iPhone Game Development - Chris Craft [163]
This application teaches you how to host Web sites and HTML inside your application. You also learn how to enable user interaction for your application.
Tip
You can find the source code for My Google at http://appsamuck.com/day13.html.
Day 14: Sleep Sound
The Sleep Sound application generates calming sounds that gently lull you to sleep. It's also ideal for meditation or for those times when you need to let the stress melt away. One of the best features of the Sleep Sound generator is that it goes everywhere with you—it's as close by as your iPhone. You'll find Sleep Sound simple to use right from the moment it's downloaded. We wanted an application that showcased the audio capabilities of the iPhone. We knew we wanted a sound-effect application of some kind, but we weren't sure about coming up with the sounds in such a short amount of time. Finally we decided on creating a lullaby-type application that would help users sleep, something we were always looking forward to by the end of the day.
The highlight of this application is learning how to loop background sounds. There is also code to work with UIImageViews and UIButtons.
Tip
You can find the source code for Sleep Sound at http://appsamuck.com/day14.html.
Day 15: ZipWeather
Enter a ZIP code, and ZipWeather gives you a weather forecast for that location. The current conditions, the forecast for the following days with highs and lows, and a link to the Yahoo! weather site are all provided. This is a reliable application because all information is provided by the Weather Channel. The fact that forecasts are looked up by ZIP code means you can find weather forecasts for locations before arriving at your destination, giving you more time to prepare for the weather you may face. ZipWeather is sure to be a useful application for almost any iPhone user.
One reason we decided to create a weather-related application was to show people how to pull data off the Internet and interact with it. The key topic featured in this tutorial is the basics of downloading data with NSURLConnection. We also cover how to use UIWebViews.
Tip
You can find the source code for ZipWeather at http://appsamuck.com/day15.html.
Day 16: World Tour
World Tour lets you know exactly when the iPhone Tech Talk World Tour will be in your area. This app keeps you up to date on the tour and allows you to view the stops that the tour will be taking, so you won't miss out. We wanted to create an app about the iPhone Tech Talk World Tour to help spread the word about all the great events Apple does to help developers learn more about programming the iPhone.
We cover lots of good stuff in this tutorial, including opacity with images, using rotation transformations, tiling images, and creating animated wallpapers. We also discuss how to play sounds in a loop.
Tip
You can find the source code for World Tour at http://appsamuck.com/day16.html.
Day 17: Fireball
The Fireball application acts like a screensaver for the iPhone. The screensaver appears as an orange ball of fire floating against a black background, leaving a trail of gray balls in its path. You can use this screensaver to entertain others and show off another neat application. We would have been remiss if we did not cover a bouncing-ball type of demo at some point. But instead of a bouncing ball we did a ricocheting fireball. It's lots of fun, and nobody gets hurt.
This application has a strong focus in using UIImageViews and UIImages. Again, we took advantage of semitransparent images. This tutorial covers the basics of creating a particle emitter and how