Designing iPad apps

[Gir_450]

Does anyone know a good website where we can learn to make an iPad app for our team?

[Jon Stratis]

The best is probably Apple's own tools and tutorials: http://developer.apple.com/devcenter/ios/index.action

[Jimmy Nichols]

I was looking into this for work.

Just a head's up, what I read was you have to apply to Apple to be able to develop App's, its a 6 month approval processs and the software will only run on MAC's (Obviously).

It was apparant to me if you could download the software before the approval to be a developer, but we don't use mac's at work so I didn't pay that much attention.

Andriod App info and software was all free for download.

[JCharlton]

You might want to look into doing a web-app, depending on what it is you're trying to do.

Take a look at this book:

Building iPhone Apps with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596805791.do

Note that O'Reilly is selling ebooks at 50% off for just a few more days.

[Jonathan Norris]

I was looking into this for work.

Just a head's up, what I read was you have to apply to Apple to be able to develop App's, its a 6 month approval processs and the software will only run on MAC's (Obviously).

It was apparant to me if you could download the software before the approval to be a developer, but we don't use mac's at work so I didn't pay that much attention.

Andriod App info and software was all free for download.

To 'apply' to be a developer all it takes is $100, there are alot of great tools that Apple provides and even more free resources available on the internet. (http://stackoverflow.com/ is your friend.... for specific issues you will run into). The only real reason there is a $100 fee is avoid everyone signing up and running beta software builds that are not ready for mass consumption.

I highly recommend this book: http://www.amazon.com/Programming-iOS-Fundamentals-iPhone-Development/dp/1449388434/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1317050454&sr=8-1
Its a very good textbook that walks you through all the basics that you need to know to know about objective C, XCode, and iOS.

Getting your app approved by Apple isn't that big of a deal aslong as you are not doing anything to crazy with it or using Private API's. It won't take longer then a week or so with a simple app.

[NullEntity]

We're going to do this.

Without a license, you can get Xcode4 (free with Lion, $40 with anything else) and develop within a virtual machine.

If you get the $100 developer license, you can test the app on any actual device that's tied to the account. We'll be using this method as it's only going to run on our devices (for the time being).

If you want to submit it to the app store, then Apple has to approve it and such.

[jtdowney]

Part of my day job is developing iOS (iPhone/iPad) applications so I just want to point out some items (and some corrections to others):


You will need a Mac to develop iOS applications
Most iOS application are developed in Apple's Xcode IDE
A standard developer program subscription is $99/yr
Xcode4 is free if you have a developer subscription
Without a subscription Xcode4 free with OS X 10.7 Lion (in the App Store), if you have 10.6 Snow Leopard it is $5 (also in the App Store)
You can develop and test (in the simulator) as many applications as you want with just Xcode4
To publish to a real device you will need to be a member of the developer program
To publish to the App Store you will need to be a member of the developer program
In my experience my new applications have been approved by Apple in 7 days

[djshaffer]

My team is wanting to experiment with makeing ipad apps. but we are unable to afford to get a developer account. if anyone is willing to help upload our app we created or give us other ideas please reply to this or send a message to me.. Thanks!

First Team 1708
McKeesport PA, 15132

[Dale]

You might want to look into doing a web-app, depending on what it is you're trying to do.


1540's very extensive competitive analysis system (http://cs.catlin.edu/spying/beta/stands.php?cache&position=blue&passcode=firerooster1540) was done in Javascript and runs on six iPads served up and supported by a web server and database. For our purposes you really couldn't tell it from a native iOS app. It depends on what you want to do. (The backend isn't running currently but the above link gives you the idea, though some of the buttons don't work and it doesn't populate at this point because the server isn't running all the services it needs anymore.)

CowScout (http://www.cowscout.com)is also a web system.

If the idea is to develop a competitive analysis system, a web-based system might be just the ticket. You don't need a developer account this way and you can roll out changes to your application just by having everyone hit "refresh".

[Andrew Lawrence]

Our lead mentor makes iPad apps for a living. If you want, I can pm you his email. He's an app expert, and has his own company.

[Dale]

Oh, and to answer the question, if you actually want to run your application directly on an iDevice (not web), I'm pretty sure you'll either need to Jailbreak it or get a $99/yr developer program account. In the mean time you can learn the programming side with the free Xcode toolset and run on the built-in simulator.

There is a University program (https://developer.apple.com/programs/ios/university/) that will allow you to distribute on actual devices but I don't know if one can get it set up for high schools.