Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ns-mx!iowasp!deimos!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!psuvax1!xavier!jackiw From: jackiw@cs.swarthmore.edu (Nick Jackiw) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer Subject: Re: Obligatory beginning-Mac-programmer questions Message-ID: <319FHPY@xavier.swarthmore.edu> Date: 14 Mar 90 14:12:56 GMT References: <2392@milton.acs.washington.edu> Sender: news@xavier.swarthmore.edu (USENET News System) Reply-To: jackiw@cs.swarthmore.edu (Nick Jackiw) Organization: Visual Geometry Project, Swarthmore College, PA Lines: 69 phaedrus@milton.acs.washington.edu (The Wanderer) writes: > A few quick questions: > Aside from Inside Mac and the other official documentation, what books > would you recommend for an experienced Pascal/C programmer trying to learn > the Macintosh programming structure? There are a number of books. None of them, however, is comprehensive, and with all of them, one will eventually run into problems because of their limitations and elisions. Inside Mac, volumes I-IV, are really the best starting point. Volume V, unlike the others, is poorly written, and relies on *implicit* knowledge of arcane parts of I-IV. (Everything in I-IV that relies on something else is clearly cross-referenced.) The Tech Notes, available from APDA or as a hypercard stack ftp'able (I believe) from APDA, augment, amend, and clarify the Inside Mac series. They contain considerable amounts of sample code, as well. > Which development environment would you recommend for said experienced > programmer, on a limited budget (still working on paying off the Mac)? > User-friendliness, a good debugger, and clear documentation are all key > issues. This would be a THINK product...MPW, by the time you get up and running, costs several hundreds of dollars and a considerable amount of time dedicated to learning the environment, rather than programming. THINK C and THINK PASCAL are both available mail-order for $100-$200. (Check MacConnection, MacZone, MacWarehouse, etc.). If you know Pascal and C equally well, I'd recommend starting with THINK Pascal. The Mac's interfaces are designed for communicating with Pascal, and by not using C, you can avoid a number of problems (parameter-passing convention, string definition, etc.) not immediately relevant to learning Mac programming. > How much easier does MacApp make the programming process? Assuming it's > the wonderful base I've heard it is and I immediately rush out to use it, how > strongly should that influence the development environment I buy? (How many > contortions do I have to go through to use MacApp with Think Pascal, that I > could avoid by using MPW?) I believe only the just-released THINK PASCAL 3.0 is compatible with MacApp (beside MPW, of course). Not much has been discussed on its ease of use in THINK. If you are already acquainted with object-oriented programming, MacApp may make things easier for you. If not, postpone getting it. Again, the Mac's interface is defined procedurally; learning OOP simultaneously, while career-wise, is going to detract from learning the Mac. Also, from what I understand, while MacApp provides a wonderfully advanced starting-block for any application development, in the course of getting the exact functionality you seek you must be prepared to modify the MacApp sources. This, of course, implies prior knowledge of both Mac structure and object-oriented programming techniques. > I apologize if these questions are naive; but it appears that the only > way I'm actually going to see any of these language products is to buy them, > and I'd much rather have feedback from experienced programmers before making > an expensive mistake. My disclaimers: I've never used MacApp. I use THINK Pascal frequently, MPW Pascal, C, and Assembler infrequently. I began in your position with advice similar to that that I've just offered, and I've found my environment nice enough to never merit switching. -- -----Nicholas Jackiw [jackiw@cs.swarthmore.edu|jackiw@swarthmr.bitnet]----- "... Then, with an infernal shovel that increases my strength, I dig out of that inexhaustable mine whole chunks of lice, big as mountains. I split them up with an axe and I transport them in the depths of night to city streets."