Advice and resources for Apple iOS 4 development

Question

I'm looking for resources, screencasts, books, courses, sites and the like to assist with learning Objective-C with the intention of developing applications for Apple's iOS 4.

My development team has access to Apple's development program, and is largely coming from a similar background: they're Comp Sci graduates that have experience with Ruby and web languages, but haven't written any C since university.

Considering Apple's announcement regarding limited programming language support for developers, what's the current best avenue for learning Objective-C with the desire for developing iPad and iPhone applications?

Answer 1

I'm pretty sure that the only place you can find info and discuss about iOS 4 is in the private developers area on the Apple website (which you have access to if you are on the paying developer program). There's an NDA preventing people from discussing betas of iOS, while they're still in beta, out side of the private area on Apple's website.

Answer 2

I would start with some of the current iPhone OS 3 books - such as Aaron Hillegas's terrific iPhone Programming: Big Nerd Ranch Guide or Craig Hockenberry's iPhone App Development: The Missing Manual. If you find that your developers are struggling with Objective-C, go ahead and grab Programming in Objective-C 2.0, 2nd Ed by Stephen G. Kochan.

The differences between iPhone OS 3 and iOS 4 are not inconsequential, but the basics are all the same. It's mostly new APIs and some refinement. These new APIs can be explored from the iPhone Developer Center. iOS 4 is still under NDA until its release, so you must be a paying registered member of the iPhone Dev Center for a couple more weeks.