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Hi I'm very much interested in iOS and OS X development, and I'm planning to start on studying for it. I came across the new programming language "Swift".
I was wondering, whether to start learning objective-c or Swift for start my career in iOS and OS X development. I'm already a developer which uses PHP.

Please advice.
Posted
Updated 24-May-16 4:09am
Comments
[no name] 5-Oct-14 13:08pm    
Is there some reason that you are unable to learn both? You have a better chance asking any random stranger outside your front door. At least they would have a small chance of knowing what iOS developers are using in your job market and if they are looking to change. We can't possibly know.
PIEBALDconsult 5-Oct-14 13:13pm    
I don't know either of them and I don't do anything with those systems, but I suggest learning the newer one.

First of all, this is totally up to you. The note by Wes Aday, about "random stranger", is quite correct.

But what to do? This is the usual self-referenced problem: to learn if you want to know for sure if you want to learn a language or not, you have to… learn it. This is what you can do: learn the both until you know which one you are interested or not. You can always unlearn if you want to.

Everything else depends on your goals, and one important part worth mentioning is: do you want to learn programming or not? Yes, it's possible to use use some language without really understanding programming in general, something which I would not advise though. So, if you want to learn programming, you should also understand that both languages are not standardized and rarely used outside of Apple world, which is itself pretty much self-isolated from the rest of programming (even though the "rest of programming" is open to Apple systems). If you add your PHP (which hardly can be considered as "serious" language), all three languages will hardly give you enough background to understand programming. But don't you take learning yet another language too seriously?

A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing
—SA
 
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Assuming you only want to develop for IOS / Mac and not for other platforms (Windows, Android etc.) then Swift should be your choice;

It is newer, but is I think intended to be the replacement for Objective C - eventually. so learning it now you will be at an advantage over others converting from Objective-C.

While learning Swift you will almost certainly need to look at some Objective-C code (many examples will still be in that language only) so it will be useful to become familiar with it in some ways, but I'd stick with Swift.
 
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These languages arent so different. They are both translated with the LLVM, but Swift has better optimization. Also is "bridging" between these languages possible. Swift is in many way a "compressed" version of Objective-C.

For a starter I would recommand Objective-C because it is the common language and a lot of code is available.

Take a look at the website of the famous Ray Wenderlich. For a starter like you is the Video plan an interesting investion.
 
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