Reviews for iPhone SDK Programming: Developing Mobile Applications for Apple iPhone and iPod Touch

1. A great way to develop your understanding of iPhone SDK

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, September 12rd, 2009

   This book is a great iPhone developer companion if you know when to read it. It is certainly not a tutorial but after you've made you way through a number of tutorials, and may be even created a few applications, you have in your memory a sequence of steps, or a number of recipes. You can do certain standard things quite successfully by repeating those steps but what if you wish to do something non-standard, or if you've got a non-standard problem? This is where this book comes to help.
   
   It is written in a modest way, most of the examples are very simple and all the user interfaces are created in code. But this is exactly what allows to easily see how different bits and pieces are coming together, and this book clarifies the different kinds of iPhone apps architectures very nicely.
   
   After reading this book, I returned to a couple of my apps that are already on the App Store and was able to enhance them in a significant way. I would gladly give it five starts but there is a number of minor problems that don't allow me to do that:
   
   1. Quite ridiculously, the code listings are printed not in a traditional monospaced font but in something like Times New Roman. Not a big deal, but the listings look untidy and are unpleasant to read.
   
   2. The same code is repeated in the listings again and again. It would be more sensible to show just the relevant bits of code.
   
   3. The author doesn't mind repeating trivial things, like 'here is a property backgroundColor, it is for the background color'. Well, maybe it's just about his writing style which doesn't resonate with me.
   
   4. I wonder why the author doesn't even mention the Cocoa APIs for processing XML - they are so much more convenient to use.
   
   Anyway, the bottom line is that I have already pre-ordered the next book by Maher Ali.

2. Prgrammers Guide

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, March 12nd, 2009

   This is centered around Objective-C programming and not for the beginner. If that's what you're looking for it's a great book

3. Rushed?

   Rated 3 out of 5 stars, March 12st, 2009

   I think this book was rushed to market.
   
   It's the only programming book I have ever seen where the code sections are not set in a fixed width font (Courier) but in a proportional serif font (Times), causing them to blend in with the rest of the page. Madness!
   
   There's no sign the book had an editor. It really could have done with one to tighten up the text and tone of the writing.
   
   Other than that, it's just another iPhone programming book. Covers all the usual topics, but no Interface Builder, and doubles as a reference.

4. Good in-depth reference of iPhone development

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, March 12st, 2009

   Maher's Book is an in-depth reference into the world of iPhone application development aimed at both beginners and experienced Objective-C / Cocoa developers alike
   
   The book is concise and more theoretical than many of the others I have read on the subject and covers everything you need to know to get started. One of the best things about this book is the depth it goes into many of the topics. For example, the book goes into great detail about consuming RESTful web services and parsing XML and makes use of real-world Web APIs such as Google Maps API for these examples. The book also provides a good insight into using the local file system and creating and working with local sqlite3 databases s well as several concise chapters on creating views and working with pretty much every control. Unfortunately the book lacks any coverage of Interface Builder (this may partly be down to when the book was written and what features were available at the time of writing) which provides in many cases quicker and easier solutions to creating views and handling events. I feel the example views shown in the various screen shots have suffered because of this.
   
   Overall this book serves as an excellent reference, going into more depth than many of the other books, and is certainly good value and just over £20.