iOS 5 GM Seed now available for download

Apple has released the GM Seed of the iOS 5.0 SDK. This signifies the final version that developers can use to test their apps for the eventual release of iOS on the 12 Oct 2011.

Developers can download the latest version from http://developer.apple.com/. Note that the GM Seed for your device cannot be download over-the-air from your device. You need to download it and manually update your device.

Come and learn the new features of iOS 5 and Android in Vancouver this December!

I will be running a series of iOS and Android courses this December in Vancouver at MobileTeach.

MobileTeach is a spinoff of DevTeach and we are proud to announce a series of workshop (12-17 Dec 2011) on the iOS and the Android this fall. The Event is divided in 3 classes: 2-days Foundation of iPhone Programming, 2-days Advanced iOS Programming and 2-days Android Programming. You can register for each event separately or for all events for a special price.

If you want a jumpstart to iOS and Android development, this is an event that you cannot afford to miss. Register today to enjoy the early bird discount!

Learn iPhone Programming in a weekend! (15-16 Oct 2011; Singapore)

Want to learn iPhone programming but can't spare the time during the weekdays? No worries, I am running a weekend class on the 15-16 Oct 2011 (Sat-Sun). All you need is your passion (and your Mac) and you will be off to developing your first iPhone app by the end of the first day! And get a free copy of my book - Beginning iOS 4 Application Development (Wrox).

Course Fee

S$997 (nett)

Course Venue

229 Mountbatten Road

#02-41 Mountbatten Square

Singapore 398007

Time: 9am to 5pm

Download course brochure and application form it here.

Displaying Status Bar Notifications in Android

Developers of Android are no doubt familiar with the Toast class, which displays a little pop-up containing whatever message you want to display to the user.

However, the Toast pop-up will automatically dismiss itself after a while, making it useful as a tool to provide timely feedback to the user (such as informing the user that a file has been saved successfully), but not a really good tool to use for some asynchronous action (such as telling the user that an incoming SMS message has arrived). For the latter, you can make use of the Status Bar Notification feature of Android, which displays a persistent notification on the status bar of your Android device. This notification can be dismissed when the user has read it, and thus this makes it a good tool for delivering notifications to the users to respond at their convenience.

In this article, I shall walk you through the steps to creating status bar notifications for your Android application.

Updated Course Brochures and Outlines!

I have uploaded the latest course brochure and outlines for all the various courses. Download it here.

Here is a summary of the upcoming courses:

iPhone and iPad Programming

1-Day Objective-C Programming Course - S$499

10 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Foundation of iPhone Programming Course - S$997

11-12 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Advanced iOS Programming Course - S$997

13-14 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Android Programming

2-day Foundation of Android Programming Course - S$997

17-18 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Advanced Android Programming Course (New!) - S$997

19-20 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Course Venue

229 Mountbatten Road

#02-41 Mountbatten Square

Singapore 398007

Time: 9am to 5pm

Android Course Schedules in Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Backed by popular demand, here is the schedule for the two Android courses for the month of Oct:

2-day Foundation of Android Programming Course - S$997

17-18 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Advanced Android Programming Course (New!) - S$997

19-20 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Register now by emailing me at weimenglee@learn2develop.net. Check out the course outlines at: http://weimenglee.blogspot.com/p/android-development-training.html

Course Venue

229 Mountbatten Road

#02-41 Mountbatten Square

Singapore 398007

Time: 9am to 5pm

iOS Course Schedules in Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Here is the schedule for the various iOS Courses in Oct 2011:

1-Day Objective-C Programming Course - S$499

10 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Foundation of iPhone Programming Course - S$997

11-12 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

2-Day Advanced iOS Programming Course - S$997

13-14 Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Register now by emailing me at weimenglee@learn2develop.net. Check out the course outlines at: http://weimenglee.blogspot.com/p/ios-development-training.html

Course Venue

229 Mountbatten Road

#02-41 Mountbatten Square

Singapore 398007

Time: 9am to 5pm

Class Photo of Foundation of iPhone Programming -13-14 Sep 2011

All my iOS courses are now fully updated to Xcode 4.1. Here is the class photo for this week's Foundation of iPhone Programming class. Can't wait for iOS 5.0 and Xcode 4.2!

iOS and Android Courses in Atlanta, Dec 2011

Here is my upcoming schedule at Atlanta in Dec 2011:

Upcoming Classes

Foundations of iPhone Programming	Dec 5-6, 2011	Atlanta, GA
Language: English		More Info
Advanced iOS Programming	Dec 7-8, 2011	Atlanta, GA
Language: English		More Info
Android Programming	Dec 9-10, 2011	Atlanta, GA
Language: English		More Info

Another Android app developed by my Android Course participant published on the Android Market!

Here is another Android App developed by one of my course participants at the Fort Gordon's first Android class. Awesome!

CacheNav is a GPS application that will track your current location as well as plot a point in one of five different coordinate formats (Degrees/Minutes/Seconds, Degrees/Decimal Minutes, Decimal Degrees, UTM, and MGRS). Once you have plotted a point, the distance to your plotted destination is displayed (in meters) at the bottom of the screen. In addition, there are also two map views: Satellite View and Street View.

If you are low on space, this app also has the ability to be stored on an SD Card.

This app is perfect for Geocaching or Land Navigation. Buy it here!

MobileTeach is coming to Vancouver this fall...12 - 17 Dec 2011

MobileTeach is a spinoff of DevTeach and I am proud to announce that I will be running for them a series of workshops on the iOS and the Android this fall.

The event is divided into 3 classes:

* 2-days Foundation of iPhone Programming

* 2-days Advanced iOS Programming

* 2-days Android Programming

You can register for each course separately or for all courses for a special price. Register before 1 November to enjoy the early bird rate!

Using your Borders Gift Card (Singapore) to offset against my courses

Recently, it was reported in the Singapore papers that due to the closure of Borders at Wheelock place, customers could no longer use its previously issued gift cards to make purchases at other branches. While this is a very disappointing news to a lot of customers, I have decided to follow the spirit of German Airline Lufthansa, who has very generously offered to let customers offset their air tickets value using their existing gift card.

As a book lover myself, I visit book stores regularly, especially Borders. I had been going there since I was a student, and had many fond memories. The smell and feel of books, and the aroma of coffee that fills the store has become a part of many peoples' lives.

Hence, I would like to offer existing Borders gift card holders to offset the fees for my courses using their existing Borders gift card. Every customer can offset a maximum of S$50 for any courses that they sign up. At this moment, here are the courses scheduled to run in Sep and Oct 2011:

September 2011

* 12 Sep 2011 - Objective-C Programming - S$499

* 13-14 Sep 2011 - Foundation of iPhone Programming - S$997

* 15-16 Sep 2011 - Advanced iOS Programming - S$997

* 19-20 Sep 2011 - Android Programming - S$997

October 2011

* 3 Oct 2011 - Objective-C Programming - S$499

* 4-5 Oct 2011 - Foundation of iPhone Programming - S$997

Details

* All courses will be held at Mountbatten Square, Singapore.

* Attendees have to bring their own notebook computers

* Training time: 9am to 5pm.

For enquiries, please call (65) 9-692-4065.

iOS and Android courses (SINGAPORE) in Sep 2011 confirmed!

I am happy to announce that the following iOS and Android courses in Sep are now confirmed!

* 12 Sep 2011 - Objective-C Programming - S$499

* 13-14 Sep 2011 - Foundation of iPhone Programming - S$997

* 15-16 Sep 2011 - Advanced iOS Programming - S$997

* 19-20 Sep 2011 - Android Programming - S$997

Come join us and get a copy of my Beginning iOS 4 Application Development (for the iPhone course) and Beginning Android Application Development (for the Android course) book when you sign up for the courses!

Newly published - Beginning Android Tablet Application Development

My latest book - Beginning Android Tablet Application Development has been published recently. Saw this at Barnes and Noble in Mall of Georgia, Atlanta, last week.

Check out it at Amazon.com!

Android Programming - 19-20 Sep 2011

Come and join us in the upcoming Android Programming course on 19-20 Sep 2011. In this 2-day course, you will learn how to get jumpstarted with Android programming using Eclipse and the Android SDK in the shortest amount of time. This is a lab-intensive course that will have you up and running in just one morning! By the end of the day, you will be able to write your own Android apps and be like these guys.

Register today and every participant get a copy of my Beginning Android Application Development book!

Sample Project by Android Course Participant - Converts between degrees of Latitude and Longitude and MGRS

In last week's Android class at Fort Gordon, I have an outstanding participant - Chiam Krause, who took some jar files from the World Wind JAVA SDK and put together a coordinate converter that converts between degrees of Latitude and Longitude and MGRS. He has kindly shared the source code of his project on bitbucket. The project name is GridSquare.

Check out his blog here. Thanks, Chiam!

Army moves to create mobile apps in pilot course

An increase in the commercial use of Smartphone technologies is rapidly finding its way into the military. For the past two years, the U. S. Army Training and Doctrine Command has pursued a concept exploration pilot program called Connecting Soldiers to Digital Applications. In the consumer market, the proliferation of phones and accessibility for developers to write and distribute powerful apps has created an environment that has challenged traditional software acquisition strategies. The reduced requirements for developers have empowered scores of programmers to learn to write apps.

The Army, through CSDA, is working toward creating mechanisms that will allow organizations to write their own apps for distribution through a future Army Marketplace. Part of the CSDA process is teaching government civilians and members of active duty and reserves the foundations of writing mobile apps. The U. S. Army Signal Center of Excellence established a Mobile Applications Branch at Fort Gordon, Ga., with a task to develop apps and host training opportunities for app development.

From 8-19 August, Fort Gordon hosted an Android class in Cobb Hall, which consisted of 38 students from TRADOC, quite a few came from other organizations within the Army and other services, who wrote their first Android apps within the course.

Read more here.

Another Android app published by my course participants - Android Programming - US Aug 2011

Here is another app published by one of my Android Programming course participants (US Aug 2011).

Need help with figuring out 25-pair color code?

Need help with figuring out fiber optic color code?
This is the app for you.

- Features
* Show colors and # from fiber optic pair count.
* Show pair colors, binder colors, and 600 binder color from a pair count using 25 pair color code.

Android apps in the Android Market from participants of my Android class in the US - Aug 2011

This week I am in the US conducting my Android Programming class. And I am very proud to list the apps that some of my course participants have created in the short time span of a couple of days. Check out these apps in the Android Market. More will be listed as soon as they are available on the Android Market. This is way cool, guys!

Simple Tip Calculator that lets you choose the level of service that you had and it tells you how much of a tip you should leave based on the dollar amount of your ticket.

Protect Lives and Property within the Cove Acres calling area. Assist other Fire Districts as needed and requested.

A simple currency converter application to give you real-time currency exchange information for 80+ international currencies.

Internet/data connection is needed in order to obtain real-time rate.

iOS Tutorial - Importing & Exporting Documents in iOS

One of the common tasks that an iOS developer has to do is to import or export documents from his iOS application. For example, suppose you are developing a document reader and you want to allow the user to import documents into your application so that it can be read offline. Also, your reader might also support the exporting of documents so that other applications can make use of the document.

In this article, I will walk you through the different techniques you can employ to allow documents to be imported or exported from your iOS application.

Schedule for iOS Programming Course and Android Programming Course in Sep and Oct 2011 (Singapore)

Quite a number of readers have asked about the schedule of iOS Programming Course and Android Programming Course (Singapore) in Sep and Oct, so here it is!

September 2011

* 12 Sep 2011 - Objective-C Programming - S$499

* 13-14 Sep 2011 - Foundation of iPhone Programming - S$997

* 15-16 Sep 2011 - Advanced iOS Programming - S$997

* 19-20 Sep 2011 - Android Programming - S$997

* 22-23 Sep 2011 - Programming iOS 5 - S$997

October 2011

* 3 Oct 2011 - Objective-C Programming - S$499

* 4-5 Oct 2011 - Foundation of iPhone Programming - S$997

* 6-7 Oct 2011 - Programming iOS 5 - S$997

Details

All courses will be held at Mountbatten Square, Singapore.

Attendees have to bring their own notebook computers

Training time: 9am to 5pm.

For enquiries, please call (65) 9-692-4065.

* Also, all iOS courses are now fully updated to cover Xcode 4.

* And as soon as iOS 5 is officially released, all iOS courses would be based on iOS 5.

You can download the course brochures and application form here.

Please scan a copy of the completed registration form and email it to weimenglee@learn2develop.net.

Beginning Android Application Development now rank #1 in Amazon.com's Software Development category

My Beginning Android Application Development book is now ranked #1 in Amazon.com's Software Development category!

If you want to jumpstart your Android development effort, check out my book!

Thanks everyone for the support!

iOS Chat Application using Bonjour

A number of readers have asked where can they find the Bonjour Chat application that was mentioned in my Beginning iOS 4 Application Development book by Wrox. It is part of the code download for the book. To download the source code, head over to here. Go to the Chapter for Bonjour and the project contains all the code for Bonjour chatting! Enjoy!

Android Article - Preserving User Preferences in Android Applications

Often you need to store personalized information for each user of your application. For example, your application may require users to logon to a secure server for authentication. In this case, the user needs to supply his credentials, such as a login name and a password. The first time the user uses your application this information will be entered by the user, but subsequently it would be useful for your application to “remember” this information somewhere so that it can save the user the trouble of entering the same information every time he uses your application. To save this information, there are a couple of ways you could use – files, databases, etc. However, a much better way would be to use the SharedPreferences feature in Android. In this article, I will walk you through the steps to creating an Android application that makes use of this SharedPreferences feature.

Foundation of iPhone Programming - 21-22 July 2011

Here is another fun iPhone programming course that I had conducted last week. As usual, after the class I think I have converted a few people to buy their first Mac in their life. :-)

And what a time to run the course, Apple just released Lion and a slew of new machines....Mac Mini and MacBook air.....

Objective-C Memory Management Tip 1 - Remember to retain item(s) retrieved from an array

Very often in Objective-C, you have an array that contains a number of objects, like this:

NSMutableArray *array = [[NSMutableArray alloc] init];

[array addObject:@"Item 1"];

[array addObject:@"Item 2"];

[array addObject:@"Item 3"];

And often, you need to retrieve an object from the array and then assign it to another object, like this:

NSString *item = [array objectAtIndex:1];

However, the statement above is not safe as the object can be removed any time, like this:

NSString *item = [array objectAtIndex:1];

[array removeObjectAtIndex:1];

In this case, the item is no longer pointing to a valid memory location. You should instead use a retain on the object that is assigned to the object from the array:

NSString *item = [[array objectAtIndex:1] retain];

[array removeObjectAtIndex:1];

Doing so will ensure that even if the object in the array is removed, the object pointing to it will still remain valid.

In short, remember to retain item(s) retrieved from an array.

Learning Objective-C Programming (Singapore) - 19 July 2011

One of the hurdles that most developers encounter when starting out on iOS development is the language - Objective-C. While Objective-C is an extension of the C Programming language, its syntax left most of the developers who are deeply entrenched in Java and C# very confused. In addition, Objective-C in iOS requires developers to manage their own memory usage carefully so that memory is utilized efficiently. In fact, a little mistake in deallocating objects in Objective-C is enough to make your application spiralling out of control. It is with this intention that I am launching this new course on Objective-C programming.

In this one-day course, I will show you how to get started in Objective-C programming the easy way. Through this lab-intensive course, you will learn:

1. The basic syntax for calling properties and methods

2. How to declare and implement a class, its methods, and properties

3. Access Privileges

4. Initializers

5. How protocols and delegates work

6. The common classes used in Objective-C

7. The 101s of memory management for Objective-C in Cocoa/Cocoa Touch

8. And more!

If you are just getting started with iOS programming, this course is a must-have to ensure that you will become productive in the shortest amount of time.

Note that this is not an introductory class on programming. Attendees are expected to have some experience in programming using languages such as Visual Basic, C, C++, Java, or C#.

Venue: Mountbatten Square (Singapore)

Date: 19 July 2011 (Tue)

Time: 9am to 5pm

Fee: S$499 (nett)

Alumni for the iOS courses (Foundation of iPhone Programming and Advanced iOS Programming courses) will get a S$100 discount.

My new eBook published - Building Applications for the Mac App Store

My new eBook has just been released at Wrox.com - "Building Applications for the Mac App Store". Here is a brief synopsis of the book:

In this Wrox Blox, you will learn how to obtain and access the Mac App Store from your Mac. You will also learn about the opportunities available for developers who want to venture into the Mac market. This Wrox Blox also walks you through the steps you need to perform to publish your apps in the Mac App Store. You will use the Xcode 4 development tool provided by Apple to develop a Mac OS X application, and then see how it can be published in the Mac App Store.

Buy it for US$8.99 now.

Inaugural weekend iPhone class - 2-3 July 2011

The first iPhone weekend class was a great success. :-) I had a lot of fun running the class and boy, we had an aspiring 9-year old iPhone developer!

iPhone and Android course for July 2011 (Singapore)

Here is the schedule for iPhone and Android courses (Singapore) for the month of July 2011:

* Foundation of iPhone Programming - 21-22 July 2011 (Thu-Fri)

* Android Programming - 25-26 July 2011 (Mon-Tue)

As seats are limited, do enrol soon to avoid disappointment! Download the application form here.