Open Source: Behavioral Driven Development Testing Framework
For those unfamiliar with the term behavioral driven development testing (BDD) frameworks are used so that you can test applications using logical English like syntax.
I have come across an open source framework designed specifically for iOS devices. What’s cool about this specific framework is that it can easily be attached to Objective-C methods, runs in the simulator, and let’s you store your different stories in different files so you could easily demonstrate your software’s ability to cope with different scenario’s.
Here’s an example of the types of a story used for testing:
Story: Example story showing the basic syntax.
Given Simon is working
Then I should be able to see abc and 5 in the log and say goodby at the end.
The framework is known as Simon, and was created by Derek Clarkson.
It can be found on Github here:
https://github.com/drekka/Simon
UPDATE: Got feedback about another framework known as Kiwi you may want to check out if this interests you.
I had never used one of these frameworks before, but it looks like a great way to illustrate an app does exactly what it should do. HKSAB58YGFWN
News: Moai SDK Game Development Kit Made Available To All
A few weeks ago I mentioned the Moai SDK. An open source iOS game development kit allowing for development of iOS apps (and Android apps) in Lua. What I really liked about the engine that it has already been used in could be extended to support any functionality within the iOS SDK.
At that time Moai a limited beta, the beta has been extended now to support all developers.
In order to download the latest SDK release and the cloud services you will need to sign up on the Moai website for the dashboard here:
http://dashboard.moaicloud.com/signup.php
You can find the Github project for the Moai SDK Source here:
https://github.com/moai/moai-beta
The cloud services look great, and very easy to code – if you’re interested be sure to check out their 60 second tutorial here:
60 Second Moai Cloud Tutorial
There are numerous improvements since I first mentioned the SDK. Looks like the guys developing the Moai SDK have been very busy!
Read More: iPhone Dev News
Best Resources In iOS Development – July 10th 2011
Another great week has gone by, and if you are a regular visitor to this site you have probably noticed that I am now using a new theme. Hopefully this betters the user experience for everyone.
In the last week there were some great resources shared, those included a number of open source libraries relating to topics such as Core Text, web services, data storage, and user interface improvements.
Here are the most viewed resources that were new in the last week listed in order of popularity:
Open Source: Lightweight Asynchronous Networking Library For Easy Communication With Web Services – A great lightweight library for communicating with web services allowing you to code complex interactions quickly by taking advantage of Objective-C blocks.
Tutorial: Custom In View Popup Windows – A guide and library for creating popup windows within your main view so that you can display content without needing to navigate to another view.
Open Source: Rich Text-Editing View Using Core Text – A drop in UITextView replacement that allows for easily creating and editing richly formatted text.
Open Source: Library For Easy Data Saving/Loading – A straightforward data saving library allowing you to save or load int, float, and NSString data with just one line of code.
Open Source: UITableView Replacement With Swipeable Cells – A slick UITableView replacement that allows you to create table view cells that can be swiped by the user revealing new content behind the cell.
Open Source: Library Allowing For Tab Bars With An Infinite Number Of Items – A tab bar library that allows you to place an unlimited number of items and allowing the user to scroll between different tab bars accessing the icons without the user having to use the more screen.
Tutorial: Format Text Magazine Style Using Core Text – A great step-by-step tutorial on how to format your text in multiple columns, and format the text with different styles using Core Text. Excellent for anyone developing a magazine style app.
Open Source: Easily Extensible Objective-C Math Parser Library – A very useful math parsing library that uses similar syntax to NSPredicate but allows you to very easily add new functions.
Open Source: Library And Guide For NinePatch Image Support On iOS Platforms – A libary for support of NinePatch format images that are commonly used for interface elements on Android.
Thanks for reading, please share and bookmark this post!
Open Source: Library For Easy Data Saving/Loading
There are many ways to save data on iOS devices. Some like a database are likely overkill for a game, and other methods like serialization are great, but things could still be easier.
I’ve found a very cool time saving library that allows you to easily save and load ints, floats, and NSString’s to an automatically created .PLIST file. No fuss at all just one line of code to save, or one line to load each of these datatypes. A nice simple quick solution if you want to install some simple data saving into an app. If you need to save a few floats of game data it is an ideal solution.
The library is ABLFXSaveSystem from Alexander Blunck and can be found on Github here:
https://github.com/ablfx/ABLFXSaveSystem
A cool example of a simple, but useful open source library.
iAds For Developers Experiment Makes iAd CPM Rates Look As Stable As A House Of Cards
iAds and the iAds for develoeprs program has been a boon for developers showing iAds within their apps due to the extremely high CPM rates. The cost for non-developer ads has been said to be as high as $18 CPM while those of AdMob are considerably less than a dollar. The cost for developer ads is 0.25 cents per click.
It’s been suggested that these new ads perform quite well. Personally I’ve been extremely skeptical as even the much lower cost for AdMob ads does not make for easy profit. Fortunately, the developers at Cross Forward Consulting performed a test, and decided to share their results.
The overall results of Cross Forward Consulting advertising their app, Audiobooks Premium, a pretty successful app in it’s own right have shown absolutely dismal results.
The end results were $1251.75 spent on iAds providing 5,007 clicks and just 48 downloads.. The overall cost was $14.90 for each download. There were 2,052,929 impressions.
You can see the full writeup, and further details in the article here:
iAd for Developers
Sure, some might say a more expensive app could do better, but it’s hard to imagine how it could be worthwhile. Considering the extremely high CPM rates non-developers are paying for iAds it looks like the iAds CPM rates are about as stable as a house of cards unless somehow iAds performance were to dramatically improve. Especially given the much lower AdMob rates. Imagine if the test was done at the rate those big-wig advertisers are supposedly paying.. the cost would have been over $750 for a download.
Thanks for reading, please share this using the buttons below!