Month: March 2019

Are you still using Obj-C, but are considering going to Swift 5? Perhaps this book may help

Dan Uff March 30, 2019 1

The other day, I was on Amazon.com when I stumbled across this book by Amit Chaudhary that compares the good and bad between using the Objective-C programming language vs. the up-and-coming Swift 5 programming languages.

This Kindle book covers the following topics:

This book has covered the latest version 5 of Swift and the latest version of Objective-C. Using Xcode 10.2.
•For beginners and for dummies, this book is a step-by-step guide to understanding object-oriented programming with Swift and with Objective-C.

•If you are an experienced developer who knows at least one modern programming language well, then this book is designed to teach you how to think and program in two major programming languages of Apple, Swift, and Objective-C.

•You can also use this book as a quick reference guide (like a cheat sheet) for both programming languages.

•Compared each topic with a simple and an illustrated example for each programming language. Do you know how to use playground feature of Swift for Objective-C language? Do you know what is stored, computed property and property observer in Objective-C? This book will answer your questions by comparing each topic of both programming languages of Apple.

I hope you find this book to be a useful and worthy addition to your library. I've had a great time writing it. Hopefully you'll have a great time reading and learning two major programming languages of Apple. I will keep updating this book to make it much simpler and more productive. Thank you for purchasing a copy!
-Amit Chaudhary, 25th March 2019

Chapters Covered in this book:

1.Basics
2.Constants
3.Variables
4.Data Types
5.Operators
6.String and Characters
7.Control Flow
8.Collection Types (Arrays, Sets, and Dictionaries)
9.Functions
10.Closures/ Blocks
11.Enumerators
12.Structures
13.Classes
14.Properties
15.Subscripts
16.Methods
17.Inheritance
18.Initializers
19.De-Initializers/ Deallocation
20.Protocols
21.Extensions/ Categories
22.Automatic Reference Count
23.Type Casting/ Type Checking
24.Error Handling

For more information and for purchasing instructions, click here.

Apple CANCELS AirPower wireless charging mat

Dan Uff March 29, 2019 0

Mid Friday, Apple's Senior Vice President Dan Riccio made an announcement that it has cancelled their wireless charging mat that they preformed a sneak peak in September of 2017:

After much effort, we've concluded AirPower will not achieve our high standards and we have cancelled the project. We apologize to those customers who were looking forward to this launch. We continue to believe that the future is wireless and are committed to push the wireless experience forward.

The mat was supposed to help consolidate most iOS devices into one convenient way to charge them on one mat.

Design Patterns in Swift 5: Learn how to implement the Gang of Four Design Patterns using Swift 5. Improve your coding skills. (Swift Clinic Book 2)

Dan Uff March 29, 2019 2

Now that the latest version of Xcode has a form of the Swift 5 programming language, we will be featuring some Kindle Books this weekend to help you get started in learning the fast-growing programming language from Apple.

To start off, is the book name that's in the heading of this article, "Design Patterns in Swift 5: Learn how to implement the Gang of Four Design Patterns using Swift 5. Improve your coding skills. (Swift Clinic Book 2)"

According to the information:

Software developers need to solve various problems. Many times, these problems are the same or similar to the ones they’ve already encountered in other projects. Wouldn’t it be great to apply the solution you’ve found instead of reinventing the wheel over and over again?

That’s precisely the reason why software design patterns exist. A design pattern is a standardized way to address a recurring problem. Relying on a proven strategy will not only save you time, but you can rest assured that it’s indeed the right choice.

Design patterns are the result of a long evolution process. It all started with a book published in 1994 - yes, it’s that old! - called “Design Patterns - Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software.” That’s a quite tedious title, so we usually refer to it as “the book by the gang of four.” The gang consists of four renowned software engineers: Erich Gamma, Ralph Johnson, Richard Helm, and John Vlissides. They identified the most significant common issues that occurred in multiple projects and developed best practices to solve them.
The best part: these solutions are (programming) language-agnostic. You can use the design patterns with any object-oriented programming language.

Many modern programming languages and frameworks have integrated the GoF patterns. You don’t have to write additional code to support say the Iterator or the Observer.
Swift is no exception. Actually, it provides many advanced language features and constructs —such as type extensions, lazy initialization, and predefined protocols — that let us adopt and integrate the design patterns into our projects easily.

This book covers all these topics and provides best practices you can apply in your upcoming projects.

For more information on purchasing for immediate reading, click here.

Apple’s free iWork Suite just got better

CompuScoop Staff March 29, 2019 2

Unlike Microsoft’s Word suite, Apple’s iWork suite of programs for the Mac and iOS are built for the platform by the people that know it best.

Now Apple has improved the popular suite for iOS with the following:

Keynote 5.0 improvements

The latest version of Apple’s presentation app doesn’t require a stylus to draw an animation path; it can be done with a fingertip as well.

With the just-released Keynote 5.0, it’s now possible to export a slide as an animated GIF. Another handy new feature is the ability to create image placeholders in slides so real ones can be put in later without affecting the design.

Get the full list of updates and tweaks offered by Keynote 5.0 in the App Store.

What’s new in Pages 5.0

All the iWork applications were upgraded to version 5.0. The latest version of the Pages word processor, Apple’s free answer to Microsoft Word, now lets users insert a table of contents into a document or book.

It also gained support for image placeholders.

What Pages 5.0 didn’t get is any additional ways to use the Apple Pencil. Still, all the iWork apps acquired some support for this handy iPad accessory last year.

Learn more, or download this software, in the App Store.

Say hello to Numbers 5.0

Apple didn’t neglect its free spreadsheet app, Numbers. This now allows users to make precise changes to table row and column counts and sizes with the format pane.

There are also improvements when inputting Excel or comma-separated files. And the maximum zoom level in now 400 percent.

More details on Numbers 5.0 are available in the App Store.