Customer Reviews

Objective-C For Dummies

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Picked this book as a fairly long shot to re-introduce myself into C++ / OO programming. (Notice: I was a C / assembly / Magic developer between '87 and '97.) With all this background I hoped for some easy (and fun) reading about the latest version of Objective C. Boy, I was wrong... This book is definitely not for the "absolute beginner". Though it runs through all the basic stuff at light speed, it is too dense for someone with zero programming experience.

Now to the good part. If you can work your way through the chapters, spend enough time with actually typing / compiling / running / analyzing those examples, you will have a good basic knowledge of Objective C (and C in general). I have fiddled with XCode for a while, but always ended up using something else for my in-house development needs. Thanks to this book, XCode and Obj C are my friends now.

Verdict: recommended with reservations. Better have some programming experience beforehand, but a good book to bridge the gap between other languages and Obj C.

Picked this book because I'm a fan of the dummies series...love having thingS explained from the ground up, in easy simple conceptual terms. I'm no programmer, despite a *very small* amount of BASIC programming about 20 years ago...but I'm good with computers, so I thought this book to be a good choice.

Despite a good start in the first few chapters, this book is *riddled* with copy errors, omissions, typos and changes in object names - all really, really bad things to find in a programming book. I stuck with it through the first 120 pages, and then gave up in disgust. I've since found a few good sites on the web that explain things alot better (like Hot Cocoa", and am hoping that the new Pragmatic Press books out later this year will fill the gap. Sadly, this book has even made me question ever wanting to buy another Dummies book - at least for programming topics.

Stay away from this one!

I have just returned this book and I think it's the first time I've ever done that.

What was the deal breaker?

Well it wasn't the dry monotone voice of the book. Though its not helpful for a close to absolute beginner like me. My last short adventure with programming was with basic 15 years ago. It wasn't the heavy use of programming vocabulary from the start with a very limited explanation of the meaning of the terms used, while not connecting the explanations to any related examples. I found my self constantly leafing back pages to see the difference between and expression and a statement just to get the jest of what is being explained.

It wasn't the example program that is used and expanded throughout the entire book. An accounting utility for travel budgeting. I'm not sure I could think of anything less fun to code.

It wasn't the fact that the author takes an approach where he has you write code and then explain what you did, giving the reader a feeling of being left in the dark.

The deal breaker was the hundreds of typos. I finally gave up on page 131. Where the first paragraph ends with: (I would also need to declare

The next thing you read is the line: That way the functions would operate on the right data.

What Neal Goldstein needed to declare I will never know. There is an errata list online that has a handful of corrections. But there are many, many more throughout the book. This adds to the general feeling of unnecessary confusion and desperation while trying to solve the mysteries of what the author is trying to say.

I studied up on what's around and ordered "Programming in Objective-C 2.0 (2nd Edition) (Paperback)" by Stephen G. Kochan. Hopefully it's a bit better at doing what is says it will.

I have some programming experience (as well as engineering and finance degrees) so I am used to reading dry material, but this book is very hard to get through. There are many authors that do a great job of explaining programming in an easily understood, clear and non-condescending way. Unfortunately this is not one of those books. (Sorry Mr. Goldstein, next time get a better editor.)

I wish I could return this book, but I marked up the first couple of chapters. Now it is a paper weight.

Some things in life are just too complex for a "Dummies" series. This is one of them... The book moves through material way too fast, and therefore does not develop a good conceptual framework required to effectively use the language.

In fact, the "Dummies" series could work for Objective-C, but the book would have to be much thicker and move much more slowly.

I, too, found many typographical errors, which I've never seen before in programming instruction.

This is obsolete. This is based on Xcode 3 and Xcode 4 is completely different. Do not buy this book if you are starting out. You need something that shows you how to program Objective C using Xcode 4 which is a must for iOS 5.

Everything is spelled out and you can follow easily up until you get to chapter 7 (a 5 star at that point). When you get to chapter 7, everything changes. Now the Dummy is an expert and can follow every modification to three distinct and separate files at once. Remember...For DUMMIES! The most difficult part in computer science are Objects. When you start Defining objects and not detailing where you are modifying things in the code, we are now lost! Keep us with you (goes to a 2 star at that point)! One good thing is that you provided a CD with the code (helps a lot..back up to a 3 star level).

When I compared my code for Chapter 7 and I looked at the code provided by the author, they were distinctly different. He lost me somewhere. With chapter 7, I'm not sure where the author was at. Followed along, and my code was different (and did not work). Do they think that we are now experts after chapter 6? So we go from a Dummy to an expert in one chapter? I will add more to this review later. I'm just annoyed now and I have to regroup I'm on chapter 8 (with the code provided from the author and modified for the chapter 7 page 178). I really think that the publishing companies should really try to go along and do the book (every chapter), before they release it to the public.

Becoming an Objective-C programmer is not something you should expect to pick up casually. Objective-C is a great programming language but it is not easy to learn. This book will teach you Objective-C. There are sections of this book that were not easy to understand yet I believe the author does get the information across. The code examples and working through them will get you where you need to be. There are times where it would not hurt the reader to go back and re-read early chapters after some other concepts are further developed later in the book. The re-read will reveal the finer points covered in these early chapters. Hang with it. Work through the code. Read some of the Apple supplied material that is online. If you want to program in Objective-C work at it and you will get there.

Normally the Dummies books do a good job getting beginners up to speed. This book doesn't. Like most Objective-C "beginners" books, it's written by someone who believes their audience is made up of professional C++ programmers. Thus he skips things that are common to people who have over ten years experience in C++ programming which leaves us true beginners in the dark. Prime example of this is the use of * in Objective-C programming. He mentions it once in passing, almost as if embarrassed that he has to mention it at all, and never really explains what it means despite the fact that it's used everywhere. I had to look it up elsewhere on the web before I understood what it does and how it's used. There are many, many more examples of such slights.

Another annoying thing the author does throughout the book is he instructs you to code a certain way, explaining what you're doing and why, then in the next chapter he tells you what you just did was wrong and you should never do it that way. You just wasted a chapter learning something that he now tells you shouldn't be done or there is a much better way of doing it. This may be fine for people who are experienced C++ programmers and need to change their thinking for Objective-C, but for beginners this is very counter productive and discouraging.

And finally, the example program he has you work on through the entire book is terrible! It's boring, bland, uninteresting, and you don't even bother to check the output after the second build, you don't care at all about the results, all you do is check for error messages then move on. Imagine a cook book that has you do nothing but boil water and you'll get an idea of how lame this feels.

I can see how the Dummies people might have rushed this book out, given how quickly the iPhone and App Store became so popular, but I urge them to not bother with a rewrite. Throw this book out entirely and start fresh with something better.

In summation, do not buy this book, there are many more better ones out there.

[ July 13 2010 Update - Update - Update - ]

I made it though part of chapter 10 and have a new perspective. Neal, "Dummies" has done you wrong. You have the ability to share and I can see that in this book, but I have lived though the book for months now. I know way more than I did concerning OC, but not enough to move forward.
I feel that I should have a firmer grasp of the language by now. And yes, I have put lots of effort into it. I have no less than a dozen page flags sticking out of the first 9 chapters. Even the variables' names got me tangled up more than I want to admit. I found myself going back over and over the same stuff trying to get a handle on it. I cannot say that my inability to grasp is solely the fault of this book, but because of my diligence in re-reviewing the material so many times I am somewhat confident that I need another book. Perhaps a different approach... maybe take a complex program that is broken down into parts and pieces. the reverse of this book. This would help me as I am a kinesthetic (touch it, feel it, take it apart) learner.

There is one positive: This statement is still true: This is the first book that has come close to explaining objects in a way that I can understand.

To the publisher...
Be ashamed, very ashamed. Your choice of editor(s) was poor, not sure if you have any proof readers; first review I just thought that they were bad, I wonder now if the book was proofed.