how to develop an iphone app??

i searched the forum and didnt really find much on this topic...

i have a lot of clients that are restaurants/bars and i was thinking a good way to make some extra $$$ is to offer to build an iphone app for them. so people can order from their phone or make a reservation, etc. nothing special.

i dont really know anything about it creating an app but im hoping theres someone out there willing to share some resources on what to do.

is there a website where i can create simple apps and test them out?
any tutorials or ebooks here?
am i better off hiring a programmer? If so does anyone on the forum offer the service?
i heard of an app that helps you create an app....any good? name?


thanks a bunch. i did search the forum and didnt really find much on this...

There are a few courses in the download section on this topic. However, the content of those are basic at best. This is not something you will learn overnight.

unless you're good with programming (specifically objective c) you're probably going to invest a lot of time before you know if it's profitable (unless you can get some of those clients to pay up front).

best to hire a programmer to do it, even then you need to watch closely and know what you want.

If you can draw out **exactly** how you want the program to run, ie make a set of drawings for each specific page / screen, how they're linked, how they work together, then you'll save yourself a ton in the long run.

Can be hard to find a decent programmer as well. That market is still hot and many of the better ones can still make better money with their own apps than on contract.

If it was me doing it in your situation, I'd try to get 3-5 of them to sign on for a couple thousand bucks each. Build it so that each different one was just a matter of changing the look / branding, so that it's cheap to re-do for each new client. Aim to break even on the dev costs with the first 3-5 clients, then everything else is (relatively) gravy. (just my 2cents)

I think you need to give apple 100 bucks to get into there app making team or somthing before you can even publish apps Also all the app making programs are for macs, so if you have a mac it will be pretty easy.

thanks for the input.

I was thinking on doing really basic stuff, like building a basic mobile layout website on the clients sub-domain. i would have a couple of features there but nothing special.....maybe a reservation system and a view of the menu. then just have the app link to that and they just browse the site.

do you experienced guys think that is doable with a small capital investment? say lesss thatn $1000?

I think in order to get an app that can be accepted on appstore, you should hire a good programmer that have some knowledge in writing iphone apps.. Else I think it would be a risk and a waste of time