How to build OS X GUI applications with Ruby and RubyCocoa
Erik Kastner has put together a great tutorial showing you how to build a graphical OS X app using Ruby and RubyCocoa. For a less wordy approach, there's also a short screencast which shows you the whole process from start to finish.
With the continual improvements of the RubyCocoa library, and Apple's commitment to Ruby for Cocoa development in OS X 10.5, Ruby is rapidly becoming a viable alternative to Objective C and Java for developing OS X apps.
Another great resource is RubyCocoa.com, a site that features several RubyCocoa tutorials and articles.
June 3, 2007 at 2:06 pm
I've written a small RubyCocoa app myself a while ago and I must say I can see the potential. The framework is really Rubyesque, with automating conversion between Ruby and Cocoa variable types and objects. Even though, I really advise everyone to read a few chapters about Cocoa/Objective-C development to get some insight in working with XCode and the MVC concepts behind Cocoa. Then you should be up and running with RubyCocoa in no time.
June 5, 2007 at 4:28 pm
The alternatives are ObjC and Python with PyObjC which will be shipped with Leopard. As far as I know the Java-ObjectiveC bridge has been deprecated, see: http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Cocoa/Conceptual/JavaTutorial/chapter01/chapter_1_section_1.html