mikeash
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An iPhone developer's story
If you're curious about developing for the iPhone, but haven't made the plunge yet, you might want to read Rogue Amoeba programmer Mike Ash's 22-step tale of developing NetAwake, which is available in the App Store. It's a fascinating story, with a lot of waiting, a lot of rejection, and a lot of "screwing about in Xcode." "The errors are essentially worthless. I believe I only ever saw Xcode generate one error, over and over and over again, as it encountered a whole bunch of different problems," he wrote. The app took a month to approve, once it was submitted. Ash says that the people he corresponded with at Apple were "nice about responding to my query" but "spending a month in limbo for a single bug is a very poor tradeoff."
How to ask development questions 101
If you are a budding developer, there are a few different ways to seek help from your peers. Whether you send an email off to your hero developer or jump into a chat room, it's not just what you ask, but how you ask the question that can make all the difference. Mike Ash, a programmer for Rogue Amoeba (purveyors of Airfoil, Audio Hijack and Nicecast), has written a 10-point article of sorts offering advice on how to ask your coding questions so you can get the right answers. While I am in no way a code ninja of any sorts, I can see that many of Mike's points center on bringing clarity to the questions you ask so those taking time to help you understand the question, instead of having to spend most of their time trying to glean the proper question out of you.Mike's Getting Answers should be an insightful read for any developers who are (or perhaps: should be) seeking help on how to get help with their projects.[via Daring Fireball]
