Top 10 Tools for Mac and iOS Development - 2013

Having the right set of tools can take your development quality to the next level. This article provides you with my personal current top 10 apps to use for Mac and iOS development.

AppCode is a must have IDE for any serious developer on the Mac/iOS platform.

Features

• Advanced Coding Assistance
• Code Generation and Refactorings
• Code Quality
• Project and Code Navigation
• i18n Support
• Debugger
• Unit Testing
• iOS Development
• VCS Integration and Local History
• Integrations
• More than Objective-C IDE
• Customization and Extensibility

Website: http://www.jetbrains.com/objc/features/index.html

Prototype out your app ideas. Indigo Studio allows you to interactively prototype your web, desktop, and mobile apps. Major upside, it's free!

Features

• Illustrate with Storyboards
• Sketch and Design Screens
• Design with Clutter-Free UI
• Leverage Built-In UI Elements
• Prototype and Visualize Interactions
• Animate Transitions
• Annotate Prototypes
• Share and Present Prototypes
• Export Prototype Designs

Website: http://www.infragistics.com/products/indigo-studio

An excellent tool for mirroring your iOS device screen when you have to demo or present to a group.

Features

• Record. Easily capture the screen of your iOS device and save it as a video file for later review.
• iOS On Your Mac. View your iOS device on your Mac and continue using it while you're mirroring.
• Password Protection. Control access to your Mac by setting a password to prevent unwanted connections.
• Selectable Frames. Change the color of the device frame on your screen to match the actual skin of your device.

Website: https://www.reflectorapp.com

A collection of valuable design and development tools all in one package.

Features

• Mirror - Effortlessly see your designs and applications on iOS while you work on them from your Mac.
• Dimensions - Instantly find the dimensions of any on-screen element simply by rolling your mouse cursor over it.
• Rulers - Powerful on-screen rulers for precise pixel measurements that include scaling, rotation, and edge snapping.
• Screens - Inspect your usable screen real estate with dozens of templates for computers, TV's and mobile devices.
• Loupe - Magnify part of your screen, copy colors and simulate how colors appear to users with vision impairments.
• Guides - Display vertical and horizontal guides that float on top of all else on the screen for easy alignment.
• Frames - Create, layout and adjust custom marker boxes that float on top of all other on-screen elements.
• Crosshair - Quickly and easily locate and align any point visible on the screen.

Website: http://xscopeapp.com

Edit and run code in any programming language. There's a bunch of preset languages already set up, and it's an easy task to add any other languages you might be using.

Features

• Run code in any language
• Powerful editing
• Customizable templates
• Built-in Console
• Add your own languages
• Interact with your code

Website: http://krillapps.com/coderunner/

A simple yet powerful tool for working with regular expressions. Includes a built in cheat sheet, if you need a little refresher.

Features

• Regular expression syntax coloring makes it easy to see how your pattern is interpreted by the regex engine. No more confusion about what needs to be escaped.
• See matches and replacements in real time while you edit your pattern.
• Copy match and replacement code snippets of your pattern for quick use in a number of different programming languages.
• The built-in regular expression reference sheet helps you find the piece of regex syntax you need.

Website: http://krillapps.com/patterns/

Quickly create tutorials and how-to documents.

Features

• Capture images.
• Each capture becomes a step in your document.
• Add annotations and text to images.
• Add text.
• Share your document via Dropbox or Clarify-it.com.
• Share as a PDF.
• Copy RTF to email or word processing documents.
• Many ways to export images.

Website: http://www.clarify-it.com

Quickly create schemes. This tool has a GalleryBrowser button on the toolbar that provides access to millions of color palettes in addition to being able to create your own from scratch.

Features

• Create and save color palettes.
• Identify color harmonies.
• Access over a million pre-made color schemes.
• Pull unique palettes from photos or images.
• Build custom LiveScheme formulas.
• Transform a single color into a complete color scheme.
• Mix colors and create gradient blends.
• Find similar or related colors.
• Preview colors on a variety of layouts.
• View colors through colorblind eyes.
• Print your color schemes.

Website: http://www.colorschemer.com/osx_info.php

Quickly create beautiful color schemes. Inspired by principles of color theory. This tool also makes it really easy to copy each color to the clipboard in a number of formats, including hex color code, UIColor, CIColor, etc.

Features

• Create color schemes based on harmony rules.
• Instantly explore tints and shades for a given color to fine tune the palette.
• Automatically create color schemes from a photograph - great for inspirations.
• Organize your palettes and create a searchable collection of color schemes.
• Capture color from your screen using the built-in color picker tool.
• Export your color schemes to CSS and ASE (for use in Adobe's Creative Suite).
• Import colors from existing CSS and ASE files.
• Instantly preview your color schemes using a variety of visualizations.
• Configure color profiles.
• Switch between two color wheel modes - perceptual and uniform.

Website: http://www.eigenlogik.com/spectrum/

Work fast. Edit color palettes with a few taps of your fingers. Easily analyze, extract, adjust, and share colors.

Features

• Work fast. Edit your color palettes with a few taps of your fingers. Easily analyze, extract, adjust, and share colors.
• Color smart. Take control of colors with the intutive 3D color scope. There are powerful tools for extracting from images, adjusting with blends, making precise edits, or generating fresh ideas with randomized palettes.
• Sociable colors. View your palettes with six different preview modes. Share with colleagues, clients and friends by email, Twitter, Facebook, Evernote, DropBox, or send to your photo library.
• Works with Photoshop. Connect to Photoshop CS5 or CS6 and ColoRotate instantly updates the foreground & background colors, or sends palettes to your desktop.

Website: http://mobile.colorotate.org