Regarding the arrangement of the docs:
I find it much easier to read the guides, and oftentimes also the
reference documentation, from a web browser rather than in Xcode's
documentation window. If I'm using Xcode, I will usually have the doc
window open. However, I'll very often have the
Boy, I've been really refraining myself from jumping into the fray
here. It's an interesting discussion which has been handled
respectfully, but it seems to me that we've reached the point of
diminishing returns on this. I think the lines have been drawn, and
most people have chosen one
I like Cocoa. Like any language it has a learning curve, but I enjoy
traipsing around in Cocoa-Land, and it's not that hard to learn if you
put some work into it. If you have a problem, you can ask it here;
that's what this mailing-list is for. If Apple thought their
documentation was
I have followed this discussion closely because as a veteran developer
who started on Mac OS back in the nineties and then gone to Win32 and
a bit with PHP, Tango, .NET (both web and mobile/desktop), Cocoa has
been very difficult to *get into*. Every technology I've been able to
get into
I don't think you're understanding what he's saying or at least taking
it to the wrong extreme. I'm reading his comment that the docs talk
about how great their API is, not explaining the concepts.
In my last post I said the docs can be too verbose. I *want* the docs
to explain why to me,
Hi,
Sincerely, I am coding under windows with Win32/Qt/Corba/Lua and others for a
living, I use MSDN every day, I read their example very often.
Well Qt has a very usable API and a good documentation and good examples and we
have access to the sources...
But on the Win32/Microsoft front, I
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 19:50:57 +0800
From: Michael Ash [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[...] the existence or even the volume of
these complains is not evidence of anything other than that this
platform actually attracts programmers who aren't using it just
because it's hard.
The platform attracts
On May 19, 2008, at 1:33 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
NSColor color
{
set
{
undoManager.prepareWithInvocationTarget(this).color =
mColor;
mColor = value;
}
}
Are you sure about this? I'm just a little surprised to see that C#
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 09:32:01 -0400
From: Jeff LaMarche [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem
[...] In many ways, Cocoa/Obj-C is an oddity, and certainly the
approaches
that Microsoft, Sun, and Apple have taken with their development tools
is different
Peter Duniho wrote:
In C#:
void setColor(NSColor color)
{
undoManager.prepareWithInvocationTarget(this).setColor(mColor);
mColor = color;
}
Your point being? If you think your example is useful in presenting
your claim, you'll need to be a lot more specific.
[...]
On May 19, 2008, at 1:33 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:]
Your point being? If you think your example is useful in
presenting your claim, you'll need to be a lot more specific.
undoManager.prepareWithInvocationTarget(this).setColor(mColor);
I could be wrong, but in C#, wouldn't this UndoManager
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 11:42:39 -0500
From: Alex Kac [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Cocoa et al as HCI usability problem
[...]
I agree with much of what Peter wrote in his post, though not his
conclusion that Cocoa can't be fun.
I hesitate to even mention this, as I've written tons already
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:33 PM, Peter Duniho [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Maybe I'm misinformed about how message-dispatching in Objective-C works.
But AFAIK, it's nothing like the direct invocation and v-table mechanisms
that exist in C# and Java. It's the exact opposite of similar.
You're
On May 19, 2008, at 10:33 AM, Peter Duniho wrote:
In any case, it takes a pretty blind eye to claim that the volume of
complaints is in no way related to problems.
I would expect that the volume of complaints is pretty much directly
related to the over 100.000 downloads of the iPhone SDK
On May 19, 2008, at 10:48 AM, Greg Titus wrote:
You've translated the Objective-C syntax into C# syntax, but the
point of the question is to think about what
prepareWithInvocationTarget() does. How would you write that method
in C#?
Well, it was a poorly stated question then. His
On May 19, 2008, at 10:52 AM, David Wilson wrote:
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:33 PM, Peter Duniho [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
Maybe I'm misinformed about how message-dispatching in Objective-C
works.
But AFAIK, it's nothing like the direct invocation and v-table
mechanisms
that exist in C# and
On May 19, 2008, at 11:00 AM, Peter Duniho wrote:
That said, because of the existence of reflection in C# and Java,
similar functionality isn't really that difficult in those
languages. It's trivial to take any arbitrary class or instance of
a class and invoke any arbitrary named method
On May 19, 2008, at 11:00 AM, Peter Duniho wrote:
On May 19, 2008, at 10:48 AM, Greg Titus wrote:
You've translated the Objective-C syntax into C# syntax, but the
point of the question is to think about what
prepareWithInvocationTarget() does. How would you write that method
in C#?
On May 19, 2008, at 1:42 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
I agree with this statement. However, the conclusion is flawed.
You are welcome to your opinion, even if flawed ;)
Seriously, though, from some of your comments, I'm not sure that I
communicated my conclusion very well, because you seem to
On May 19, 2008, at 12:27 PM, Jeff LaMarche wrote:
On May 19, 2008, at 1:11 PM, Alex Kac wrote:
However I believe that 99% of the complaints given - including mine
- are due to that really high hill.
I do not disagree with you there. It's a challenge, and frustrating
at times, and once
Am 19.05.2008 um 13:11 Uhr schrieb Peter Duniho:
I just don't see how declaring an interface and then using it is so
inferior to an informal protocol that it justifies the entire
message-dispatching paradigm, especially given that there are in
fact advantages to the former. At best, it's
On May 19, 2008, at 11:21 AM, Greg Titus wrote:
[...]
I've worked in Java quite a bit in the past, and I disagree, but
more to the point: I've never done significant work in C# before,
so if that's an environment you are familiar with and you are
willing, I'd very much like to see what
On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:33 PM, Peter Duniho [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Well, I'm still waiting for someone to show me how that flexibility is used.
I'll take that challenge. :-)
The flexibility of the Objective-C language runtime allow me to intercept
messages sent in either direction, and
Am 19.05.2008 um 13:11 Uhr schrieb Peter Duniho:
I just don't see how declaring an interface and then using it is so
inferior to an informal protocol that it justifies the entire
message-dispatching paradigm, especially given that there are in
fact advantages to the former. At best, it's a
On May 19, 2008, at 12:51 PM, Andy Lee wrote:
* Interface Builder is sometimes given as an example of an app
that would be more difficult to write in, say, Java.
It's not - I did this in a past life, with Control-drag to form
connections, nib archive files and all that.
Best,
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 20:31:02 +0200
From: Andreas Mayer [EMAIL PROTECTED]
This is (part of) a method that handles an AppleScript command send to
the application.
One possible argument is the color to be used for display:
- (id)handleDisplayCommand:(NSScriptCommand *)command
{
On May 19, 2008, at 4:29 PM, Jayson Adams wrote:
On May 19, 2008, at 12:51 PM, Andy Lee wrote:
* Interface Builder is sometimes given as an example of an app
that would be more difficult to write in, say, Java.
It's not - I did this in a past life, with Control-drag to form
connections,
Le 19 mai 08 à 22:36, Peter Duniho a écrit :
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 20:31:02 +0200
From: Andreas Mayer [EMAIL PROTECTED]
This is (part of) a method that handles an AppleScript command send
to
the application.
One possible argument is the color to be used for display:
-
On May 19, 2008, at 12:08 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
[...]
However, _with_ reflection we can do much of the same kinds of
things that Obj-C does, without knowing in advance the classes that
might use the NSUndoManager class.
One advantage I see in Cocoa is that, because classes may respond to
On May 19, 2008, at 3:36 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
I appreciate the example. It's certainly reasonably elegant and to
the point, and it's more real world than some of the other ones
(bridging Cocoa to another language? yeah, right...a) it's not like
you can't interface between languages
Le 19 mai 08 à 22:36, Peter Duniho a écrit :
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 20:31:02 +0200
From: Andreas Mayer [EMAIL PROTECTED]
This is (part of) a method that handles an AppleScript command send
to
the application.
One possible argument is the color to be used for display:
-
On May 19, 2008, at 4:36 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
But not the sort of compelling we really need the language to be
this way otherwise it just doesn't work example I was hoping for.
I wonder -- just thinking out loud now -- if this standard is too high
for Objective-C to meet. I also wonder
On May 19, 2008, at 2:20 PM, Jean-Daniel Dupas wrote:
And as we are here, note also that Key-Value-Coding uses dynamic
properties of the language.
Yes, it does.
OK, implementing valueForKey: and setValue:forKey: is probably easy
using introspection.
Likewise reflection. And in .NET,
This is not a helpful attitude to take when this discussion is going
so well.
Please, either be helpful or don't take part.
scott
moderator
On May 18, 2008, at 4:38 PM, P Teeson wrote:
begin rant:
Oh me oh my the poor newcomers to Cocoa. Sorry folks back in the
days of 360 mainframes
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 15:51:07 -0400
From: Andy Lee [EMAIL PROTECTED]
* Objective-C allows you to create categories, effectively modifying
a class's interface at runtime.
C# provides partial class implementations for when you want to
split functionality across multiple module files (one
On May 19, 2008, at 6:06 PM, Peter Duniho wrote:
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 15:51:07 -0400
From: Andy Lee [EMAIL PROTECTED]
* Objective-C allows you to create categories, effectively modifying
a class's interface at runtime.
C# provides partial class implementations for when you want to
split
I appreciate the example. It's certainly reasonably elegant and to
the point, and it's more real world than some of the other ones
(bridging Cocoa to another language? yeah, right...a) it's not like
you can't interface between languages with other languages, and b)
this is not the kind of thing
Le 20 mai 08 à 00:06, Peter Duniho a écrit :
C# provides partial class implementations for when you want to
split functionality across multiple module files (one use of
categories).
As you wrote, this is one use of categories. However, it is not this
usage that makes categories so
On May 19, 2008, at 4:33 PM, Alex Kac wrote:
2) Many of the examples you're looking for are not so much in
people's apps, but in AppKit itself meaning that AppKit would have
had to be far more complex, big, and clunky if not for this feature.
Don't underestimate the utility of being able
On May 20, 2008, at 01:49, Alex Kac wrote:
I think one of the issues here is you're comparing .NET - which is
not the primary Windows framework - to Cocoa - which is. They are
comparable and many people do compare them, but truthfully most
commercial software on Windows will not be
On May 19, 2008, at 8:15 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Don't underestimate the utility of being able to make use of
Objective-
C's dynamic features outside of the core frameworks like AppKit and
Core Data.
I'm not. But my point is that in most of our apps you'll find one or
two key things
Am 19.05.2008 um 22:36 Uhr schrieb Peter Duniho:
But not the sort of compelling we really need the language to be
this way otherwise it just doesn't work example I was hoping for.
There is no such example. As was already pointed out, you can do the
same things in every touring complete
With you 100% on all this below.
Been having trouble coming up with something useful to add to all
these discussions about Cocoa Apple Developer Documentation .. what
you said below sums a lot of it up.
These points really resonate for me:
++ explaining why _their_ API and paradigm is
On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 1:33 AM, Peter Duniho [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Date: Mon, 19 May 2008 19:50:57 +0800
From: Michael Ash [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[...] the existence or even the volume of
these complains is not evidence of anything other than that this
platform actually attracts programmers
Hear hear. It has already happened to one platform, and look how
abysmally inconsistent it has become for users. I for one do not want
to see every Tom, Dick and Harry throwing Cocoa around and doing it
badly (even if I do so myself ;-). Yes, that's probably elitist. I
offer no apology.
The very good , interesting and informative debate in this list
concerning the accessibility of the programming environment to new
users has it seems to me incresingly polarised between those who
think the documentation more or less adequate and those like me who
for whatever reason, have
Julius,
You could change Apple for just about any other vendor, and Cocoa for
just about another GUI/system interface, and your argument will still hold.
(Have you ever tried programming X11 with just XLib C calls? Nasty stuff
that)
Also, please don't confuse the language, Objective-C
On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 10:39 AM, Erik Buck [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Cocoa is the most consistent, elegant, and productive software development
technology I have ever used, and I have used a lot. Cocoa uses key
metaphors and design patterns ubiquitously. If the programmer is either
unaware
On 18 May '08, at 4:33 AM, Julius Guzy wrote:
Apple has been less celebrated for the humanity of its programming
interface having, in my experience of Macs from the Lisa onwards,
seemingly taken the attitude that its programmers were hobbyists,
geeks essentially, who because of their
Well what can you do. Not sure why but lately many newcomers have
been showing up and complaining about Cocoa's difficulty. I'm not
sure if they've done GUI work before, but I remember my days with
PowerPlant and spending a massive amount of time just creating the GUI
and the code to
On May 18, 2008, at 12:41 PM, Jens Alfke wrote:
Maybe I'm taking this too personally, but I sense a subtext that
some people think the task of software design itself is somewhat
trivial, more like programming a VCR than like architecture or
painting or chemistry
... well it *should*
begin rant:
Oh me oh my the poor newcomers to Cocoa. Sorry folks back in the days
of 360 mainframes there were manuals and they were inscrutable.
But if you took the Winston Churchill aproach and spent some blood,
sweat, toil and tears you would probably become a 1/2 decent
assembler
For the record, my comments weren't about it being difficult; it's
about the documentation not providing the information needed to use it.
It's a beautiful API, as you say with tons of work done to implement
these reusable constructs. The documentation is voluminous, but in too
many cases
Johnny Lundy wrote:
Tutorials to me are pretty much useless, as I am not looking for a step
by step cookbook to just getting something working, but rather a
discussion of the why. How many times have we seen a tutorial say
something like control-drag from the textfield to the File's Owner
As a (relatively) newcomer to Cocoa and generally far less experienced than
most of the people that have responded so far, here are my 2 cents.
Cocoa and Objective-C are no more difficult or obscure than any other
popular OO framework out there. I made the transition from .NET as easily as
I had
I'm also wondering if many of the people finding Cocoa difficult are
also lacking OO programming experience. The docs teach Cocoa really
well but if you're unfamiliar with OO design and concepts the Cocoa
docs are going to be very daunting.
On May 18, 2008, at 3:28 PM, Jason Stephenson
On May 18, 2008, at 22:38, P Teeson wrote:
begin rant:
Oh me oh my the poor newcomers to Cocoa. Sorry folks back in the
days of 360 mainframes there were manuals and they were inscrutable.
But if you took the Winston Churchill aproach and spent some blood,
sweat, toil and tears you would
On 18 May 2008, at 14:36, Jason Stephenson wrote:
(Have you ever tried programming X11 with just XLib C calls? Nasty
stuff that)
Yes,
superDooperExtraSpecialHighIntensityOpenWindowAndDoLotsOfWonderfulThings
IfYouSetTheParametersRightWidget.
Also, please don't confuse the language,
On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 8:41 PM, Julius Guzy
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Well, there is a problems with the documentation and if it does not get
resolved then people will end up unable to write the code. I mean what is
the point in loosing people who actually want to program this machine and
are
On 18 May 2008, at 17:41, Jens Alfke wrote:
On 18 May '08, at 4:33 AM, Julius Guzy wrote:
Apple has been less celebrated for the humanity of its programming
interface having, in my experience of Macs from the Lisa onwards,
seemingly taken the attitude that its programmers were hobbyists,
On 18 May '08, at 6:15 PM, Julius Guzy wrote:
I do not think it naive of me to raise serious questions regarding
usability given that i have made huge and increasingly successful
efforts to get into this system so I can do some heavy duty
programming.
…
Well if it were doing as good a
On 19 May 2008, at 1:56, David Wilson wrote:
On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 8:41 PM, Julius Guzy
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Well, there is a problems with the documentation and if it does
not get
resolved then people will end up unable to write the code. I mean
what is
the point in loosing people
On May 18, 2008, at 5:03 PM, Johnny Lundy wrote:
Take the Currency Converter With Bindings much-touted tutorial; it
actually uses a method that is deprecated.
this actually is a prime example of why tutorials are few and far
between in the Apple doc. They require significant upkeep.
where you feel this to be the case, PLEASE file bugs
(bugreporter.apple.com) or feedback.
it is all taken seriously.
On May 18, 2008, at 5:39 PM, Νικόλας Τουμπέλης wrote:
Apple's documentation is often verbose and pedantic but there are
excellent
free alternatives online and very good
On 19 May 2008, at 2:34, Jens Alfke wrote:
On 18 May '08, at 6:15 PM, Julius Guzy wrote:
I do not think it naive of me to raise serious questions regarding
usability given that i have made huge and increasingly successful
efforts to get into this system so I can do some heavy duty
On May 18, 2008, at 7:39 PM, Julius Guzy wrote:
So I wouldn't have much to say about it except that it does have a
tendency to make things seem more exciting than they actually are.
For instance I can refer here to the idea of dynamic typing which
still requires us to have the header files
For what it's worth, something about the OS X Cocoa docs' arrangement
has never quite clicked with me. In part it might be an excess of
hyper text, too many pages to click through, breaking up the stream
of thought. (I wish XCode's doc viewer had some kind of keyboard
shortcut for clicking
On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 8:41 PM, Julius Guzy
email_removed wrote:
Tthe fact is that there will be others like me who do not find it
easy to get into cocoa. At this stage I'll not be jumping ship but
believe me I've had sleeples nights about it. Mainly i'll not do it
because although I'm far from
On May 18, 2008, at 8:39 PM, Julius Guzy wrote:
Well this is exactly how things seem to pan out. Those who have been
doing this for some time like the documentation they have. No doubt
once I become a bit more adept I will too. But right now..
This is going to sound bitchy, but it's
Am 19.05.2008 um 04:08 Uhr schrieb Michael Vannorsdel:
Hopefully you won't get rude people responding with RTFM and such.
Actually, I don't understand why an RTFM kind of answer is perceived
as rude. I'm really happy when I get an RTFM *with a link* to the
appropriate document.
Also, I
On May 18, 2008, at 3:56 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 8:41 PM, Julius Guzy
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Well, there is a problems with the documentation and if it does
not get
resolved then people will end up unable to write the code. I mean
what is
the point in loosing
Nothing wrong with saying you should read such and such. But RTFM
is the condescending way of saying it (just look what it stands for).
Would be like asking someone where the restroom is and getting look
at the building directory, you blind clueless moron. My point was
about posts that
Some people have said they didn't know where to start (or their
questions lead myself and others to believe that is the case).
One of the conceptual documents that I found most useful was the Cocoa
Fundamentals Guide
From: ben syverson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
This is going to sound bitchy, but it's hard for me to have any
sympathy for vague complaints about the docs or the usability of
Cocoa.
That does sound bitchy. I mean, it's fair enough to say that people
ought to be providing specific feedback and
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