Event Report: ID-Objective Conference 2012

Last Saturday at Concordia Room Sangkuriang Hotel Bandung, over hundreds people interested in the development of IOS platform attended ID-Objective  Conference 2012 (IDOC 2012).

The event was organized by ID-ObjectiveC and DailySocial. It's sponsored by XL and supported by Dycode, Beetlebox, Firefox community, Cititrans and various media partners. This event was able to collect over a hundred participants, mostly developers. They came from various areas such as Yogyakarta, Surabaya, Denpasar, Palembang, Jakarta, Bandung and even Taiwan.

Andri Yadi, President of ID-objectiveC said in his opening presentation that the event is basically from the community and dedicated to the community as well. The event is primarily intended for developers who develop applications in Apple ecosystem, specifically for iOS. For a first-run event, it could be a proof that iOS development attracts many people.

The material provided emphasized on the technical side which is reserved for developers and focused on the development of iOS 5. The event's theme 'Getting Started with iOS Development' is intended to be an introduction or an early stage for those interested developing iOS apps.

Andri Yadi opened the ceremony with first subject, an Introduction to iOS Development. In this presentation he described the development of the  mobile industry, the presence of iPhones and how it is changing the mobile industry. With his typical presentation, Andri also described the distribution of applications on Apple's platform ecosystem including a variety of facilities and support for developers such as application development, test and distribute it to consumers, the consumer market (which is big and global).

The next speaker was Ikhsan Assaat of Beetlebox. He spoke about "Development Using Storyboard". Ikhsan explained some advantages for developing applications using Storyboard, the lean code and have the whole picture of application. In his presentation Ikhsan also gave demo and case studies to make a simple Twitter client. With the simple drag and drop, the app was completed and it could be used to tweet.

Three speakers in a row were Tata Tricipta, a founder of the Trendie.st; R. Ayu Maulidina Alexandria (Dina) from STI; and Sumandityo Noor Muhammad (Didiet) from Guava Games. Tata presented and equipped with a demo "how the web developer can make a stepping stone into iOS development". This subject was also included in the arrangement of events to facilitate web-developer participants. Then Dina presented new things in iOS 5 and performed a demo - live coding to show some functions in the iOS 5 development. Then the final presentation about "Game development in iOS 5" was done by Didiet. In his presentation Didiet explained why he chose to develop the game. The one reason is the game application is including in the top 10 most popular applications on various platforms (including iOS).

Apart from the material, IDOC 2012 event is also equipped with a sharing session presented by a number of sources, moderated by DailySocial's own Rama Mamuaya. This sharing session brought all speakers plus Aulia Masna (a DailySocial editor and Apple enthusiast) and Anton Soeharyo (a founder of Touchten). The sharing session will be discussed in another article.

Many participants who attended the event held for the first time seemed showing how big the development of existing market for Apple devices (especially for mobile - iOS). From the discussion sessions, almost all the speakers agreed that the future potential of iOS application development is very big; it’s in terms of sales increased and the challenge to develop a good application.

I also found time to chat with some participants mainly from Palembang and Taiwan. Participant from Palembang is one of the ID objectiveC community members and he was with his colleague. It's interesting to hear about the developer development even though the interest in mobile development also began to spread little by little. Some university graduates who are interested in mobile device developing for were recruited by the company in Jakarta. There are still less events associated with mobile but the development, opportunities and talent are there.

A participant from Taiwan is a web and mobile application developer who is in a group company that invests in startup. When talking with him, his enthusiasm about Indonesian market is clearly visible. This participant said that apart of seeking developer and planning to establish a development office in Jakarta, he's also interested in startup investment (in Indonesia). In addition to the materials and sharing sessions, IDOC 2012 event also had application development competition. The winners were rewarded with Apple devices sponsored by XL. The detail of the competition and event presentation materials, according to information, will be uploaded on the ID-objectiveC official site.

Although I helped this event, I didn’t participate in the event detail. However I'm very happy to see the enthusiasm of the participants who attended the event. Although there are still some lacks in the event organization, I hope this event can provide benefit and information for developers, both for exsisting iOS developer and for those who want or plan to focus into iOS development.

We look forward to having similar events in the future and the continuation of event. Hopefully it may be also available in other cities such as Yogyakarta or outside Java.

Here's a brief interview with representative of ID-Objective C and the chairman committee, Andri Yadi and Finan Akbar. See you at other events.