Objective-C is an object-oriented extension of the C language that is based on Smalltalk paradigms. The vast majority of apps in the AppStore are written in it. The creator of Objective-C, Brandon Cox, aimed to solve the problem of code reuse. This greatly reduced the resource requirements of the system and allowed not only to improve the code quality, but also to increase the performance by the Objective-C development company.
The app is optimized for the iOS platform, which means it will work quickly and correctly.
The app responds to taps instantly; there are no lags in animation and content scrolling.
The app allows clear and easy access to the device hardware - camera, microphone, accelerometer, geolocation, address book, player, etc. The application functionality can be based on these and other features of the device.
The app has a platform native interface. Native apps usually operate with platform-specific interface elements: Menus, navigation, forms and all other design elements are taken from the operating system and are therefore familiar and understandable to the user.
The syntax of Objective-C language remains almost unchanged with each iOS update. That’s why application support is almost painless. You will have to change or rewrite only a small part of the code.
High degree of code maintainability
With each update, changes to Objective-C are minimal.
Availability of documentation
Objective-C has plenty of documentation, technical literature and a huge community. Apple provides and regularly updates official books and resources. In our article, you can find out what kind of knowledge a dedicated Objective-C developer needs.
Rapid transition
Objective-C is an extension of the C language. This means that any C code is also correct code for Objective-C; you just need to get used to the syntax.
Compatibility
Objective-C compatibility within projects written in Swift allows using two languages simultaneously.
One of the main roles in Objective-C is played by the main OOP paradigms: inheritance,
polymorphism, encapsulation and abstraction. Being a superset of C language, Objective-C
inherited its syntax and principles of data types. It added description of methods and
classes to the OPP functions.
Another exclusive feature of the language is that it is weakly typed and has a dynamic data
type system, which enables checking the object type before the compilation process is
completed.
Sending messages in Objective-C is a philosophy. When requesting an object via a message, the object itself may not respond. If we send a request for an empty index, nothing bad will happen. We just won’t get a response message and that’s all.
Objective-C is used to program and create apps for any Apple device, whether it’s an
iPhone, Mac, Apple Watch or even CarPlay. In 1988, the founder of the Apple company, Steve
Jobs, licensed Objective-C and took it as a basis for his company NeXT. NeXT later was
absorbed by Apple and used all the Objective-C developments in the creation of their first
personal computers.
According to the TIOBE Index, Objective-C is now among the top three most popular
programming languages and maintains its position steadily. In fact, until 2014, when Apple
presented its new Swift programming language to the public, all apps ever created for
iOS/macOS were written in Objective-C. And this trend of stability will continue for the
next couple of years.
Objective-C has been proven over the years and there are over 1.2 million apps in the App
Store written in this programming language. Today, more and more major companies decide to
hire Objective-C developers and use this language in their projects. So proficiency in this
language will be an advantage when applying for a job in a certain company. Unfortunately,
the transition to Swift is not moving by leaps and bounds and knowledge of Objective-C is a
mandatory criterion for a good CV.
Dynamic typing of the language facilitates software development for novice developers, which
is a big advantage. A large amount of documentation, technical literature and a huge
community will help you master Objective-C and save you a lot of time and effort.
All frameworks provided by Apple are based on Objective-C. A huge number of libraries are constantly created and shared by the community of developers, which will simplify your application development. There are useful frameworks and libraries for iOS developers, such as UI-components, modern frameworks and libraries for working with network, audio, video, graphics, animation and files.