Creating apps for iPhone/Android/whatever
 

What is the best way to learn how to do this?

Should I try to learn a specific programming language first or do I just jump right in?

Any advice, websites, and guides would be appreciated. Thank you.

http://www.appinventorbeta.com

that's google's tool for creating android apps.

Google has:
http://www.appinventorbeta.com/about/

But:

As we announced on the App Inventor Announcement Forum, Google will end support for App Inventor on December 31, 2011, after which data in appinventorbeta.com will not be accessible and will be deleted from Google servers. You can preserve your App Inventor projects by simply clicking on the Download All Projects button on your My Projects page. This will download to your computer a zipped archive of all your projects. We recommend you retrieve your projects well before December 31st.

By the end of 2011 Google will also be making the complete App Inventor source code publicly available under an open source license, so that anyone can study the code and modify it as they desire.

In order to ensure the future success of App Inventor, Google has funded the establishment of a Center for Mobile Learning at the MIT Media Lab. Sometime in the first quarter of 2012, the Center plans to provide an App Inventor service for general public access, similar to the one Google is currently running.

In order for you to continue working with your projects in an open source instance (MIT or otherwise) of App Inventor you will need to download your data from appinventorbeta.com before December 31st and later upload them to an open source instance as it becomes available.

Please visit the App Inventor user forums to get future updates on App Inventor. You can also visit http://mobilelearning.mit.edu/ for updates on what is being done with App Inventor at MIT.

The App Inventor Team

I bought a couple books, The Dummies Guide to Writing iPhone Apps

You have to buy a Mac, download the iPhone simulator, join the App developer club.

There's a couple of programming languages you can use, buy a book on one of those too.

Never got round to doing it!!

Just tell Siri what you want, and she will make it.

html5 /css3 / phonegap

in before mac bashing lol

Checked out http://www.appcelerator.com a while ago when I had an idea for an iPhone app. Coudn't figure out how to use it for the life of me, but it's one of the top iPhone app makers.

For Android, Java is the preferred language. There's also something called Basic for Android, but Java is the language everyone uses. By learning Java, you can also use it elsewhere. For iphone, Steve Jobs made up his own language called Objective C. It's very rarely used anywhere else. Both have cute little wizards and things you can use instead for really simple apps. Kind of life using Frontpage Express to wysiwyg a web site, as opposed to actually learning the technology. Java and Objective C are the languages for "real" apps, though.

You can certainly dive right in and that's what most people do. That's also why if someone describes an app, I pretty much know how to hack it, because they learned a language and started coding without ever learning a damn thing about the art and science of programming, or software architecture. They therefore make very predictable mistakes, creating very predictable bugs.

Learning a programming language is kind of like reading the owner's manual for a power tool. Knowing how a specific saw works does not make you a carpenter and you'll get crappy results if you never take the time to learn things like what type and thickness of wood should be used in what type of project. Similarly learning the keywords for a specific doesn't make you a programmer. Languages are the easy part. Systems design is what really counts. I would strongly encourage you to spend some time learning that stuff, stuff that is entirely independent of what language you're using. Particularly if you application sends data to a server or had access to sensitive personal information, you'll need to learn enough about security to avoid certain common and costly errors.

I know that's not the fun part for most people. The fun part is seeing something "work". The boring part is making sure that it doesn't leak memory and crash the device if it's left running overnight. Yet, 95% of what I've learned over many years of programming has nothing to do with a specific language, platform, or feature. 95% of it is algorithms, architecture, design principles, and best practices.

Well put, Raymor. Personally, I hate coding for the iPhone/Android market. It's tedious to me.

check out the titanium framework

http://www.appcelerator.com/products...n-development/

Well said....

I work as a fulltime iphone APP developer and i cant recommend PhoneGAB. Everytime apple make changes to the SDK you have to wait for phoneGAB to catchup before its compatible again.

Do it the right way from the start, you will be happy you did down the line.
Intel based mac.
Xcode / Iphone Sim / Instruments
Objective C

you are welcome to write if you want some tips on some good books to get you started.

Best Regards
Boot

don't waste your time on an Android app... some chinese fuck will just download your app, decompile it to smalli, edit it a little, recompile it and resubmit it.

Sly, You should have a look at Aptana / Appcelerator quick and easy... You will need a mac for iphone apps though.