elementary Developer Guide: 1st Edition

What We Will & Won’t Cover

We're going to assume you have absolutely no experience in writing apps for elementary OS. But we will assume you have some basic programming knowledge and hopefully a little experience in Vala—or at least similarly-syntaxed languages. If you’re not familiar with Vala, we encourage you to brush up on it before reading this book. GNOME’s Vala Tutorial is a good place to start.

We’re also not covering design too much in this guide; that’s what the Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) are for, and you’re highly encouraged to take a look at them before beginning your app. We’re going to assume you have a basic knowledge of—or at least a quick link to—the HIG and focus more on coding.

We’re going to cover several tasks including: building apps using GTK+, Granite, and other tech available in elementary OS; setting up a build system; hosting your code for collaborative development; packaging and distributing your new app; and more.

As a student driver, you wouldn’t expect us to teach you about the inner workings of the car in order to get from one spot to another. Rather, you would expect to hear about the rules of the road and the technique required to make the car perform certain maneuvers. In much the same way, we won’t be creating a computer engineering guidebook. We are going to cover concepts at a higher level. To steer the car analogy in a different direction, as a student mechanic you’re going to learn how to change the oil, swap out the seats, and adjust the suspension. We’re not going to teach you every technical engineering aspect of internal combustion, aerodynamics, and the like.