MonoTouch, the future of MonoTouch and should I use it for iPhone applications (instead of objective-C)

Question

I decided to start writing an application for the iPhone and switch from the C # background, I thought I would start developing it using mono.

Although this may be a subjective matter, I would like some guidance from you.

Is it safe to develop my application using this technology, or should I buy some books and start learning about the purpose of C?

I know that Adobe will release a feature that will allow you to create iPhone apps using Flash CS5, but that didn't last long.

I appreciate your feedback.

Marco

Answer 1

Monotouch does a great job of keeping it up-to-date (usually within 24 hours after api updates), so I just say that you have no idea about xyz, but you know that abc is much better than a little silly. Monotouch has some serious advantages over obj c - for example, obj c has just been updated about two times in the last twenty years! expect good XML, regex, support for Http? Think again. Linq to obj c? never. Good OS community? Most likely not. There are many reasons to use MT, except that C # is a much better language. The ability to reuse a good percentage of your code in MonoDroid is one thing. Although there is a word that an apple creates a new language - I do not really hope so. We will see, I think.

I recognized Obj C before getting into MT, and the reason I went with MT is that using Obj C is like returning to the 90s. It simply does not have any modern language features and is too far from the curve. Build your bleeding apps with their archaic langauge? Thanks, but not thanks.

Answer 2

None of us, except people who work very closely with the OS and the policies of the App Store in Apple, knows how to "safely" develop applications using this technology. In the future, Apple cannot say no, but we do not know. We know that all compiled code must be in C, C ++ or Obj-C. However, there is one catch: In some cases, you can run interpreted languages .

If I were you, I would go with Objective-C. We know that Apple fully supports it, it has been there for almost 20 years. It's not that hard to learn, since you know C #. I came from C ++ / C, and it took me about a month or so to learn half of the frameworks. There are many other frameworks that I did not recognize, because they are not applicable in my applications (such as accelerators, GPS, OpenGL ES, etc.). You can probably avoid this too.

Once again, there is another way: build it using HTML5. However, this way you have to think about what your application will do when it is opened using the Safari desktop, Firefox, IE, etc.

Answer 3

The iPhone development agreement is pretty clear that C # is not an accepted technology for developing applications for the iPhone. Despite this, Monotouch applications are still not accepted into the application store without any problems. My suggestion is to keep in touch with Monotouch forums to find out what their position is on this issue and make a decision based on this. The long-term safe bet is to learn Objective-C.

Answer 4

Apple recently changed the offer for third-party development tools, which now state that if you have prior approval, you can use them. I did not see the official word that Mono would be allowed.

If you come from a C # background, I would highly recommend learning Obj-C, because it always helps to know a different language, and you can easily pick it up. Take a look at Stanford University lectures on the iPhone, they were the best resource when I was studying.

Although I personally have not used C # or Mono, the iOS SDK, as soon as you find out that it has a really great job, thanks to which it becomes simple and powerful when you get used to it, and I would be surprised if Mono took advantage all this.

Answer 5

I think it’s important to learn the language in which the frameworks were written for your platform of choice. Then you can understand why the infrastructure is what it is, and often anticipate the behavior or calls of the API, based only on what is typical of the language and structure.

In addition, there is now a ton of API support for blocks (only iOS4 and only), which may take some time to be included in MonoTouch. Overlay frames are always a step behind the base platform, so it's best to use frames directly.

Answer 6

It has been several months since Flash and Monotouch and Unity are still swinging.

As developers in the .NET store, we are considering an iOS development extension. After prototyping some pretty simple things in Objective-C, we are 100% committed to using Monotouch, it costs every penny.