The experience of searching for and finding the SDK, and a beginners guide couldn’t be easier.  A google search provided immediate results for the 6.1 SDK refresh, and a search of a well known community (MSDN) provided plenty of information to get started writing apps using the .net development platform.  Microsoft Windows is still one of the most widely used operating systems, making it an easily accessible native platform.

WineHQ has a write-up on installing Visual Studio .NET 2005 Express natively in Linux, but is mostly rated as garbage.  I suggest using the same technique here as installing the Apple SDK – grab a copy of windows and install it in a VM session.  Running a Mac you could easily run this using Parallels or VMware Fusion.

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Victory at long last.    Long ago I left the Apple IIGS for Windows 95 and hadn’t looked back since. This handy little guide brought me home.  I named my VM Sex Panther, because 60 percent of the time, it works every time.  That’s about the success rate I’ve had with these hacked together distros for Leopard.

In addition to VMWare’s 6.5 Workstation offering a fantastic test environment, the best ISO out there I’ve found to date is the iDeneb.  The customization options are commented so that even the average person can make sense of what they’re clicking.  Success rates may vary, but I now have my development environment set up.  If you plan on undertaking a similar project, I highly suggest either paying to become an apple developer for $500, buying a license for Leopard (even though this is against the EULA), or taking the easy way out and spending the $600 on a Mac mini.  Next on the docket is a review of the training videos/materials available through apple.

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There are a few options out there for people that want to utilize a PC to develop for the iPhone, but I can almost guarantee that none of the apps developed using these tools will see the light of day in the Apple Appstore.  Regardless this might be a good starting point for learning.

I’m starting to see VMware as my savior as much as I’ve been trying to avoid virtualization.  More on that in a later.

This tutorial by PJ Cabrera misses out on a lot of the features that the Apple SDK provides, but it’s a working solution for Windows and Linux developers.  I’m already feeling a bit more in my element.  This was released last summer, but unfortunately this was not a major interest of mine at the time.  The basic premise of this method is using the Eclipse C Development Toolkit, an open source project, to release applications for jail broken phones.  Not an ideal solution, but again, it could be a good launch point to start learning the process of writing code in C.

Another option I ran across in my quest is called winChain.  At first glance it looks like the bees knees for installing the environment and getting coding, but after reading the comments below the guide it seems far from simple.  Another cause for concern is the last update date – December 7th 2007.  The iPhone OS has evolved significantly since the last update of this tool, so it gives me cause for hesitation.  I think I’ll try the final route I want to look at – I’d like to develop the way Apple intends people to develop rather than hacking together something similar.

Back to the doldrums of the osx86 project.  This is basically the same as my Hackint0shing article minus the commitment of altering my native partitioning/OS.

To be continued . . . VMWare and BEYOND!

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The hype for the 3.0 version of the iPhone OS got me motivated this week to do something I haven’t done in a long time – write code.  I’ve been rockin’ an iPhone 3g since last summer and have loved/hated it like any user familiar with the missing features and poor memory management of the 2.x firmware.

3.0 feels like the second coming, and I’m hoping with all the new APIs available out there, the development community can come up with some fantastic stuff.  So a starting point. Not too difficult to find is the noobs guide to enlisting in the apple development community.  Good beginning.

I registered using my pre-existing Apple ID, and within minutes I’m a card toting apple developer.  I quickly noticed that to get access to the 3.0 SDK I needed to pay the $99 annual developers fee.  A little trigger shy, I decided to wait on that until I could get my feet wet with what’s already available to the public – the 2.2.1 SDK.  First stop, clicking the big blue “DOWNLOAD ME NOW!!!!!!!!” button, which is really small round and grey, but wow does it pop out.  Next  is the boilerplate “SDK Readme” PDF file just below the download link.

Disappointment sets in . . .

iPhone SDK requires an Intel-based Mac running Mac OS X Leopard version 10.5.4 or later. Xcode 3.1.2 is also available separately for Mac-only development and is compatible with Intel and PowerPC Macs running Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 and later.

Now, like most technophiles, I’m well versed in both Windows and Linux, but never saw a particular point in purchasing an overpriced piece of hardware with a simplified user experience OS.  (no offense to any Mac users out there)  The real problem is, most corporate or even personal computers come with some flavor of windows, and generally anyone that wants to dig into the nuts and bolts a bit more will opt for a free copy of Linux.  Like anything worth doing, it seems this is going to require more effort.  Next on the project list – The Hackintosh.

To be Continued . . .

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