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Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

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Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#11

Post by justinzollars »

jure_z wrote: post #7
justinzollars wrote: post #6

I was in this situation last March. I had no native experience with only years of ruby and javascript under my belt. I decided to begin my journey into the Apple world by starting with Objective-C. I made this decision because of the rich availability of learning resources, Stackoverflow's engaged community and the maturity of the language. I moved over to Swift this January, and the transition couldn't have been bet…

Of course, you definitely didn't waste time spent learning Obj-C - once you dig into more advanced stuff, you find that knowledge useful. Although, I think that considering Swift is only around 7 months old, there are already a lot of really good and high quality resources available online.

Good point. This is now totally true. It was not the case last year when I had to make this decision. The resources available is rich today.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#13

Post by jure_z »

jspru wrote: post #12

A completely different suggestion: Neither - learn C# and use Xamarin. Lower learning curve than both Swift and Objective-C, you can port your apps to other platforms more easily, and your new skill will be applicable across paradigms beyond iOS development.

Well yeah, there are numerous different approaches one can take. You could also build hybrid apps if you're familiar with HTML&CSS, you could use RubyMotion if you're a Ruby dev, etc. :)

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#14

Post by ctvo »

jspru wrote: post #12

A completely different suggestion: Neither - learn C# and use Xamarin. Lower learning curve than both Swift and Objective-C, you can port your apps to other platforms more easily, and your new skill will be applicable across paradigms beyond iOS development.

1) Your app is now tied for life to a third-party vendor. 2) There's is a steep yearly licensing fee. (starting at 300 USD PER developer, PER platform). 3) Xamarin Forms is notoriously buggy if you're looking to also use it for cross-platform UI code. 4) It's debatable how much easier C# is to learn than Swift.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#15

Post by flywheel »

"Swift is the more beautiful language and it lets you write pretty code and bring you joy"

If you think code is "beautiful" then you don't know what you're talking about. You're anthropomorphizing a list of instructions. It's functional, not beautiful.

Go out and watch a sunset, and then try to compare that to a list of instructions, or better yet, compare your wife's beauty to that of a list of instructions - I bet she won't appreciate the forced equivalence either.

I've been programming for 30 years, and for me there is no beauty in code except for what it produces. Is buggy code written in Swift still "beautiful"? This is why it's not good to spend so much time in front of a computer, if you start to think of list of instructions as "beautiful" then you've lost touch with reality.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#16

Post by pan69 »

jspru wrote: post #12

A completely different suggestion: Neither - learn C# and use Xamarin. Lower learning curve than both Swift and Objective-C, you can port your apps to other platforms more easily, and your new skill will be applicable across paradigms beyond iOS development.

I wouldn't advice Xamarin to someone who wants to learn to write apps for iOS.

Xamarin in great but it makes most sense to use in a professional environment where a single app needs to be target at multiple platforms. Usually developers using Xamarin already have a great understanding of iOS and Android (and Windows?) before they start using Xamarin.

I think for someone new to developing apps it would be too much of an abstraction.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#17

Post by bitwize »

Start with Swift because it's easier. Move to Objective-C when you are ready for lower level hacking. It's the same trajectory we all followed: first learning BASIC, then doing some grovelling in assembly, then moving to something like C or pascal.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#18

Post by matthewmacleod »

jspru wrote: post #12

A completely different suggestion: Neither - learn C# and use Xamarin. Lower learning curve than both Swift and Objective-C, you can port your apps to other platforms more easily, and your new skill will be applicable across paradigms beyond iOS development.

Lower learning curve than both Swift and Objective-C

I would have to see some evidence of that. Neither Swift nor Objective C have a particularly scary learning curve.

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#19

Post by rdsnsca »

bitwize wrote: post #17

Start with Swift because it's easier. Move to Objective-C when you are ready for lower level hacking. It's the same trajectory we all followed: first learning BASIC, then doing some grovelling in assembly, then moving to something like C or pascal.

When Swift is done... there will be nothing it can't do that Objective-C can.

Swift is not going to be just the beginner language for Mac and iOS programming.... it is going to be THE language for them in a few years

Re: Should you start with Swift or Objective-C to learn iOS development?

#20

Post by jure_z »

rdsnsca wrote: post #19
bitwize wrote: post #17

Start with Swift because it's easier. Move to Objective-C when you are ready for lower level hacking. It's the same trajectory we all followed: first learning BASIC, then doing some grovelling in assembly, then moving to something like C or pascal.

When Swift is done... there will be nothing it can't do that Objective-C can. Swift is not going to be just the beginner language for Mac and iOS programming.... it is going to be THE language for them in a few years

Highly agree. It will grow mature in time (probably a lot faster than iOS did - 30 years) and will feature a lot of new and useful paradigms.
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