Hey guys,
I am trying out livecode and want to get the opinion of those who use livecode for IOS development.
Do you recommend Livecode over learning Obj. C -> Xcode ?
What are the strengths? and which plug ins do you recommend to deploy to Xcode and for IOS in general
What are the limitations or things I should know?
Thanks for any incite you can provide!
Kevin
Thoughts on livecode for IOS dev?
Moderators: FourthWorld, heatherlaine, Klaus, kevinmiller, robinmiller
Re: Thoughts on livecode for IOS dev?
Hello Kevin,
First, I'm not a code guru, i.e. an experienced programmer.
But I'd like to share my thoughts on this issue, as brief as possible.
And I will be glad that this thread becomes a discussion platform about the pros and cons of LiveCode vs. Alternatives.
Objective-C?
Don't spend time for Objective-C, no, don't do that!
It's hard to learn, time-consuming and you don't need to, at all.
LiveCode?
It's great, I love it; well, most of the time.
But it has serious limitations regarding mobile development.
I mean, sometimes you just pull your hair off, grr
Alternatives?
Sencha, PhoneGap, Titanium, etc.
And common ground of them is HTML5 + JavaScript {hJ}.
If you have spare time to invest, like a couple of months, learn HTML5 + JavaScript {hJ}.
Sky is the limit.
There is virtually nothing you can't achieve with hJ.
Even we LiveCoders take benefit of it.
A tiny example:
One of my apps have more than 100 high-res photos and I've built a gallery page for them.
The gallery should be like the Photos app of iPhone.
One should be able to swipe to wander around photos and pinch to zoom in or out.
I tried to go native way and just use the LiveCode instruments.
So, I grouped the photos on the fly, put an iOS Scroller on top of them and set the PagingEnabled of iOS Scroller to true.
It took time, but eventually it was working fine, until...
Until I realized that first 30 or so photos are fine but the others are scrambled around and the scroller won't work, and many other issues.
It took me a couple of days, but finally I've figured out what's wrong.
Whenever the width of group is more than 32000 px, well around 30 photos or so, it just goes haywire.
LiveCode can't handle wider controls or groups.
Same goes with text fields longer than 32000 px. It just won't work.
So, I've found an excellent hJ pack called PhotoSwipe, it's open source.
I embedded it in my app.
I alter the index.html of it on the fly concordantly with my photos folder.
And show that page with a browser control.
It works like a charm.
No limitations whatsoever, it just works. One can swipe through the photos and pinch to zoom and auto-slideshow if needed.
Building an html file on-the-fly and displaying it with a browser control is a great solution to many problems, which many experienced LiveCoders use, btw.
Bottomline?
I love LiveCode and I've earned a fair amount of money thanks to it.
For a year now, I bring home the bacon via LiveCode.
But for a beginner I strongly advise the HTML5 + JavaScript way.
Go hJ, mate; you won't regret it.
Best,
~ Ender Nafi Elekçioğlu
First, I'm not a code guru, i.e. an experienced programmer.
But I'd like to share my thoughts on this issue, as brief as possible.
And I will be glad that this thread becomes a discussion platform about the pros and cons of LiveCode vs. Alternatives.
Objective-C?
Don't spend time for Objective-C, no, don't do that!
It's hard to learn, time-consuming and you don't need to, at all.
LiveCode?
It's great, I love it; well, most of the time.
But it has serious limitations regarding mobile development.
I mean, sometimes you just pull your hair off, grr
Alternatives?
Sencha, PhoneGap, Titanium, etc.
And common ground of them is HTML5 + JavaScript {hJ}.
If you have spare time to invest, like a couple of months, learn HTML5 + JavaScript {hJ}.
Sky is the limit.
There is virtually nothing you can't achieve with hJ.
Even we LiveCoders take benefit of it.
A tiny example:
One of my apps have more than 100 high-res photos and I've built a gallery page for them.
The gallery should be like the Photos app of iPhone.
One should be able to swipe to wander around photos and pinch to zoom in or out.
I tried to go native way and just use the LiveCode instruments.
So, I grouped the photos on the fly, put an iOS Scroller on top of them and set the PagingEnabled of iOS Scroller to true.
It took time, but eventually it was working fine, until...
Until I realized that first 30 or so photos are fine but the others are scrambled around and the scroller won't work, and many other issues.
It took me a couple of days, but finally I've figured out what's wrong.
Whenever the width of group is more than 32000 px, well around 30 photos or so, it just goes haywire.
LiveCode can't handle wider controls or groups.
Same goes with text fields longer than 32000 px. It just won't work.
So, I've found an excellent hJ pack called PhotoSwipe, it's open source.
I embedded it in my app.
I alter the index.html of it on the fly concordantly with my photos folder.
And show that page with a browser control.
It works like a charm.
No limitations whatsoever, it just works. One can swipe through the photos and pinch to zoom and auto-slideshow if needed.
Building an html file on-the-fly and displaying it with a browser control is a great solution to many problems, which many experienced LiveCoders use, btw.
Bottomline?
I love LiveCode and I've earned a fair amount of money thanks to it.
For a year now, I bring home the bacon via LiveCode.
But for a beginner I strongly advise the HTML5 + JavaScript way.
Go hJ, mate; you won't regret it.
Best,
~ Ender Nafi Elekçioğlu
~... together, we're smarter ...~
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macOS Sierra • LiveCode 7 & xCode 8
__________________________________________
macOS Sierra • LiveCode 7 & xCode 8
Re: Thoughts on livecode for IOS dev?
Ultimately, it depends on what apps you want to create. I strongly endorse LC unless you need a level of graphics performance or other features (e.g. running in the background*) that necessitate getting closer to the metal. Once you grasp basic LC concepts, going from an idea to a working app is quick and relatively painless. Advantages include ease of use, speed of development, reliability, a somewhat dated but functional IDE, somewhat fragmented (getting better) but very helpful resources for learning, people here who are always willing to help you over hurdles and a proven track record of apps in the App Store. Key disadvantages include limited debugging capabilities for mobile (you can't step through your code, set breakpoints, etc while running on the simulator), lack of more than rudimentary support for native controls and lack of support for certain features that may or may not be important to you (take a look at the iOS release notes). Many of these can be overcome with the use of third-party externals, libraries or plugins e.g. MobGUI- good for certain UI elements but has some flaws, TmTools- no personal experience, mergExt- awesome and addresses many shortcomings for mobile *including experimental support for running in the background.