Sebastopol, CA--O'Reilly & Associates has released Building Cocoa Applications (O'Reilly, US $44.95), a step-by-step guide that shows developers how to build sophisticated graphics applications for Mac OS X using Cocoa.
"Cocoa embodies the principles of object-oriented programming from its user interface down to its very core," says Simson Garfinkel, co-author of "Building Cocoa Applications." "While it greatly simplifies the task of building applications for Mac OS X, the Cocoa environment is also different from the environments to which most programmers are accustomed. As a result, the learning curve can be pretty steep if you don't have competent instruction."
As one of the principle application development environments for Apple's advanced, Unix-based operating system, Cocoa includes a powerful collection of object-oriented tools and libraries. "Building Cocoa Applications" is a no-nonsense, hands-on tutorial that teaches through example--not only simple and self-contained examples of individual Cocoa features, but extended examples of complete applications with enough elegance and complexity that programmers can put them to immediate use in their own environments.
"Since its release in 2001, Mac OS X has generated tremendous momentum as a development platform," says Michael K. Mahoney, co-author of "Building Cocoa Applications." "The combination of its Unix-based foundation plus the Cocoa, Objective-C, and Java programming environments makes Mac OS X the best and most comprehensive development platform available, by far."
In "Building Cocoa Applications," Garfinkel and Mahoney lay out the basics of an application in one chapter and then layer additional functionality onto that application in subsequent chapters. This practical, concrete approach gives developers a solid understanding of what it really means to develop complete and incrementally more complex Cocoa applications.
Fast-moving, entertaining, and full of helpful hints for developers, "Building Cocoa Applications" is focused on Objective-C and delves deeply into Cocoa's graphics capabilities.
"Cocoa is built on top of the Objective-C programming language-- a language that's simultaneously simpler than C++ and yet better suited to creating graphical user interfaces," explains Garfinkel. "Whereas most people find programming in C++ a chore, most Objective-C programmers find the language to be a joy."
The book includes extensive source code, available for download from the O'Reilly web site, along with an appendix listing additional resources. Cocoa--and "Building Cocoa Applications"--is absolutely essential for anyone doing serious, hands-on development work for the Macintosh.
Additional Resources:
Building Cocoa Applications: A Step-by-Step Guide
By Simson Garfinkel & Michael K. Mahoney
May 2002
0-596-00235-1, 648 pages, $44.95 (US) $69.95 (CAN)
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1-707-827-7000; 1-800-998-9938
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