May 2009 Archives

I have some time ago, already looked at Objective-C and Cocoa, the framework from Apple, but never stayed strictly with my learning objectives. One reason was maybe that the book I have bought was based on an old version of XCode, this made it really heavy to follow the exercises.

Now I have some spare time and I started a new try. With other tutorials and the right books for my version of XCode. But I had to recognise soon, that I have first to read some basics about the programming in C or Objective-C before I could go on with the book about Cocoa.

The most basic question you have to ask yourself is the following:

Know what you want to use your notebook for

When you know this, then the other considerations are really easy, even if you do not understand too much of computers. Here are a few hints about what you have to think:

• What are typical applications I am using? (Sometimes does this also include your operating system)
• Will I or do I have to take my notebook with me outside of my 'office'?
• Do I have to write a lot or just occasionally?
• What and how many connections do I need (USB, WLAN, Bluetooth, Infrared, FireWire, Ethernet, Smartcard etc.)?
• Do I need additional communication features (webcam, microphone etc.)?

When you are more or less sure about these points (for which you can draw a nice matrix and evaluate different possibilities) you have to decide how big you budget is. There are a lot of brands and models available, so there is something for everyone. You just need to find it.