Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

v4.chriskrycho.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 400 posts

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#241

Post by Rebelgecko »

AlexandrB wrote: post #37
sillysaurusx wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, this is just going to fall on deaf ears. Apple isn't listening. Their machine is output only. That's not really true. Apple is active on Twitter and actively reaches out to correct problems. For example, when I complained that their Xcode beta hangs when you open a large file, an Xcode dev reached out to me and asked for a repro case. https://twitter.com/theshawwn/status/1175197286349119490 (I'm not an Apple fa…

Isn't that the exception that proves the rule though? Why is Twitter the most effective way to get developer support from Apple as opposed to their own website?

Reminds me of this post from a few days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21324798

tl;dr: Recent performance improvements in the Mac version of Firefox are dependent on an undocumented feature of an API that was tweeted out by someone from Apple

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#242

Post by wolco »

GGfpc wrote: post #104
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #70

Some time ago, I was contacted by Apple to apply for a job. My code is insanely well-documented. I like to think that a lot of the inspiration for my code docs comes from Apple's open codebases. Their code is exceptionally well-documented. In any case, as is usual with all employers, these days, they completely ignored the focused, relevant links that I sent them to elements of my extensive portfolio of repos, and, i…

To be honest, while documentation is extremely important in the real world, interviews are time-constrained, and it makes no sense to write documentation when you have 45 minutes to implement something like that.

At another company not writing it would fail you. It's difficult to know when to apply the correct answer-

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#243

Post by richardwhiuk »

not_a_cop75 wrote: post #68
no_wizard wrote: post #61

I actually agree whole heartedly with the intentions behind this article. I find Apples documentation to be incomplete and not nearly as detailed as I think it should be. I think that personally it’s not all that well organized either. My minimum standard for good documentation has and always been Python’s[0]. While no documentation is perfect, I think they mostly get it right by providing good explanations and examp…

php, whether you like the language, or abhor it, has always had some of the most useful documentation, I've found.

I disagree.

See Example 5 in https://www.php.net/manual/en/security.database.sql-injectio...

This is the recommended way to avoid SQL injection, using sprintf...

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#244

Post by gatherhunterer »

chooseaname wrote: post #9

> Apple, if you want developers to love your platform — and you should, because good developers are your lifeblood — and if you don’t want them to flee for other platforms — and you should be worried about that, because the web is everywhere and Microsoft is coming for you — then you need to take this seriously. Adopt the mentality that has served other frameworks and languages so well: If it isn’t documented, it isn…

You criticize their rabid fans but aren’t you just as irrational? You have made claims that are so bizarre they cannot be supported by evidence. You are making emotional attacks that sound like someone talking about their high school bully. I don’t know how you convinced yourself that Apple is more interested in being aloof than in making changes that would help them make money but that belief is just as ridiculous as the belief that they are altruistic.

“Apple” has become a trigger word for many people. It is strange that one would allow something they claim to dislike to have such a profound impact on them that it compromises their reasoning.

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#245

Post by AgloeDreams »

leshow wrote: post #182
AgloeDreams wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how it looks in ObjC but in Typescript you could write something like: let studentScoreFormatted: string = student.formattedScore ?? 'Student has not taken this test yet.'; Whereas if the score is null it will return the value after `??`. It is awfully helpful for ensuring you handle error states in displaying API values. Additionally if you want this behavior but when the value is falsey, then you can u…

?? doesn't exist in typescript yet, but there is a tc39 proposal to add it to js proper

TS 3.7 adds it.

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#246

Post by DerekL »

accatyyc wrote: post #109
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think the ternary operator, but worse. In Swift, this is expressed by "??". It means "If the previous test returns nil, then execute what is after the ??". For example, if you have a concrete Int, but the source might be an optional, then you could do something like this: let a = b ?? 0 That means that if b is nil, then set a to 0. Otherwise, set it to whatever value b has. You can chain these, like so: let b: Int? =…

In Objective-C (and some other languages with ternary operators) the same can be written like this: int a = b ?: c ?: 0

That's not specific to Objective-C, it's a GCC extension to the C language.

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#247

Post by chooseaname »

gatherhunterer wrote: post #244
chooseaname wrote: post #9

> Apple, if you want developers to love your platform — and you should, because good developers are your lifeblood — and if you don’t want them to flee for other platforms — and you should be worried about that, because the web is everywhere and Microsoft is coming for you — then you need to take this seriously. Adopt the mentality that has served other frameworks and languages so well: If it isn’t documented, it isn…

You criticize their rabid fans but aren’t you just as irrational? You have made claims that are so bizarre they cannot be supported by evidence. You are making emotional attacks that sound like someone talking about their high school bully. I don’t know how you convinced yourself that Apple is more interested in being aloof than in making changes that would help them make money but that belief is just as ridiculous a…

Apple has a very long and very known history of ignoring problems until they can't. They'll get away with terrible/missing docs until they can't.

> You are making emotional attacks...

Am I?

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#248

Post by twblalock »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #70

Some time ago, I was contacted by Apple to apply for a job. My code is insanely well-documented. I like to think that a lot of the inspiration for my code docs comes from Apple's open codebases. Their code is exceptionally well-documented. In any case, as is usual with all employers, these days, they completely ignored the focused, relevant links that I sent them to elements of my extensive portfolio of repos, and, i…

> This was clearly not something the tester liked. Also, to add insult to injury, they dinged me for not writing a cascaded nil-coalescing operator. The code they wanted me to write was difficult to understand, and absolutely not one bit faster.

The interviewer probably wanted you to write idiomatic Swift. That seems reasonable.

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#249

Post by Terretta »

pfranz wrote: post #228
phendrenad2 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think Google and Apple were making a poor choice by doing this kind of interview, but I wonder now if it gets the results they want: they want interchangeable cogs that don't stand out too much. They want known quantities. If you're "the documentation guy" or "the security-testing girl", you've wasted time learning skills they won't utilize, since they want you to be exactly like every other developer. If d…

I was at a place that had been around for 20+ years, but needed to grow fairly quickly. So they systematized their hiring process. The focus was on generalists both because a lot of their technology was written in-house (it predated the commodity, off the shelf, solutions). It used the theory of the off the shelf solutions, but often had a different name or a slight difference. But the major reason they wanted genera…

You’re right, and it can get worse. Certain focused industries such as financial services employ what they call “subject matter experts” aka “SMEs”. Turns out most are “solution matter experts” as in, only know how the particular wonky solution works as installed at their company unchanged since it was installed 10 - 15 years ago.

Re: Apple Developer Documentation Is Missing

#250

Post by pjmlp »

arcticbull wrote: post #240
SkyPuncher wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'll make it clear that I'm NOT a fan of these. I am mediocre, at best, at them, as I don't come from a traditional CS background (I started as an EE). I come from a CS background and struggle with these too. The big problem I have is this performance stuff is often barely relevant to the position. You need to know the principle of a BST. Unless you're building a database working in a unique scenario, actually trav…

It's a game. You win, you get a job. It's worth spending a few weeks and just banging out BSTs every night until you're good at it. Engineers with years of industry experience tend to fall flat in these interviews because they haven't written BSTs in years and don't think they should have to in an interview. It's not about should, though, it's about whether you want the job. Change the system from the inside.

Thankfully in many regions we still have the choice not to go through hiring games.
Post reply on HN