it all, but when it comes to technology, you never know it all. This is particularly true of iPhone development technologies. The programming language and frameworks we've been working with in this book are the end result of well over 20 years of evolution. And Apple engineers are always feverishly working on that Next Cool New Thing™. Despite being much more mature than it was just a year ago, the iPhone platform has still just begun to blossom. There is so much more to come.
By making it through another book, you've built yourself an even sturdier foundation. You've acquired a solid knowledge of Objective-C, Cocoa Touch, and the tools that bring these technologies together to create incredible new iPhone applications. You understand the iPhone software architecture and the design patterns that make Cocoa Touch sing. In short, you are even more ready to chart your own course.
At its core, programming is about problem solving—figuring things out. It's fun and rewarding. But there will be times when you run up against a puzzle that seems insurmountable, a problem that does not appear to have a solution.
Sometimes, the answer just appears—a result of a bit of time away from the problem. A good night's sleep or a few hours of doing something different can often be all that you need to get through it. Believe us, sometimes you can stare at the same problem for hours, overanalyzing and getting yourself so worked up that you miss an obvious solution.
And then there are times when even a change of scenery doesn't help. In those situations, it's good to have friends in high places. Here are some resources you can turn to when you're in a bind.
Become one with Xcode's documentation browser. The documentation browser is a front end to a wealth of incredibly valuable sample source code, concept guides, API references, video tutorials, and a whole lot more.
There are few areas of the iPhone that you won't be able to learn more about by making your way through Apple's documentation. And the more comfortable you get with Apple's documentation, the easier it will be for you to make your way through uncharted territories and new technologies as Apple rolls them out.
The following are some useful mailing lists that are maintained by Apple:
http://lists.apple.com/mailman/listinfo/cocoa-dev: A moderately high-volume list, primarily focused on Cocoa for Mac OS X. Because of the common heritage shared by Cocoa and Cocoa Touch, many of the people on this list may be able to help you. Make sure to search the list archives before asking your question, though.http://lists.apple.com/mailman/listinfo/xcode-users: A mailing list specific to questions and problems related to Xcode.http://lists.apple.com/mailman/listinfo/quartz-dev: A mailing list for discussion of Quartz 2D and Core Graphics technologies.
These are some discussion forums you may like to join:
http://iphonedevbook.com/forum: Forums that we set up and host for iPhone development-related questions. We also make sure that the most current version of the project archives that accompany this book are here, updated with all errata and running on the most current release of the iPhone SDK.http://devforums.apple.com/: Apple's new developer community forums for Mac and iPhone software developers. These require logging in, but that means you can discuss new functionality that's still under NDA. Apple's engineers are known to check in periodically and answer questions.http://www.iphonedevsdk.com/: A web forum where iPhone programmers, both new and experienced, help each other out with problems and advice.http://forums.macrumors.com/forumdisplay.php?f=135: A forum for iPhone programmers hosted by the nice folks at MacRumors.
Here are some web sites that you may want to visit:
http://www.cocoadevcentral.com/: A portal that contains links to a great many Cocoa-related web sites and tutorials.http://cocoaheads.org/: The CocoaHeads site. CocoaHeads is a group dedicated to peer support and promotion of Cocoa. It focuses on local groups with regular meetings, where Cocoa developers can get together, and even socialize a bit. There's nothing better than knowing a real person who can help you out, so if there's a CocoaHeads group in your area, check it out. If there's not, why not start one up?http://nscodernight.com/: The NSCoder Night site. NSCoder Nights are weekly organized meetings where Cocoa programmers get together to code and socialize. Like CocoaHeads, NSCoder Nights are independently organized local events.http://cocoablogs.com/: A portal that contains links to a great many blogs related to Cocoa programming.http://www.iphonedevcentral.org/: A web site devoted to iPhone programming tutorials.http://stackoverflow.com/: Although not specifically oriented toward the iPhone or Objective-C, a great source for finding answers to questions. Many experienced and knowledgeable iPhone programmers, including some who work at Apple, contribute to this site by answering questions and posting sample code.
Check out these blogs:
http://iphonedevelopment.blogspot.com/: Jeff's iPhone development blog. Jeff posts sample code, tutorials, and other information of interest to iPhone developers.http://davemark.com/: Dave's little spot in the sun. Not at all technical, just full of whimsical ephemera that catches Dave's interest and he hopes you'll enjoy, too.http://theocacao.com/: A blog maintained by Scott Stevenson, an experienced Cocoa programmer.http://www.wilshipley.com/blog/: Wil Shipley's blog. Wil is one of the most experienced Objective-C programmers on the planet. His "Pimp My Code" series of blog postings should be required reading for any Objective-C programmer.http://rentzsch.tumblr.com/: Wolf Rentzsch's blog. Wolf is an experienced independent Cocoa programmer and the founder of the C4 Independent Developers conference.http://chanson.livejournal.com/: Chris Hanson's blog. Chris works at Apple on the Xcode team, and his blog is filled with great insight and information about Xcode and related topics.http://www.cimgf.com/: The Cocoa Is My Girlfriend site, which covers software development on both the Mac and iPhone using Objective-C.http://cocoawithlove.com/: A technical blog for Cocoa and Cocoa Touch developers, run by Matt Gallagher. It has many tutorials.http://mattgemmell.com/: Matt Legend Gemmell's blog. Matt is an experienced Cocoa developer. He is the author of several open source Cocoa frameworks, including the MGTwitterEngine framework, which makes Twitter integration with your iPhone apps a snap.