[TheRevoltingX]

It's so much easier when you already know how to program anything. I was a Perl dev and dabbled in Java. I was forced at my job to learn iOS and produce a specific app in less than 3 weeks. Wasn't pretty, but working under pressure can be good motivation too.

[FuzzyDunlop]

Pretty similar situation here. Was told to experiment with mobile apps first, but after deciding to use my own computer went native instead. From a background in PHP and only very limited knowledge of how Obj-C works, I managed to get an app mostly finished in the best part of a fortnight.

The biggest hurdle was actually trying to create a native form; something which is remarkably difficult to find good resources for compared to other things.

Had I tried to learn in my own time, without the pressure of having to get something working at all, I would have spent months reading textbooks and learning how to write basic hello world apps.

Instead, I made more progress than I could ever have imagined just by being given a challenge and an idea of what to make. And that's sometimes the best learning experience you can get.

[wallflower]

That is pretty impressive. 3 weeks. I hope your app didn't have to do anything database-related (sqlite/CoreData - that can suck up time)

[TheRevoltingX]

Nah, it was actually a basic form and tableview.

However, it did have in-app purchasing and that was tedious to implement.

Not code-wise, but fiddling with xcode/apple dev center to generate ad-hoc profiles and signing and transferring to the device.

That sucked up more time than the code, at least for the first prototype build.