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The Linux distillery Write your own iPhone apps for fun and profit | Write your own iPhone apps for fun and profit |
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| by David M Williams | |
| Wednesday, 09 July 2008 | |
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Ok, true, this isn’t my regular Linux story - but it does thematically fit if you’ll permit me some artistic license. Firstly, it ain’t Windows Mobile so there’s a plus! Secondly, Apple did see the light some years ago and MacOS is now actually a BSD Unix derivative even if it’s not (yet!) Linux. And thirdly, well, your iPhone apps could be open source, why not! Maybe that’s stretching it a bit, but let’s just say the iPhone is hot right now and inquiring minds will want to know how to develop for it. It’s in the spirit of freedom for us open source advocates to promote such knowledge and understanding! So, let’s begin. First, you will need an Intel Apple Macintosh desktop or laptop running MacOS 10.5.3 or later. Sorry about that. Lest I receive myriads of flame from Macophiles let me quickly point out I’m not saying sorry people have to use a Mac, but sorry that the development tools are only available for that platform. Nevertheless, it actually does use the GNU C compiler so I’m certain bright types will figure out how to make it all work on their Ubuntu or Fedora or other system. The next thing you require is the Apple iPhone Software Development Kit, or SDK. Happily, this is free, although you do need to register as a developer - although there is one pretty serious caveat. You get all the tools necessary to write iPhone apps, including an iPhone emulator, for nix - but you will need to pay $USD 99 if you want to actually run what you develop on a real iPhone, including your own, and if you want to put your works up for sale at the Apple Marketplace. Still, the emulator is pretty cool and you can use it to work out how far you want to go in the world of iPhone apps. Open up the Apple Developer Connection site; the link to download the iPhone SDK is fairly prominent. Click “Download now.” You will be prompted to sign in, if you already have an account at the Developer Connection site, or to register. There’s no fee for registration and you don’t get spammed with junk mail. Once you are both signed up and logged in you can download the SDK finally. Be warned, it’s 1.25GB so you’ll probably want to let this run overnight. The SDK comes in the form of a .dmg disk image. Simply double-click to open it, and then double-click the file “iPhone SDK” to launch the installer. CONTINUED
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