My First iOS Gaming App Experiment – Log2

I hope you guys would have gone through my previous post  My First iOS Gaming App Experiment – Log1. Yes thats my first experience on gaming in iOS. This briefly tells my experience about starting the app after development xp.

Cocos2D with Box2D: One word people. Only One word. WOWW! A amazing framework to develop iOS games. Keeping my programming friend(RayWenderlich website) in my browser tab started the magic with my 10 fingers on the 104 keys in keyboard dreaming to create a iOS game. Now coming to the Box2D with the shapes i had a hard time figuring out the best tool in finding the shape values for the games(In any Physics Engine it has a feature to create shapes with coordinates for objects in game). So after browsing on internet found Physics Editor is awesome but still was searching for a free tool. So i put Physics Editor in my BuyList basket and started searching for tools. After finding Vertex Helper it made my iOS-Gaming-Coding-Life much easier.

Bugs: One word that every programming developer hates. Obviously mine was full of those stupid things(Yes I created them and yet I hate them and I know it). This gaming is very new for me and this c++ with box2D all in my head made my app somewhat Not-So-Awesome but then with all compromises I started fixing those sick things slowly.

Kamcord: One of the best things of friendship is friends help. Sadesh the guy who i told in Log1  helped me in cocos2d. He incorporated this framework called Kamcord in his previous game called HappyJump. Which is basically a video record and sharing framework for mobile games and i was fascinated by the potential of that framework. So i thought this a kool feature that my game should have. So got the knowledge transfer from sadesh and implemented kamcord in my game. The support from those guys are really aaammaazing. Kevin & Michele from Kamcord they are really awesome to work and get information, they supported me with all my doubts. Kudos to those guys.

Texturepacker: I was late. Not very late but too late to have known the power of TexturePacker in iOS games but anyhow i adapted to it. You know what watch their mindblowing video about spritesheets its absolutely funny and interesting. By using this i can build images into a single large sheet and can import to my other devices such as iPhones and non retina iPads. This helped me convert my ipad game into a universal game app(iPhone4/iPhone5 and iPad) very easily without any pain. You know what I purchased both Physics Editor and TexturePacker.

Finally i had some rookies at my office(Nitesh and Pratap) who just fixed those stupid bugs created by me and finally added some extra touch to my app making my game crash free and bug free.

Marketing: All of sudden i thought it is best to start the marketing before i am ready with the appstore binary. Raywenderlich has a amazing tutorial on marketing iOS aps and games.

1. PreDevelopment Phase

2. Release

3. Post Release

4. Finale

So took some advice from these. Definitely it has lot of information which i think a indie developer should get to know of. While i typing this blog i uploaded the game into appstore and waiting for my app to get approved from apple. Fingers crossed.

Like iPingpong Here

Follow Pingpong Here

Youtube Channel here

My First iOS Gaming App Experiment – Log1

I got bored of being a iOS App developer i wanna jump to the Gaming Side. How kewl it would be to play a game when you have created that game, That feeling is awesome. So it happened suddenly that i  wanted to develop a iOS game and i have to take the simpler path as i have to go through complex calculations and mathematical formulas for Gaming. But it is not that hard what i imagined when i think now. As a iOS developer for the past 3 years i love the way how Objective-C and iOS evolved inside my Medula Oblangata. It was so so soooo phenomenal.

Ideation So i jumped into the iTunes which i call the iWorld. Searched, Browsed, Surfed 100s of game to pick the right thing. Finally i found that the basic pingpong game(The classic computer pingpong) is the opt one because it doesn’t have complex controls simple swipe and simple mechanics. Also found there are some bored Not-So-Fantastic pingpong apps in appstore. So took that idea and added some wow factors like superpowers in it. I iterated Iterated and Iterated a lot in this game(There was a famous saying i remember now “Innovation is 1%Innovation and 99% Iteration) and finally created a Game design document on that

Design Finally drawing after drawing, sketching after sketching found a good complete gameplay for the app. Simple slider on both ends. Superpowers spawning from both the ends. User has to touch and drag superpowers to acqiure them. Superpower may cause damage to other user. and soooooo oooonnnnn. With some help from our UI team(Hari & Arul) designed the whole thing in Photoshop and created the Visual Elements in iPad Retina size So that i will resize that to any device resolutions like iPhone4Inch, iPhone3.5Inch, Retina and iPad.

Development For any game development. Be prepared with the Images before You start coding. With Xcode 4.6 in my Macmini. Downloading Cocos2d framework and installing in my Xcode created a Cocos2D Project. Cocos2D has been amazingly very easy to develop any game. This can be the best framework that any iOS geek can start his gaming idea. With cocos 2D i started my idea with great help from my friend(Sadesh). Keeping RayWenderlich’s Tutorials(This n this and this one too) on my Browser tabs i opened my Xcode and started coding by filling my coffee mug with Latte. After a week coding in cocos2D making just the 2 sliders on my screen heard that my game can be made very easily using Box2D extension and started reading about Box2D about how physics will be applied to the gaming objects and after reading this tutorial on Ray i got very much excited. Thats how i kicked off with my gaming app. My next Log will be discussing more on technical stuff Next Log…. Coming Soon

How to get paid iOS apps for free

If you are a newbie to iWorld then you would be really annoyed by the free apps which dont have much features and you will not have enough money to pay or your dad will not give his credit card for you and stupid ads getting popped up at unwanted times. Here are some tips where you can purchase some paid apps for free.

According to apple if you once download a app from appstore it belongs to you for lifetime. So some companies will release their paid app for a limited time as free or drop their price. Keep looking out for them is the easiest way to get the paid app for free.

Appshopper is a website that provides the list of iOS/Mac apps which goes free for a limited time. So the best is to visit this website daily and find the popular iOS apps that has gone free or dropped in price. Just click the buy now button that will open the app in iTunes and click the download button. If you really dont want that app right now but it may be useful in future just download it and cancel the download at once the app has started downloading because it will make you own the app for lifetime.

Apple will release a outstanding-superintuitive-awesome-amazing app free for a week. Which you can checkout at the home page of iTunes. When i am typing this blog Plants Vs Zombies is free app of the week by Apple(which is normally priced $7 for iPad HD and $3 for iPhone). Those who are diehard fan of PvZ this is absolute jackpot for them. This is the most simple method of purchasing a really good paid app for free. A big thank to apple for this.

There are also many iOS applications which will keep track of pricedrops and freebies. Some of them are here

Free App a Day

App of the Day

App Gratis

Apps Gone Free

These apps provide you notifications of some interesting price dropped apps.

Mostly some companies will give out all their applications for free. So also watch out for the developer companies and their products. For example they may drop the price for all thier applications when they release a new app or company founded day or some 100000 applications downloaded day. So cross your fingers for that.

Free of anything that always makes us smile. Just grab the opportunity when it is there 🙂

The Backpack

So now a days rate of digital equipment’s for person increasing at exponential rate. Where people carry machines like work phone, personal phone, iPod, office laptop,  personal laptop, a tablet and the list goes on. So i measure these gadgets in backpack with the length of the wires that they need to use these silicon machines. Probably my digital equipment measure is 25meters/backpack(That includes my dell charger, macbook pro charger, iPod Touch cables, Samsung Android cables, A spike buster).

Last week a backpack fiasco emerged after Steve Wozniak(Steve Jobs friend who cofounded Apple) opened his backpack to the whole world of what he carries in it. After seeing his backpack you can absolutely say this guy is a tech-loving-silicon-friendly-mobile-fanatic-digital-freak. This guy carries around a ton of digital crap with a lot of iOS and android in it. I can measure his digital equipment rate as 500meters/backpack.

So this is his comment on his backpack

Steve Wozniak

Some mornings I open my email and I receive something incredible like this: the awesome contents of Steve Wozniak’s backpack. What you see above (click to expand) is just his charging setup—there’s even more! Here’s Woz to explain it himself—J.

You might think this is abnormal for me but, to the contrary, it’s customary.

Every extension cord and USB adapter and USB cable shown here I carry all the time in my backpack with a few exceptions:

• one Belkin AC tripler with dual USB I carry in my suitcase
• one dual USB adapter is from Janet’s travel stuff
• Canon battery charger is carried in the camera bag
• firewire HD I carry in my suitcase
• Verizon 3G mifi adapter (standard micro USB screws up this mifi, have to use their awkward connecter)

Almost every USB cable is retractable.

Every device shown, I carry in my pockets or in my backpack all the time except:

• 2 iPhones, an iPod nano and an iPad belonging to Janet.

Some people ask how heavy my backpack is. There are a lot more things in my backpack including

• the AirPort Express and MacBook Pro 85W magsafe adapter, which are out of sight in this photo,
• bluetooth mouse,
• binoculars,
• projector connectors,
• multiple Gameboy Lights (a Gameboy sold in Japan but never in the U.S.),
• Gameboy link cables,
• plenty of foreign AC adapters,
• prism glasses for watching movies in bed,
• sunglasses,
• earplugs for concerts,
• Ultimate Ears UE18 earplugs for flights,
• Gameboy link cable,
• tons of pencils for pencil games on flights,
• tons of pens,
• tons of sharpies,
• tons of paint pens (signing),
• red-blue-purple-yellow-green laser pointers,
• credit cards,
• hotel cards,
• airline cards,
• hard rock card,
• medical cards,
• small accessories like olloclip iPhone lens adapter,
• Square,
• flash keys,
• flash media adapters,
• cigarette lighter dual USB adapter,
• audio doubler cable,
• iPad USB/SD Card adapters,
• toiletries for hotels,
• batteries of many types (AA, AAA, CR2, CR128, odder types for things like my bag beeper for locating my suitcase)
• eyedrops,
• $2 bill pads,
• pencil puzzles,
• itineraries for upcoming travel…

I usually say that my backpack weighs 50 pounds. I’m not sure but I have to carry it every step through airports. I’m sure that I’m shorter now than before and I don’t walk as fast. Everything has its place in my backpack.

Sometimes TSA takes a long time unpacking it. A couple of times they asked me to take out everything electronic and I asked for seven bins, all of which I filled (only 2 half-size), plus my MacBook Pro, plus the bag. All of that through the X-ray machine. Then repack it.

Nothing in my backpack goes unused, although the bluetooth mouse is close.

So whats yours?

5 Things a iOS developer should get used to

You can raise your collars about how cool you are if you develop apps for iPhone iPad android or windows phone. Since these are the most favorite platform in entertainment world. As a iphone ipad app developer i have experienced a lot of information about the app developing world and wanna share with you people. Apart from programming i personally found that these information can nurture any mobile developer into high class programmer. so let me enlighten you folks

1. Stackoverflowing: If you are a mobile developer definitely you would have crossed this site Stackoverflow. We stuck up, we forget, we make stupid bugs and still we wanna make sure everything is perfect and we go fetch code from SO. Whats my idea is instead of searching in SO just for answers you can answer the questions which are asked in SO when you get free time. This will greatly improve your learning curve.

2. Tracking Apps: Tracking your appstore for new apps is a fantastic way to know the trending apps currently in market. After seeing these apps they can make you ask a question to yourself (How did they do it? Is it possible in development?) and when you find answers for these you are definitely becoming pro.

3. Pirate: Don’t get panic by reading the title. This what Steve Jobs said to his employees Good artist copy Great artist steal. What i am trying to say is there are lot of drop-in code files and ready made classes out there. Instead of copying functionality and writing code yourself just steal(with their permission and that’s what i call ‘steal’) and modify it according to your requirement. Get iphone and mac drop-in classes here www.cocoacontrols.com, www.verious.com, www.maniacdev.com

4. Photoshopper: Though you may be good with objects, functions, arrays, strings classes, etc when it comes to mobile mostly it talks about the User Interface so even though you are a mobile developer it is good to have a touch in photo editing knowledge to deal with those UI’s.

5. Githubing: This is a thing which i wanna do for a long time. You would have developed many components that may be useful to a lot of rookies. But you havent commented those code or not organized properly so that the third person can use it easily. If you are a Let-All-Developers-Be-Happy type user then try cleaning those codes that are components  so that it should be easily adapted by a third party. So once you are done Github it.

If you can give some extra tips then most welcome…

Funny-Interesting-Humorous iPod Screenshots

Accidents always happen and to make that into really interesting idea is absolutely fun. So i was operating my iPod and accidentally took a screenshot. Then i found out that screenshot was really funny and so this idea emerged from my brain that posting funny screenshots in my blog. So here is my thoughts on screenshots

1. I ran pretty good. Check out my distance 😉 Screenshot inside Screenshot.

2. Thats how i manipulate my apps

3. I think its awesome to keep like this now stop using my ipod and get lost

4. Just look deep this is a different screenshot. Found out the abnormality?

5. Thats in the order of my communication.

6. I got something to do daily

7. Extremely addicted to this. Did you ever tried and completed this.

8. Hate when i get this.

9. As a iPhone app developer this is one of the best apps ever made.

10. My city. Hot as Hot at noon Cold as Cold in eve.

11. Thats how to take a picture without taking a photo in iPod. Screenshoto!!

12. 😉

13 Took a total of 19 takes to take this screenshot at 0.0 level tilting my iPod. Then realized there is a Hold button :p

14. The screenshot says..

Introducing iDevices

If apple is going to reveal any of its masterpiece it is always a thrill for gadgets freaks like us. I always keep track of the Apple’s new introduction video of their products where those guys give a sleek and exciting advertisements of their products. These are some of the mesmerising advertisements of iPhone, iPod, iPad and macbook

Introducing the Smart Cover for iPad

Introducing the New iPhone 4S

Introducing the New iPad

Introducing the New Macbook Air

Introducing Siri

Introducing OS X Lion

Introducing iOS5

Introducing iCloud

iOS Development for Beginners

Hi Nerds

So welcome to the world of objective-C, your future favorite programming language. With just a two year experience, as a iOS developer it has been a Roller-Coaster ride for me with iOS development and I had some thrilling slides, smooth sight-seeings, slow-uprising of my iOS applications. Hope i will give you some tips to become a comfortable and pro-active iPhone/iPod/iPad developer.

If you are really reading this then you should definitely know some programming language at a very basic level. If the answer is “C” then you will be a Rockstar here. Some of the other techie words that you should get familiarize with are the OOPS concepts, MVC patterns and IDE’s.

Assuming you are pro in the above mentioned techs. I would like you to jump into the Apple world. There are two rules which you should obey when you start developing iOS applications

1. Buy/Borrow/Own/Steal/Rent a Mac machine

2. Buy/Borrow/Own/Steal/Rent a iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad device

Without a mac machine you can’t develop a native iOS app(of-course you can go hybrid but thats not your focus now newbie) as Xcode is the only tool for developing iOS apps and it is available only for mac OS. Without a device to test is always a risk. So obey the two rules.

You got everything you got start learning. I would like to suggest you to see as many video tutorials than the normal text blogs. Lynda.com provides some of the best video tutorials with very simple and clear explanations of iOS and Xcode. Apart from that the best is to learn from the people who created it. Apple Documentations are the best  for any clarifications or doubts.

Try to take a simple idea and create the application for that to learn. Learning each feature separately is not going to help. Take a simple idea that has some of the basic controls and start completing that project so that you have a complete app. My idea would be trying these basics in a single app.

• Textfield validations
• Button, Label, View creations
• Transition of views from one screen to other
• Passing data to next screen
• Sqlite DB operations
• Tableview Creations and manipulations
• Delegates

As a starter you don’t  need to be so choosy for glassy interface for your app. While things go on you will be familiar with the user interface so do not worry about it now.

If you are stuck up on middle of a bug/isssue and apple documentation doesn’t solve your issue then go posting your question on Stackoverflow. Be neat, simple and clear on the question you are going to ask provide sample code in that and acknowledge the person who is trying to answer your question. Your hours and days effort will be minimized into seconds and minutes. If you become pro someday you can answer the questions posted by other developers as I do now. Thats me in SO.

RayWenderlich is a good team of iOS coders provide very easy and simple tutorials with sample code for some commonly used functionalities. Feel free to browse through their tutorials.

Appsamuck is site that provides open source iOS projects for free. You can download and play with those codes and feel the awesomeness in you by experimenting in it.

So welcome to the iOS.

Titanium Appcelerator – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

So developers here we go.

You probably heard this word Titanium or Appcelerator when you want to go for a Hybrid app development. That is you want to create once and have to deploy the app in both Android market and Apple appstore.

So i have jumped into this TA and had a experience with it and found its good, bad and ugliest features.

The Good Part

If this is the question – One time development and multiple platform deployment? The answer for it is the TA. The beauty of TA is that it does not use resource files to create a webview based app(Like Phonegap) instead it uses javascript notation and creates a native(iOs or droid) compatible files which can be compiled by thier native compilers.

This thing also accepts all basic native controls(Tableviews, Switch) each respective to their platforms supporting features like accelerometer, GPS, Push Notification manager etc.

Modules. Modules are the codes that we develop in native way and insert it into our TA app. For example you can add a module like Map that shows routes from one point to another point. This(Drawing Routes in Map) cannot be done in TA so it has a option to create that module in native and include it inside the app.

The Bad Part

If you think of a very small app just with small amount data with less than 10 screens and very little amount data from services, you are good to go with TA. But if you take a huge complex app then you have to face a lot of consequences at the end maintaining the app. These TA guys have been saying the memory has been fixed and i am not sure how far they have fixed.

If you are a iPhone programmer then you would probably miss the sexy, freaky, funky Xcode IDE’s animating breakpoints, pragma markings, helvetica font, Interface builders, finding methods, auto suggestions. I kinda miss them in Titanium IDE.

The thing I found in my experience is it takes more time to debug and deploy the code.

The Ugly Part

There are lot of Let-Me-Punch-My-Face, Why-I-Choose-Titanium, This-Is-Driving-Crazy situations  when i worked with Titanium.

Each time I quit the simulator and run the build there is a iOS simulator process accumulating on the physical memory(RAM) after some 5 to 6 hours of coding what ever you do the simulator wont run and only solution is to restart the system.

You have a lot of traceback issues and there is no accurate solution for it. Only hope for me is to close Titanium IDE and start again or to restart the whole system.

The documentation is so worthless all you know is properties and event listeners. The explanations are so bad.

The Climax

As a developer i really appreciate Titanium for creating this hybrid app development. By far i can tell you that this the best hybrid app development tool around the mobile nerds.

And there is always the but

So if you have a project that is very simple. You can go for TA. If you want a app that has complex functionality then I would advice you to go in native way.