REALbasic for Macintosh

Rating:
Summary: REALbasic for Macintosh Review
Review: Although the text is lightweight and friendly, I found the amount of information in "REALbasic for Macintosh" to be quite sparse considering the page count. Although the book is intended to have a limited (introductory) scope and is priced accordingly, there is a good deal of blank space at the end of most topic sections, and many common steps in the tutorials are repeated ad nauseum. I was left thinking that much more could be covered in the same amount of pages.

I don't know if the Visual Quickstart format assumes that the reader needs to be told each and every step EACH and EVERY time, but I found the ongoing repetition to be tedious and a bit insulting. The text should provide shorthands to these common procedures after the reader has done them a few times.

Worse than that are the numerous typos in both the examples and main text. I spent a good deal of my time being distracted by errors and emailing the author to request that he revise his erratum web page for this book.To his credit, Mr. Swaine did get back to me each time I emailed an new item. Needless to say, the book would benefit from more careful proof reading.

I second the motion that a second edition should be aimed toward fixing these typos and providing more substance. Only then can "REALbasic for Macintosh" become the fine introductory guide that novice REALbasic programmers are looking for,

Rating:
Summary: Chris Seibold MyMac.com Book Review
Review: I had heard how easy programming with REALbasic was, I decided I wanted to program something using REALbasic. To that end I downloaded REALbasic and signed up for the e-mail list. I fired up REALbasic every week or so (I suppose I was hoping that programming would suddenly seem easy) and couldn't figure out how to do a damn thing. The net result of my REALbasic interlude was a whole bunch of press release e-mails from Lorin Rivers (REALbasic PR guy). Reflecting on my failure at becoming a programmer (other failed ambitions include: cartoonist, scientist, writer, engineer, director, pro surfer, magician, comedian, and pimp daddy) I wondered "is it me or is REALbasic just a little too unintuitive?" The answer has been revealed to me thanks to REALbasic for Macintosh.

So was REALbasic beyond my feeble ken or is REALbasic incredibly powerful and surprisingly easy to use? Right now I lean heavily towards the latter, I blame my earlier failings on lack of proper research. Reading REALbasic for Macintosh and working a few examples made me realize that REALbasic is refreshingly easy to use and plenty powerful if you can just get a small foothold. How powerful? Well, every Mac aficionado is aware that periodically Microsoft hems and haws and then slyly hints that they may kill Office for the platform. When the folks at the Mac programming arm of Microsoft hear those rumblings they worry for their jobs. When they're not wondering how long the checks are going to be coming they're using REALbasic to mock up the next version of Office for Mac (Microsoft apparently does all the early work for Office in REALbasic and then programs the final release in something completely different). All this should illustrate that REALbasic is a fairly powerful programming language that you can use to make even the most complicated pieces of bloatware.

So we've established that REALbasic is plenty powerful, but is it easy to use? A week ago I would have said no, but now I think differently. So how did REALbasic for Macintosh instill such confidence in a complete neophyte like myself? Well Michael Swaine apparently subscribes to the idea that first you teach something very simple but complete and build from there (this was a popular way teaching violin at one time). In this spirit REALbasic for Macintosh starts out showing you how to build an HTML editor. Sure it's simple and useless but if you work through the exercise you begin to see other possibilities. I am a walking example of how successful Michael Swaine's methodology is. I read the Pong example and before I was through I could see how to write Breakout, Super Breakout, Centipede. Q-Bert remains a mystery, but you get the idea of how much you can learn from REALbasic for Macintosh. The examples offer positive feedback and keep the pages of REALbasic for Macintosh turning. While those pages are turning you'll also realize that REALbasic for Macintosh is easily accessible and well thought out, Michael Swaine hasn't written and edge of your seat instruction manual but if you're looking to learn a good deal but don't want to read completely mind numbing textbook type stuff you'll be more than satisfied. In short, between the green and purple covers you'll find everything you need to know to make a super bitchin' REALbasic program, and you'll be surprised how easily the text flows.

I hear the amassed readers crying: But Chris, What about the visual Quickstart part, that uses pictures instead of lengthy explanations? This is the biggest waste of visual quickstarting since "Braille: The Visual Quickstart Guide" Yep, REALbasic for Macintosh would be just as useful if you took an exacto knife and cut out every single picture (many are simply gratuitous and the rest don't add anything meaningful). I suppose the Visual Quickstart part is tacked on to sell a few more copies but, truthfully, how many books about programming actually need the visual Quickstart part?

Okay, I've vented and I feel better. Let's review the innate value of the product. REALbasic for Macintosh will set you back twenty-two US dollars. For the twenty two greenbacks you part with you get a top notch instructional manual that will take you as far as you want to go (the back says beginning to intermediate but by the time you're finished with REALbasic for Macintosh you won't need another book you'll need the scary documentation). Compare this to REALbasic prices: The documentation (available via ftp) is a whopping 1,200 hundred pages or you can buy a printed version for fifty bucks. So for twenty-two bucks you can can save a few trees and get all the info you are ever likely to need. I call that a pretty decent value, accountants call it a nice ROI (return on investment) and Enron would subtract the twenty two dollars you spent from the fifty bucks you could have parted with and call it twenty eight dollars of hard earned profit.

Bottom Line: This is a great way to get familiar with REALbasic.

MacMice Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Chris Seibold
[www.address]

Rating:
Summary: Imperfect
Review: I like this series of books, and its an admirable attempt in this case, but i was tearing my hair out because the several examples I tried failed to work. at various points there are key details left out, and a number of typos or incorrect diagrams. The author has a website with the errors, and seems to make a conscientioius effort to address the problems, but i think the truth of the matter, is that this book needs a re-write and re-release. I find it still useful to have to get another opinion after reading the real manuals. I have had some frustrating days with RB, but now that I am getting the hang of it, it can be quite fun. There does not seem to be a single good reference. The manuals are either too general (the users guide) or too sparse and lacking in detail (the reference manual). I suppose if you keep plugging along and look at the manuals AND the books, it will be come clearer and clearer.

Rating:
Summary: Can't use it for a text book.
Review: I usually like the Quickstart guides and I waited a long time for this book. I'm teaching an introductory computer programming course this semester using REALbasic and I delayed making a textbook choice because this book was supposed to ready in time. The "Definitive Guide" is available, but maybe a little too heavy, so I kept hoping this would be ready and resemble most of the Quickstart guides - short examples that illustrate one point. I wondered why it was twice as long as most Quickstart Guides. Now I know why - it starts with one GIGANTIC example of creating an HTML editor. Not something I'm interested in creating and not something that I can ask my high school students to sit down and do in one session. There are good parts in the book, but they start after that awful HTML editor section. We chose the "Definitive Guide" which is broken into manageable chapters.

Rating:
Summary: It's REALLYREALLYbasic
Review: If REALbasic is to be your very first venture into the world of computer programming, and you don't even know what an IDE, a compiler or a stream is, this book could very possibly provide you just the orientation you need to start writing a simple application. In this sense, the book is true to the Visual QuickStart concept. However, so is REALSoftware's own Quickstart.pdf, and the latter is free and you probably already have it (if you already bought RB). Go through Real's quickstart tutorials, and if you're still not getting anywhere, consider this book.

If you've programmed in any other environment at all, particularly any of the "visual" ones or even Flash, then you will find yourself quickly looking past the back cover of this book wondering where the in-depth content is. I'll tell you where it is, it's in Matt Neuburg's book, the REALbasic book that you should be purchasing if you already have ANY programming experience. Don't let the "Now covers version 3" on Matt's book fool you into thinking it's obsolete--far from it! Certainly parts of RB have been improved upon since V3 (it's at 5.2.1 as I write this), but the core language and concepts are all the same. Matt's book is also a good reference, which you'll consult regularly as you work. Example: wondering how to properly use a memoryBlock? You could read pages 186-191 in Matt's book and learn all you need to know, or you could consult Real's online Language Reference examples, or you could look in the index of this visual quickstart book and find that there isn't even an entry for memoryBlock. The proper choice should be clear.

I give this 2 stars for its potential usefulness in orienting someone who knows literally nothing about any manner of programming.

Rating:
Summary: Useful nuggets, clear and to the point.
Review: This book is a great way to "get your feet wet" with REALbasic and I'd recommend it for anyone just getting started with programming or with REALbasic. If you're looking for a comprehensive book on REALbasic -- this isn't it. Instead the book covers fundamental aspects of REALbasic, explained with plain talk and illustrated with direct and easy to understand examples.

The format is extremely easy to digest. The book is broken into a dozen topic chapters, each broken into 2-10 page lessons that introduct an aspect of the REALbasic feature set. Each lesson has a one paragraph overview, then some casual tips and great illustrative graphics before clear and step-by-step examples.

If you've been programming for a while, the plain talk and "don't skip even the obvious" style may put you off. But if you've been programming longer than that, you'll appreciate the plain talk and "don't skip even the obvious" style.

A great "first book" for REALbasic and a valuable reference for the rest of us.

Rating:
Summary: A very bad, bad book.
Review: Wow. This book is terrible. Here are some of the problems I have discovered in the short one hour or so of looking through it.

1. There is actually about 2/5ths of the content it advertises. While it claims to have 500+ pages it is only around 200. See, the author is so damn lazy that the on each page is only a thin column about 2 inches across. Now they claim that this is because of the many pictures scattered throughout the book, but if you look at it, the pictures RARELY fill the empty 5-6 inch wide column. Pathetic.

2. The explinations are just poo. He goes into little detail when describing each component of the language. I mean really. Let me reiterate myself, Pathetic.

3. It doesn't even explain everything. Though I've been programming for a few months, I still consider myself to be a beginner-intermediate (the publishing company proudly says this book is for me.) And yet, I'm still left without many answers.

Here's my advice - don't get this book, get REALbasic The Definitve Guide by Matt Neuburg. And don't get the dummies book either, thats even worst. Oh, and if your new to programming and are in need of help, just head to realgurus.com and don't be afraid to post.

...P>- Guruze