Mac OS X Development

Mac OS X development is the process of building scripts and applications for Apple's Mac OS X operating system. Developers use tools provided by Apple, including a code editor and project manager dubbed Xcode, a user interface designer called Interface Builder and a Dtrace-based debugging application known as Instruments. Native Mac OS X applications are compiled using the standard Unix gcc compiler and a variety of other open source utilities. This is made possible by Mac OS X's BSD core known as Darwin.

Fast Facts

1. Apple bundles its development tools with each copy of OS X for free
2. Mac OS X uses many of the same development frameworks and tools as the old NEXTSTEP operating system
3. The NS that prepends many classes stands for NextStep
4. The CF that prepends many classes stands for Core Foundation
5. OS X applications can also be built using Ruby, Python and AppleScript

Frameworks

Mac OS X includes a variety of frameworks to ease the burden of building native applications. The main framework, known as Cocoa, allows developers to rapidly build native graphical applications with relative ease using the Objective-C programming language. Other major frameworks on OS X for development include Carbon (a C-based variant), Java, Ruby and Python.

Mac OS X also includes many other utility frameworks to ease the developer burden. New to Mac OX X Leopard is Core Animation, which allows users to easily add graphics routines and animations to an application. Core Data is a SQLite-based data storage backend that enables developers to store user data easily. There is also Core Image for image editing, Core Video for video effects and Core Audio for audio processing.

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