Wibtown

After a couple of weeks of reading numerous programming manuals I finally managed to write a simple Cocoa app yesterday, well I say write but it was more modify the existing code in one of the books that I’ve been reading. Nevertheless  I do feel like I’m getting somewhere now. The app itself is a simple profit calculator which takes your stake and odds and then works out how much profit you’ll receive should you win and is based on the simple calculate app found in Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X for Dummies.

The next challenge will be trying to get it to work on the iPhone.

For anybody who’s interested the source code is after the break and if you want to know how to configure the interface just ask but I think it should be easy enough to work out from the code and please note that this might not be the best way to write the app but it works and that’s all I’m concerned with at the moment.

(more…)

When writing a book on programming where accuracy is paramount is it too much to ask that it’s proof read before it’s published and maybe it should include all of the steps needed without missing some out here and there. Also it might help to keep the same names for items instead of changing them on the next page. On the other hand could this be deliberate to give me more experience debugging?

Learning how to program is hard enough as it is without having to correct the books errors as well as my own.

OK it’s been a week since my Mac Mini arrived and barring a few little hiccups things are coming together nicely, in fact I’m pretty much at the point now where I wish that I had switched to a Mac sooner. My original intentions where just to use the Mac Mini for coding purposes but I’ve slowly been migrating everything over from my PC as I’m finding the Mac to be more fun to use.

That’s not to say that I’ll be getting rid of the PC anytime soon as it’s still my first choice for gaming and watching satellite TV but I am using it less and less now.

After reading Sams Teach Yourself iPhone Development in 24 Hours up to chapter six and not really feeling like any of the information was settling in I decided to try to find another book that suited me better. Cocoa Programming For Mac OS X For Dummies is the one that I eventually decided on and it arrived yesterday.

So far I’m finding it far easier to follow than the Sams book but it has brought another bit of Mac strangeness to my attention. The early lessons in the book teach you how to make a simple calculator which has problems displaying fractional values but luckily it then teaches you how to fix that and this is where the problem comes in. To fix it you need to be able to type # which is known to people in the UK as a hash symbol but I believe it’s also known as a pound symbol and number symbol in other areas of the world. Problem is when I press the # key on my UK Windows keyboard it brings up \. I thought that this may be a similar problem to the @ and ” symbols being transposed but unfortnately it’s not as simple as that as the \ key brings up § and so on.

Wanting to be able to get on with my learning as quickly as possible I oredered a Mac keyboard as I would be needing one in the future anyway and then set about trying to find a workaround for my Windows keyboard. Whilst trying to find the workaround I discovered that UK Mac keyboards don’t actually have a # key for some reason so you have to press alt 3 instead which also works on a Windows keyboard, so that’s another problem solved for now but the burning question is why don’t UK Mac keyboards have a # key?

For anybody wondering how to include your Mac in a Windows workgroup for file sharing using OS X open up system preferences, click network, click advanced, select WINS and then enter the workgroup name.

You should now be able to access any shared files or folders that you have permission to.

Does clicking on the x icon in a window close a program or just send it to the dock? Or is that instance of the program closed but the icon remains on the dock for easy access if you need it again? I’m confused.