develop iphone application - is the GUI HTML?

Question

Hi

I want to start developing IPhone application.

I need to understand something about it - I am working with a graphic designer.

If she supplies the GUI in HTML - will it be easy for me to develop with it?

How does it work? like regular web development?

Answer 1

Apple uses Objective C and Cocoa for iPhone applications. Neither uses HTML; you'll instead be using interactive controls like you'd find in a desktop application. Whether it's easy for you to develop using an HTML mockup will depend entirely on your skills with Cocoa. (In the same way I encourage designers to give me mockups in Photoshop knowing that I can easily build HTML versions of them.)

You might want to start with some of Apple's documentation on iPhone development: http://developer.apple.com/devcenter/ios/index.action

Answer 2

For GUI development of your own apps you have several options:

1. Code: UIKit framework in Objective-C

2. Interface Builder: Tool to click your GUI together, but the logic will be coded like in 1 in C, Obj-C or C++

3. You can build a HTML gui and present it in a web view, but for native apps, this will only bring you so far.

Oh, and no native Flash on iOS. :-)

Answer 3

You could write an app that uses HTML for its UI - in essence you'd simply be wrapping a webkit widget and driving your app from events generated by that UI. However, that's not going to give you a UI that really takes advantage of the phone.

For that, you need to get down and dirty with Objective C and the Cocoa Touch API for iOS. Another option is using Flash CS5, which is ActionScript based.

Answer 4

Strictly speaking, the answer is no, your HTML skills are not transferrable.

That said, there are two projects that deserve looking into, both of which are about producing native (or "native-ish") apps from HTML and JavaScript. The first is PhoneGap, and the second (which I think is more robust and promising) is called Appcellerator.

Neither of them give you really-and-truly full access to to the iPhone API, but they do allow a significant flattening of the learning curve for people who already have well developed web app skillz.

If you go the native route, bear this in mind: it took me about a month to go from being a web developer to being a slightly competent iOS developer, and six months or so to feel solid and reliable and productive with iOS.