Big Nerd Ranch

My background - I had about 7 years of Software Development experience out of which 3 years I had been working on developing iOS Apps with Objective-C. I took a break for about couple of years from iOS development and software altogether and wanted to... Read More get updated with Swift and iOS 9. Big Nerd Ranch (BNR) Guides have been the gold standard to anything apple and I thought I would be able to come to pace by doing an intensive week long bootcamp. I would not say I achieved 100% of what I had planned for.

The course starts on a weekend (Saturday). You arrive to the facility on Previous Night (Friday) and have dinner with the instructor (Mine was Scott Ritchie) and other attendees. I was a Asilomar Conference Grounds CA and it was a great campus. Scotts a great guy to hang out with. He has worked with Apple in its glory days (pre-iPhone) and loves to share stories about his encounter with Steve Jobs. He has good knowledge of how Apple Development team and hence the software written have evolved and how it affects the current development ecosystem. Also he is well networked with todays app developers so can definitely share pragmatic tips about app development. He was very attentive towards all student queries and also was kind enough to chat about anything related to iOS development and even stuff outside of it. He knows the area in and out and makes sure everybody is comfortable even after hours. He drove me to supermarket as I did not have a car and need urgent shaving supplies which I had forgotten to pack and made margaritas for us for one of the camp fire labs.

Let me get to the point about the course.

Pros
- Very comfortable stay (I would say over comfortable. I would not mind to pay less and settle for a little less lavish and more functional stay during 7 days).
- Instructor was a great guy to hang out with.
- People are mostly friendly and helpful and the batch is small so Instructor does get a chance to work with everyone.
- After course, camp fires, wine nights, labs with camp fire and margaritas (shh) and beach walks between the course were fun.
- You could meet a lot of interesting people working in valley. We had people from Netflix and couple of them from Apple (though they were in stealth mode), Intuit, Black Pixel, 3M. Great bunch to network and hang around with.

Cons
- Pace - I found the program to be a little fast even with iOS programming background I had. I highly recommend to go through the entire book (BNR's iOS and Swift Guide) so you have enough time during the bootcamp to go into further details. You will learn the most if you do all the labs and ask questions when you are stuck or a concept you are not understanding.
- Screen - BNR should provide a bigger and better screen. There was constant adjustment/focus/scrolling going on and I though it affected the flow of the instructor.
- Meals provided by the facility will get to you in 3-4 days. So plan to explore the surrounding areas.
- Connectivity is very bad. Could be a pro as it keeps you focussed on the course and gives you enough rest but the rooms and facilities are ok for the price.
- Biggest point I thought that they can work on is include more practical areas that are used in today's apps. I was surprised to see things like Push Notifications and use of Networking Libraries skipped. I would say these things are essentials rather than advanced topics.

This 5-day class explores advanced iOS development topics and will teach you how to maximize the performance of your new and existing iOS applications. Prepare your brain for an influx of Swift and iOS programming knowledge.

What you'll learn
Various tools... Read More for document-based and multithreaded architecture
Create iOS extensions
Record video, process barcodes and synthesize speech using AVFoundation
Create custom animations for transitions between view controllers
Take advantage of unit testing
Create your own UIs with custom Layers and Core Graphics

This was a great bootcamp. I learned more in five days there than I had in the five months before I went. The instructor was nice and highly knowledgable, the location was great, and I met a lot of people and made a lot of connections with people who... Read More are in the iOS development industry. This bootcamp is what made me really start to see my self as an advanced iOS developer.

I attended the advanced iOS dev bootcamp. They covered many of the most important, but sometimes overlooked features in iOS. We also did a deeper dive into some of the core parts of iOS that have been invaluable. I would highly recommend Big Nerd Ranch... Read More for any training needed. The instructors are personable, knowledgable, and approachable.

The BNR boot camps are worth every penny and then some. The lectures expand so much on what is in the book and the conversations that arise during the course are perhaps even more valuable than the lectures and lab time. I learned so much more than what... Read More was in the syllabus. I was able to have an app I wrote while in the class code reviewed by the instructor and that alone was worth the price of admission. I learned about how to think about coding an iOS app and not just the syntax of a language or the nuances of an API. Being able to continue to ask questions and have conversations with both the instructors and classmates in the forum after the class has ended has helped immeasurably. I would go to any boot camp BNR offers because the instructors are incredible and the courses are amazing.

Although I knew the basics of Android development, there were many pieces I was missing. Not only did I learn what I needed to in order to make sense of everything, but I learned much, much more. The instructor was fantastic, non only an Android expert,... Read More but a good teacher to boot.

This boot camp prepared me well to have confidence going into my new job. I recently changed careers from that of sales to that of a mobile developer. While I took numerous courses to assist me, it was the boot camp that cemented in me a basic understanding... Read More of Swift and Cocoa. It prepared me well to feel comfortable in finding answers to my questions going forward.