Programming iOS 6, 3rd Edition

Notes on the Third Edition

Shortly after the official release of iOS 6 and Xcode 4.5, I began revising the code examples in this book (available at https://github.com/mattneub) to use and demonstrate the new iOS features. When that was done, I proceeded to rewrite the book text; while I was doing so, iOS 6.1 and Xcode 4.6 were released, so those are the versions that the book now assumes you’re using.

For this third edition, I have eliminated most references to previous iOS versions. Many iOS 6 features, of course, do not exist in iOS 5 or before; I usually mention that a new feature is new, but I have not generally addressed the problem of writing backwards-compatible code. The text would become confusing and bloated if everything had to be qualified with advice for different versions (“but if you’re targeting iOS 5.1, do this; if you’re targeting iOS 5.0, do that; if you’re targeting iOS 4.3, do the other”). I believe I can justify such omission on the grounds that the previous editions of this book exist! If you’re targeting iOS 5, I’ve already described what to do, in the second edition; there’s no need to repeat myself here.

New iOS 6 features are, of course, both explained and adopted in this edition. For example, having described NSArray subscripting (in Chapter 10), I then use it consistently, in place of objectAtIndex:, throughout the rest of the book. Aside from this, the book’s structure remains the same as in previous editions, growing where necessary to accommodate explanations ...