iOS Development: Things to Like; Things to Hate

Things I like about iOS Development

• I like writing code in the Objective-C language.
• I like Apple’s provided frameworks and tools. They are, on the whole, very good.
• I like the iOS community’s enthusiasm for great products. It is very inspiring.
• I like that people will pay you good money to build apps for them in iOS. Though this is has good and bad implications.
• I love attending, and over the last few years running, CocoaHeads in Philadelphia.
• I like that the community on a whole is not very secretive. There is a sense we are in this together and people constantly help each other out sharing tips, code and war stories.

Things I hate about iOS Development

• I hate the exclusivity of the AppStore distribution.
• I hate that I can’t side load apps that people build that Apple doesn’t approve of.
• I hate that I have to sign my apps.
• I hate the learning curve and the bugs of the signing process for all but especially for people new to iOS.
• I hate that Apple has a shitty code validator during app signing that will complain when I have methods on my objects that look like private methods on their objects.
• I hate how shitty AppStore search and discovery is.
• I hate the corporate politics that let apps get featured in the store because of “connections”.
• I hate how people continue to manipulate the AppStore ranking system and I hate how little Apple seems improve the situation when many small developers livelihoods are at stake.
• I hate how the Radar bug system doesn’t have tools in place to involve and update the original bug reporter on progress being made. From a third-party perspective most bug reports might as well go into a black hole.
• I hate how in the pit of my stomach I believe that, on the whole, the iPhone and its brethren have not improved society. I think the majority of mobile software has only helped to empower “generation ‘me’”, a generation that is “friends” with everyone, but no one. This deserves a post on to itself someday.
• I hate the iOS / Mobile bubble. The fact that people are spending way too much building apps and are not getting a proper return of value on the investment.
• I hate that building products is way riskier than consulting (bubble related).
• I hate that Apple hasn’t shown more interest in providing a library management system. Thankfully we have CocoaPods but since it’s on the outside there is a fear it might not be able to keep up as the tool chain evolves.
• I hate that back when Apple first started to integrate OCUnit into Xcode it enviably killed like 3 or 4 other very promising testing systems because the thought at the time was “well Apple made their choice and will build on it” when in fact Apple never did. Only recently did we see XCTest and it is, right now from a functional perspective, a method renamed version of OCUnit with no new features.
• I hate how Xcode Bots doesn’t have pre and post scripts.
• I hate (hate is a strong word — let’s say disappointed by) the growing community of “Apple Celebrity”. The once full time developers who can build great things but now choose to spend the majority of their time blogging, podcasting and tweeting all day. They partake in a low impact ping pong match of opinions on weekly events and news that frankly doesn’t mean all that much in the grand scheme of things.