“This book assumes you have a working knowledge of C.”

I’m slowly plodding along with learning Objective C, with the goal of developing an iPhone application. I really don’t have time for classes. So I wanted to find a book to get me through Objective-C at my own pace. But when I started looking at iPhone programming books, many of them started with the phrase “This book assumes you have a working knowledge of C.” Well, I don’t. I’m a designer, not a programmer (yet).

So I started looking into books on C. But there’s a problem with that. Objective C - the programming language that is used for iOS and Mac programming - is different than C. So I’d have to learn C, and then learn Objective C. I’m not that patient. Plus most of the C books started with “This books assumes you have some programming experience.” Which I don’t. I’m a designer.

Finally, I found Programming in Objective-C 2.0 by Stephen G. Kochan. And in the introduction, Kochan writes “This book does not assume much, if any, previous programming experience. In fact, if you’re a novice programmer, you should be about to learn Objective-C as your first programming language.” Perfect. Exactly what I was looking for. So I bought it for Kindle so I could view it on my iPad and my Mac.

I’ve started going through the book chapter by chapter. And so far, I like it. It’s challenging. I’m doing the assignments at the end of the chapter. Writing simple programs to solve mathematical equations or perform simple functions. All command line programs with no graphical interface. Sometimes, it’s easy and sometimes, it’s really not. iOS and Mac programming are still a long way away, but I’m making progress.