Adding a no animation segue to iOS

If you want a view to just appear without any animation or transition in iOS then this quick tip for you. First off you do not have to code a custom segue like is suggested on several sites. All that is required is selecting the correct preset segue type and changing a simple setting. Selecting Present Modally and unchecking the Animates checkbox. That all that is needed to have the new view just appear without any animation or transition. That much easier than writing a custom segue.

If you need to see how to do this then watch this short little video;



Thanks and happy coding :)

iOS Xcode Auto layout device preview

When layout of a unversial app in Xcode for iOS, there a way to preview the unverisal layout on all apple device sizes within Xcode at the same time.

I been working with Xcode Swift with several companies and pretty much all of them never knew this could be done. It is a great little tip and I felt it is worth sharing with the world.




Enjoy and happy coding ;)

Fun with Swift recap

Since 2015 we added a number of Swift tutorials to this blog for Mac OS X and iOS. I mostly have focused on Mac because I discovered there not many code examples around the web for Mac and swift. iOS there thousands of them and many are very good.

I also have been making apps for the Mac since 1997 and would like to see so many more jump on board to the Mac OS platform. Users are actually willing to pay money for a Mac apps, unlike iOS where anything over $0.99 is frowned upon.

I going to recap  back to all of the 2015 post we made so far up to March 1st on Swift.

Saturday, January 17, 2015

Using Swift for Mac OS X apps

The basic intro of using strings.

view topic

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Hello Mac From Swift

A video walk through of Xcode and how to make outlets and actions. How to setup UI Controls, Windows with layout constrains. How to use and combine text strings.

view topic

Friday, January 23, 2015

Make OS X Web Browser with Swift

A video showing how to make a basic web browser with swift, inculding adding Google search.

view topic

 Saturday, January 24, 2015

 Sliders with Swift

A basic look at how to uses the a slider control.

view topic

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Alert Messages with Swift

A look at how to present a NSAlert

view topic

Saturday, February 14, 2015

Alerts with Swift for iOS

A look at how to use alerts with iOS.

view topic

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

64-bit requirement for iOS

Simple info about all app store apps require 64-bit support.

view topic

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Tabbar for iOS with Swift

A video to show how to add more tabs to a iOS tab view app.

view topic

Friday, February 20, 2015

Swift language update

Info about Apple beta release of Swift version 1.2

view topic

Saturday, February 21, 2015

Xcode swift tip: Access to docs fast

A tip on how to access header files fast in Xcode to quickly speed up development.

view topic

Monday, February 23, 2015

Swift for Mac Cocoa: Radio Buttons

A video show how to program with Radio Buttons and NSMatrix with Swift.

view topic

Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Swift for Mac: Programming Image Views

Another video showing how to load bundle images and present them on screen.

view topic

Thursday, February 26, 2015

Swift for cocoa importing files with open panel

Another video showing how to use a open panel to import and read files selected by the user.

view topic 

See All Swift Posts

View

I will be adding more swift examples this year, however I will also be focusing back on cross platform also.

Thanks and happy coding ;)

Swift for cocoa importing files with open panel

 Today we look at programming a open panel to import files that the user selects. Most apps do things with files so this is really a good thing to know. With swift this is pretty simple and I think you will find the example easy to do your self.

My example will show importing images that the your selected, but this same panel can open anything. From text, movies, music, folders etc.

Here the video showing how to add open files to a cocoa app using swift:



Thanks again, Happy Coding ;)

Swift for Mac: Programming Image Views

Today's Swift example shows how to display images “photos” in a cocoa based app. It is actually easier with Swift and Xcode, than with most third party development tools I used.

Video to watch is here:



Thanks, happy coding ;)

Swift for Mac Cocoa: Radio Buttons

When it comes to Swift for Mac OS X cocoa there very little info to be found anywhere. Google very rarely returns anything useful. The only swift examples found for the most part are for iOS not Mac. The two platforms are not really the same even if they use the same programming languages

Personally I want to use Swift for everything, because I really like it. It is possible to inter-mix Swift and Objective-C but why? Apple set up Swift to work completely on its own two feet.

Today is a basic example on how to use AppKits Radio Buttons for a Mac cocoa base app. I go over how to get which radio the user clicked on and how to set a highlighted radio cell by swift code.

I have a video showing you this in full, Here a my video on YouTube:



Thanks, happy coding ;)

Tabbar for iOS with Swift

Working with Xcode and Swift is really simple. I keep getting amazed how fast and simple it is to use.

I keep getting people telling me that Swift and Xcode is hard. Also have some say it is s not as fast as Xojo or Livecode for iOS or Mac OS. Actually for iOS and Mac OS its just as fast if not faster. It is really not that hard once you grasp the basics of Swift and learn the ins and outs of Xcode. 

 

Today we look at using  Xcode and Swift for a iOS interface, Tab bar views. Xcode comes with a template with two such tabs. My video will go over what you need to do to add more tabs to your tab view controller. Its under 5 minutes long. So enjoy.

Video:

Thanks for watching, Happy Coding.

Alerts with Swift for iOS

A few weeks ago I went over alerts with swift for Mac OS X. Well just to show how different alerts are between Mac OS X and iOS well take a look at several different type of alerts that can be used with iOS with swift.

First is the most basic alert that includes a title, message and up to 3 action buttons.

below is the code to set up the alert, and call it when a user taps on the button; btnShowAlert

//button action:

@IBAction func btnShowAlert(sender: AnyObject) {
      
       // set up the alert view
        let alertController = UIAlertController(title: "Hello World", message: "this is the obleo's alert message", preferredStyle: UIAlertControllerStyle.Alert)
       
       //set up the action button
        alertController.addAction(UIAlertAction(title: "OK", style: UIAlertActionStyle.Default, handler: nil))
       
        // show a alert view
        self.presentViewController(alertController, animated: true, completion: nil)
    }



That a little different to what we did with Mac OS X and swift. It has more code (however if you have auto complete on, most of its filled in for you.)

Another type alert that I use often is the alert with a text field. It has all the same options as above but includes a text field on the alert. ( you can have several fields if wanted, my example below screen shot show just one.)

 

To set up the alert with the field is not much different than the normal alert. There is just two added lines of code needed different than an normal alert. 1) add the field to the alert with addTextFieldWithConfigurationHandler and 2) setting up way to get the text added to the text field.

see code below:

//button action:

@IBAction func btnShowAskAlert(sender: AnyObject) {
        

// set up alert view
        let alertTextController = UIAlertController(title: "Your Name", message: "Name:", preferredStyle: UIAlertControllerStyle.Alert)
       
        // add the field to the alert (new)
        alertTextController.addTextFieldWithConfigurationHandler ({ (mainTextfld) -> Void in mainTextfld.text = "Add Your name"; })
       
        //add a button action
        alertTextController.addAction(UIAlertAction(title: "OK", style: UIAlertActionStyle.Default, handler: { (action) -> Void in
           
            // add code to preform action from user tapping OK button (new)
            let mainTextfld = alertTextController.textFields![0] as UITextField
            // present result on screen in UIText

            self.fldResult.text = mainTextfld.text
        }))
       
        // present the alert with field on screen
        self.presentViewController(alertTextController, animated: true, completion: nil)
       
        }

That it, swift is just amazing no mater if your targeting Mac or iOS. I noticing that swift for Mac is actually easier than iOS and is less lines of code than iOS for many of the same type of things.

Happy Coding ;)
 

PS I know its been a few weeks since I made a video, my old MBP finally died. I ran into issue with screenflow 3 is not working with my new Mac, I need to update screenflow to version 5+ and do not have the  extra cash today to make it happen. ( And yes I tried quicktime, but it not as professional as screenflow)

Alert Messages with Swift

Here is a quick look at using a modal alert window with swift for Mac OS X

The main window has a simple button action to present a basic modal alert with a text string.

the code to do this in swift is:

@IBAction func btnShowAlert(sender: AnyObject)

        {

            var myAlert:NSAlert = NSAlert()

            myAlert.messageText = "Alert Text Here."

            myAlert.runModal()

    }

Alerts can be more in depth than this. This was just the basics to show how easy they are to add and use in swift. Alerts can also sheet from the main window by using;

beginSheetModalForWindow()

Instead of using the runModal()


Happy Coding;)

Sliders with Swift

Here a quick one how to display a value of a NSSlider with swift in a field.Here the running example:

To basically only get the value from the slider we only need to make an outlet for the text field and an action for the slider. ( However if you want to set the slider by code you also need to make it an outlet also.)

The Slider action is as follows:

// field Outlet

@IBOutlet weak var fldSliderValue: NSTextField!

// NSSlider Action

@IBAction func mySlider1(sender: AnyObject) {

// x holds the value as a double as the slider changes position

var x: Double = sender.doubleValue

// to get the value to display as text string in the field do this

var mystring = x.description

// display the value in the field

fldSliderValue.stringValue = mystring

 }

Below is the source view:

Swift for Mac OS X is really fun. Will be sharing more soon.  

Make OS X Web Browser with Swift

Make OS X Web Browser with Swift

The last swift example we did was using basic text strings. This next example takes what we learned using basic text string and shows how they can be used to make a very basic web browser. By taking basically the user inputed text we will load a web page. Also we will take a basic user field input and take that string and do a basic google web search. The video still stays in the realm of basic, however you can see how quickly the project could and should start using functions and be broken into separate sources files.

Swift for Mac OS X is really not very hard to pick up and makes in a good choice for those who came from Apple Script, Basic, Ruby, Javascript or a Small Talk language to pick up quickly as it is very similar to what you already know.

Swift makes you start  to see very fast why you should consider using it over a 3rd party tool, as it simple to learn and use. Best of all it has access to everything Mac or iOS and is free to use. (note for iOS the webview is done differently. It is kind of the same, however you need to use UIWebview instead. It is also more limited than the webview for Mac in what it can do.)

This video a little long at 30 minutes but covers a bunch. Will likely revisit this project in the future with more advance topics.

Here the video:

(It supports up to 1080p and may even work with the new 1440p Beta resolution.
It may take a while for youTube to Process higher video resolutions upto a hour from posting, I suggest 1080p or higher to read the sourcecode.)

And if you on a mobile device and want to view on the you-Tube app instead here the video link (video quality is better for mobile on youTube app) http://youtu.be/khhi52p9szQ




Thanks and happy coding ;)

Hello Mac From Swift

After my last post about using swift to make cocoa apps on Mac OS X, I got a few questions on how to make an outlet. I guess it is easier to see it happen. Also got questions on how to do window layout constrains with Xcode for Mac also.  As I said it is easier to see this than read about it, So I show you in this video with a very simple basic Cocoa app Hello Mac again with using swift.

There a million swift examples for iOS but not to many for Mac OS X cocoa based apps, so again I keep sharing more swift for Mac stuff in the future. As I am a more a Mac OS developer more than an iOS one.

Here the video; Enjoy.

Note: (If you do not see 1080p resolution then wait for YouTube to process the higher res version. should be not to long)

 

Using Swift for Mac OS X apps

Yesterday I ran into an issue out of my control with a 3rd party cross platform tool I use. The issue was something that may end my development with it for Mac OS X. Now I not 100% sure if I will not find a work around with that tool. However it is very clear that I need to stop putting all my eggs into one basket and make a real move into using Apple's Xcode to build for Mac OS X in the future.

I already been learning swift for iOS, however when it comes to Mac OSX there very little info or example projects floating around. Even Apple developer site has only 3 swift examples for Mac OSX but have a ton for iOS. Mac and iOS are not the same.

I decided I going to do, if my schedule allows it one or more Mac swift project a day for the next 2 months and really learn how this is done. I have already meet a dozen other developers who want to learn swift for Mac also and are trying to find examples to.

That why I going to share much of what I learn each learning project I do here as, it may help some what.

I decided to skip the Hello world app and start with working with basic text strings and very basic button actions for my first mac demo.

Now first off for a Mac swift project there only one source file the AppDelegate.swift file that all your code goes in.

You still design the interface in Interface builder much like it was done with objective c. Just like with Objective-c each object needs to be assigned an outlet or a action however this is done in the same  AppDelegate.swift file.

This example will simply take the text from each 3 fields and add it together with the process button. And secondly with the clear button remove the text from all 4 fields.

The photo below shows the outlets for all 4 text fields. to create the outlet, first put Xcode into 2 views. the left one the interface view the right one the source code view for AppDelegate.swift. (If that file does not appear in the right side of the subview. At top left corner has 4 boxes like icon, click there to get a sub menu to switch the source code for the view.) To create the outlet simple select a field while holding down the control button and drag the string like graphic to the source code view as like the photo below. This will present you with a pop over window where you name the field (such as fldFieldName) that in turn makes an outlet. do this for each field. (below is an image of the added outlets, Note the window outlet was pre made by Xcode as was the functions for app launching and will terminate) 

Next Adding actions to the buttons. This is done similar to how you create a outlet however you need to add this code after the last function Xcode made but between the last "}" symbol. Also note when the pop over appear there a pop up menu if you select that, you can change the outlet to action. That what you want to do for the button, then assign it a name and hit return.

for my mini app I have the following:

 @IBAction func btnProcessName(sender: AnyObject) {

}

Now between the {} you add your code. Working with strings in Xcode is pretty simple and is similar to many other development languages. we take the object dot property such as:

@IBAction func btnProcessName(sender: AnyObject) {

        fldFullname.stringValue

    }

To assign as value to this fields string value (text) use the = symbol and basically just add the text together. This example does not current check if a field has no text however doing such would not be hard. 

The final action that makes a full name from 3 text fields for first, middle and last name looks like this:

 @IBAction func btnProcessName(sender: AnyObject) {

        fldFullname.stringValue = fldFirstName.stringValue + " " + fldMidName.stringValue + " " + fldLastName.stringValue   

    }

And last to clear all text from the text field as simple action very similar to many programming languages. 

 @IBAction func btnClearAllText(sender: AnyObject) {

        fldFirstName.stringValue = ""

        fldMidName.stringValue = ""

        fldLastName.stringValue = ""

        fldFullname.stringValue = ""

    }

And below are additional images of this very simple swift learning example for Mac OSX.

The full source code (and yes you can make your Xcode editor any color, like mine.)

And last an screen shot of the app test running (like my input;) )

I know I did not do a video, but my upstair neighbors are very loud with there yelling and screaming that a video would not work today. If you think a video would help I could do one in the future when they calm down upstairs.

I hope this helps some as it help me making it to learn myself.

Happy coding ;) thanks for visiting.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year

When I first started this blog part of posterous.com over 6 years now, (moved it to blogger 3 years ago) we meet some pretty cool people. Between my video collections at Vimeo, Screencast.com and YouTube we made over 100 free videos for just learning something cool to do with programing. Some of these videos are now outdated, as the technology world changes every second, (ok it seems like it does, every 6 to 14 months) and that causes some of this stuff to no longer work :(

This blog went from 583 unique visitors a month from 2013 to 8,704 in 2014. Wow! I almost feel I do not give that much content to deserve those numbers. Thank you.

We always try to make more content, but we do not get paid for this blog. We do it when we are in-between programming and multi- media work and jobs. If its slow we give more content, and if busy it will be less.

We also tell it like it is, no candy coating here, not many fancy edits. Why? because we are real people, only fake people edit out there flaws.

Thanks everyone for watching in 2014 and for supporting my little corner of the internet. Hope to see you here again in 2015.

Your friend,

Obleo ;) Happy Coding.

Xojo vs Livecode best option for iOS Development?

I use both Livecode and Xojo I like them both. Xojo is way better than Livecode when it comes to Mac OSX and Linux. And Livecode way better at Windows. Livecode also supports Android and is one of the best 3rd party android development tools on the market.

However when it comes to iOS what my thoughts on the subject. First off Xojo just released version 1 of iOS support and Livecode has supported iOS for several years now. I used Livecode for iOS and liked it, but when I heard Xojo was going to support native iOs GUI I was excited.

Once iOS was released for Xojo I became disappointed fast, it was missing so much basic stuff that it was uncanny. Xojo is very very limited out of the box when compared to Livecode for iOS.

It was so limited that I made a chart highlighting some of the different things I came to need to when making iOS apps. Livecode supports most of them. Xojo supports only few of them. Lets take a look.

I really like how Xojo works and prefer it still over Livecode for Mac and Linux. And I like the IDE and the way BASIC works over small talk and Livecode IDE. However when it comes to Mobile Livecode wins for now. It supports more stuff out of the box for iOS and also supports Android with most of the same items as it does for iOS.

Another area that impressive is Livecode is now cheaper than Xojo if your going to make iOS apps. With Livecode your required to have Livecode Commercial License to sell iOS apps which cost $299 each year (that also includes 7 platforms for now and up to 8 in the near future.) For Xojo since there pricing change iOS cost $299 a year for only iOS. For Desktop its an extra $299 and for Pro its $699.

Also if your interested in just iOS and want to only do free iOS apps , Livecode for iOS only can be as low as $99. Xojo does not even have this option.

However Apple new swift changes the game even more. You can always switch over to Xcode and use swift for free, and that supports everything out of the box. The reason anyone would use Xojo or Livecode would be to make cross-platform apps.

I still like both tools and will keep using both tools, but for now Livecode wins iOS based on it supports way more needed stuff. However if you need or want Native GUI and learn declares for Xojo then Xojo can be a real improvement in overall quality of the end product.

------------------------------------

I personally have moved to Xcode and Swift for iOS as neither Xojo or Livecode does what I need to grow as a developer of iOS apps.

Swift is very easy to use as a programming language and Xcode supports everything. The case its not cross platform is not valid to me because Xojo and Livecode are not really cross-platform either when it comes to iOS. You can not take the same code base as a Linux or windows app and make it work with iOS with either of those tools without re programming it for iOS.

That fact of that alone makes Xcode and swift the best overall option. Plus its free to use, there millions of developers using it. Which gives more chances to get answers if you get stuck. And last if your looking for a paying job you likely find one for swift than with either of those tools.

Adventures of iOS with Xojo Part 2 Tab Bar Now Working

If you been following along the first part I had a hell of an time figuring out the Tab bar set up. Well after a good night sleep and a good tip from a beta user,who had more info than me. Now it works and did another video showing how it does work.

When the help docs are vague it often seems harder than it actual is. Since I do not work for Xojo I can not help document for them but I can make a video like this in no time flat.

Adventures of iOS with Xojo Part 1 Tab Bar Blues

I was super happy to finally have a chance to work with iOS for Xojo. I knew there would be a learning curve. However never thought the would be a learning curve to just add user interface element like a tab bar.

Xojo included example project of a tab bar however that example has no code. It was done some way by the IDE. Trying to figure out how is the topic for this first part of the Adventures of iOS with Xojo.

I feel this is fitting for the first part because Xojo for iOS is not as easy as Xcode without better help docs. Would have thought it should have been, but its not. Since this has taken up hours trying to understand how Xojo for iOS works with just adding tab bars. also hearing other are experiencing about the same thing. Its fitting to start this series off this way.

Part 1; Xojo iOS Tab Bar Blues (in full motion color)

-

Xojo for iOS is here, a first look.

Xojo for iOS is here, a first look. I have some screenshots and basic info. Later in the week maybe a video.

Xojo has a pricing change so depending on what you need. you maybe paying less or if your like me you be paying more. Xojo has a blog post on this info.

Above is a screen of one of the included example apps in the Xojo IDE. (One of those annoying and reject-able noise apps.)

Above is a iOS simulator view of a date picker running on the iPad. This uses declares.

Above is the example notes app running in the iPad simulator.

Xojo for iOS is done very well. I have used several development platforms for iOS over the years (including such; Livecode, Unity, Cornia SDK, Phone Gap, Ruby Motion and a few others) And to be fair when I compare Xojo for iOS Xojo is one of the best I seen.

However Xojo does not have a full out of the box feature set at this time. It is a little limited what you can do without writing declares. However declares are pretty simple to understand and use, that it not that bad. However for the price some may think some of these things should be added out of the box and I would agree.

One thing xojo does that basically no one else has done besides Ruby Motion and Xcode is have Native iOS controls built in. Corona & Livecode has no native controls and was one major reason both tools are a disappointment.

iOS Xojo control palette

Another awesome feature is the code signing is built in to Xojo so we do not need to sign it ourselves our pay some other app developer some huge overprice license to do it either (like you do on mac).

One of the neatest but confusing features is the auto layout. What cool is it has auto layout, however it works no where close to Xcode and swift in ease of use. here a image below.

Auto layout palette

Xojo for iOS gets a thumbs up from me. However It still needs work to be a really contender to several other iOS toolsets for its cost. Consider that iOS for Xojo is at 1.0 I say its pretty good. It still has much more it needs to do to get many to switch however. I still think its worth checking out. 

More info at Xojo.com

Look at Livecode 6.7 & 7.0

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away.... Many many users submitted bugs for Metacard / Revolution/ and now Livecode that went unfixed for what seem like forever. Well the new versions of Livecode which have been in the works for well over a year have fix many of those old time bugs in versions 6.7 and 7.0.

I knew what your thinking? Why two versions. I asked several times myself and no one would tell me either. However after the actual release it became clear that 7.0 is the full unicode version which does break backward compatibility with any apps that accessed text, image data, and arrays. That where version 6.7 steps in its the backwards compatible version without the new unicode.

I decided to do a little video overview Editorial of the new Livecode versions. If you like check it out, below.

I should also note when I went to Livecode web site to download the new versions of Livecode, it does not have a link anywhere for the actual versions 6.7 or 7.0. Instead it gives you version 6.6.5. I tried to ask runrev where the new versions where, but I guess there to busy to tell us where there open source stuff actual can be downloaded from.

After a week of asking anyone I could find, I finally found out from another Livecode user where this secret download web page was at that has all of Livecode downloads. I will share that with you here. Because we all just want to know http://downloads.livecode.com/livecode/  Link Here



Have fun :)

Jumping into swift for iOS

5 years ago I started making iOS apps. I started out using Livecode where I made 13 iOS apps and games. I also tried Corona Sdk where I made two more games and also Unity where I made one game. I then stopped for a while to focus on desktop apps again. Something I favor more that mobile because desktop apps make more money and have way more users (at least for my products). 

Another reason I stopped iOS development for a while was the development tools I where using had issues. Many where buggy and did not have full access to very much. 

When swift first came out I focused on it for Mac OSX but recently I decided to jump into swift with iOS. I am shocked just how easy it is over Objective-C. Actually I find now swift is actually easier than using Livecode or Corona to make iOS apps. And that is the truth

I was waiting around for Xojo to release its iOS version, which made it self into beta last week. However I just wanted to see if swift could be the answer. I am still interested in Xojo because of the cross platform aspect.

I started by making a simple photo app with swift for a simple benchmark test. That imports a photo from a album adds some core image effects and exports the altered image back to the photo album. I had made a similar app with Livecode back in 2012 and that was a month of programming. With swift the same type of app tock 3 hours from start to finish. Yes, Wow! I never knew I could do something that fast.

The coolest idea for learning and using swift, is swift has more widespread work available world wide than with another tool. 

I highly suggest checking out swift, it is a lot easier than it looks. 

I sure this blog will see some more Swift post with some code examples soon.