Re:Ask HN: What do you think of Objective-C?
by tlrobinson on Thursday December 18, 2008 @01:40AM
(#401886)
You can't really call it a step backwards, since it's been around for 20 years, long before many other dynamic languages like Ruby and Python. But irrespective of time, there are a few annoyances compared to at least Ruby (I wouldn't say it's worse than Java though).
The pointers aren't such a big deal, as long as you don't try to use the math operators on them. You just have to remember the "*" in declarations. Remember, objects in most dynamic languages are "pointers", you just don't have access to the raw bits.
BTW, Objective-J solves the problems you mentioned (no raw pointer access, no header files or needing to declare things multiple times, the "+" operator does string concatenation and regexes are built in). Of course it's mostly for client side web apps, rather than native apps (though Cappuccino works in Adobe AIR...)
The pointers aren't such a big deal, as long as you don't try to use the math operators on them. You just have to remember the "*" in declarations. Remember, objects in most dynamic languages are "pointers", you just don't have access to the raw bits.
BTW, Objective-J solves the problems you mentioned (no raw pointer access, no header files or needing to declare things multiple times, the "+" operator does string concatenation and regexes are built in). Of course it's mostly for client side web apps, rather than native apps (though Cappuccino works in Adobe AIR...)