Chmod iPhone Application

I am excited to announce my first iPhone app is now available in the Apple App Store. The apps name is Chmod and it can be used to help determine the appropriate Mac OS X, Linux and Unix file and directory permissions. Check it out, it's free.

First CIDUG (Columbus iPhone Developer User Group) Meeting

The first CIDUG (Columbus iPhone Developer User Group) meeting was a huge success. We had 50 people in attendance. In addition to a presentation on how to get started in iPhone development we also talked about the future of the group and what we want to do from a meeting and website perspective. There is a strong desire to meet frequently even monthly and some of those meetings to just be coding events where we can help each other.

Most importantly, we officially desided CIDUG is pronounced sigh-dug.

Creating a simple iPhone checkbox

I was disappointed to discover the iPhone SDK did not include a Checkbox component. Yes, I know there is the UISwitch component. But sometimes that is just to big and does not look right for your design.

After googling, I could not find a checkbox component that somebody else had made or a good tutorial. So below are the steps I did to create a simple checkbox.

I began by adding a UIButton to my view and setting its Type to custom and its background to my unchecked png image with transparent background. Then I implemented the auto generated viewDidLoad method to set my background image if the button state was selected to the checked png image.

- (void)viewDidLoad {
[super viewDidLoad];
[checkButton setBackgroundImage:[UIImage imageNamed:@"checked.png"] forState:UIControlStateSelected];
}

Finally, I attached a changeSeletected method to the button's Touch Up Inside event that changed the selected state of my button.

- (IBAction) changeSelected: (id) sender {
UIButton *button = (UIButton *) sender;
button.selected = !button.selected;
}

I think the final outcome turned out pretty nice.

3D Internet

I am taking a 3D Modeling course at Columbus State starting this week. Several people have asked me why I am taking such a course. The simple answer is I find 3D fascinating. The long answer is I think 3D is the future. 3D is currently playing an important role in movies, games and even mobile applications like those found on the iPhone. But I also think 3D will be the future of the Internet. I think our children will look back at today's two dimensional Internet like I look back on black and white TV. Every time I see a B&W movie or TV program, I ask how could they watch this when they live in a colored world. I think our children will ask how could you live with a 2D Internet when you live in a 3D world. I think Second Life is a glimpse into this future. So I think at some point 3D skills will be an important skill to have if not a required one.

CodeMash 2009 Presentations - Groovy and Grails Precompile and iPhone Web Development with Grails and iUI

I thoroughly enjoyed attending and presenting at CodeMash 2009. My co-author of Beginning Groovy and Grails, Jim Shingler and I presented a Groovy and Grails Precompile which is CodeMash speak for preconference tutorial. The presentation went well and we had 27 people in attendance. If you are interested, you can view the slides at http://www.slideshare.net/jshingler/gg-code-mash2009-20090106-presentation/.

I also presented a regular session on iPhone Web Development with Grails and iUI. Most of the presentation is about iPhone Web Development but there are several Grails introductory slides and several more on integrating iUI with Grails. I am glad I included the Grails introductory material since this was the first exposure to Grails for most of the developers attending my session. If you are interested, you can view the slides at http://www.slideshare.net/cjudd/iphone-web-development-with-grails-from-codemash-2009-presentation/

iUI Web Development with Grails article

I am excited to announce my iPhone article iUI Web Development with Grails was just published as the cover story of the December 2008 edition of GroovyMag. In the article I explain why you might want to consider iPhone web development over native iPhone applications, how to add native iPhone looking support to an existing Grails application using the iUI library and the iUI Grail plug-in as well as tips for testing and debugging iPhone web applications. Check out my article and the other great GroovyMag articles at http://www.groovymag.com/main.issues.description/id=4.

Columbus iPhone Developers User Group (CIDUG)

I am interested in meeting other iPhone developers in Central Ohio and sharing information. So I am proposing a local iPhone Developers User Group. If you are interested, please join the Google Group created for starting the conversation about this group at http://groups.google.com/group/cidug.