Creating Your Xcode Project

To develop an app, you work in what's called an Xcode project. So, it's time to fire one up. Here's how it's done:

1. Launch Xcode.
   After you've downloaded the SDK, it's a snap to launch Xcode. By default, it's downloaded to /Developer/ Applications, where you can track it down to launch it.
   Here are a couple of hints to make Xcode handier and more efficient:
   • Drag the icon for the Xcode application all the way down to the Finder's Dock so you can launch it from there. You'll be using it a lot, so it wouldn't hurt to be able to launch it from the Dock.
   • When you first launch Xcode, you see the Welcome screen shown. (After using Xcode to create projects, your Welcome screen will list all of your most recent projects in the right column.) It's chock-full of links to the Apple Developer Connection and Xcode documentation. (If you don't want to be bothered with the Welcome screen in the future, deselect the Show This Window When Xcode Launches check box. You can also just click Cancel to close the Welcome screen.)
2. Choose Create a New Xcode Project from the Welcome screen (or choose File → New Project) to create a new project.
   No matter what you do to start a new project, you're greeted by the New Project window.
   The New Project window is where you get to choose the template you want for your new project. Note that the leftmost pane has two sections: one for iOS and the other for Mac OS X.
3. In the upper-left corner of the New Project window, click Application under the iOS heading (if it isn't already selected).
   With Application selected, the main pane of the New Project window shows several choices. Each of these choices is actually a template that, when chosen, generates some code to get you started.
4. Select View-based Application from the template choices displayed.
   You'll use the View-based Application option to start the DeepThoughts app, the first sample app.
   Note that when you select a template, a brief description of the template is displayed underneath the main pane. In fact, click some of the other template choices just to see how they're described as well. Just be sure to click the View-based Application template again when you're done snooping around so you can follow along with developing the DeepThoughts app.
5. Select iPad from the Product pop-up menu, and then click Choose.
   You must choose iPad (not iPhone) from the Product pop-up menu to start a new iPad project from scratch - this choice puts the standard iPad resources into your project. After clicking Choose, the Save As dialog appears.
6. Enter a name for your new project in the Save As field, choose a Save location (the Desktop or any folder works just fine), and then click Save.