Quickest way to get started with OS X app development?

Question

I need to build an application which will run on OS X, polling for data, and displaying that data full-screen in a purty, graphical way - generally "identifier: value" text in some sort of tabular format, but possibly with spark-lines to display historical changes, and "animations" (nothing fancy, just fading text and similar) to show updates.

However, I've no idea where to get started. I've no experience with desktop application development or development on a mac.

Where/at what should I be looking for OS X development information which will get me quickly up-to-speed (coming from a web-dev background)?

Answer 1

If you really want to go native with OS X that will mostly mean learning Objective-C and Cocoa. You get started by becoming an Apple Developer Connection (ADC) member and downloading XCode. Inside the ADC site there is a lot of information that will help you get started, Objective C reference, sample code, etc. .

Depending on your background you might want to consider using Adobe Air for your application, if you know Flex or Flash that might be easier for you to learn.

There are also a couple of question already up on stackoverflow on this subject http://stackoverflow.com/search?q=learn+cocoa

Answer 2

Take a look at http://www.realsoftware.com. It's a cross platform development environment. Easy to learn, established user community, lot's of sample, shared code to get you started.

Answer 3

For OS X development, and a really nice overview that will get you writing actual applications quickly, I'm not sure anything can match Aaron Hillegass' book, Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X.

It's considered by many to be the Bible of Cocoa programming, and it is example driven. You are writing applications that you can actually run throughout.

It is useful, although not as much so, for iPhone development, which you don't mention in your question, but you do in your tags.