A Quick Step-by-Step Guide on Becoming an iPhone Developer

1. Buy a Mac, and one of the newer ones with an Intel-based processor, running the Leopard version of OS X. To cut down on cost, you can buy a Mac-Mini, and plug it into your existing keyboard & monitor. To further reduce costs, only buy one — and setup remote login so the rest of the team can contribute code when they need to.
2. Download the SDK & bang out a Hello World app to start getting the feel for iPhone/iPod Touch development.
3. Get “Programming in Objective C.” The cheapest place I could find is actually Chegg (so you’d be renting the book for 4 months). If you’d rather buy it you can grab it here for about $24. For a free version of a different Objective C book that you can read online, check out this.
4. Build something simple. Don’t focus on building a hit, just try to solve a simple problem that you have, or a frustration you have, or the response to one of those times you said, “Man, it would be cool if I could do x on my iPhone.”
5. Become an official iPhone developer. This costs $99 and a few minutes maneuvering through Apple’s site.
6. Buy an iPhone or iPod Touch. If you’re concerned about cash, I’d go with a Touch. If you’re concerned about money and have some generous friends, you might borrow an iPhone for testing, or just all of your friends come over so you can upload the app on their device and let them try it.
7. Code up and release your first app, no matter how small. Momentum is so key at this stage — releasing an app will give you a psychological win, and help you to stay motivated. There’s nothing worse than perfecting an app to the point of exhaustion, and then releasing it only to find out that nobody wants it.
8. Contact other developers who are building apps that are in other categories, and talk about trading impressions or cross-promoting each other’s apps in other ways.

If your app becomes a big hit, then you might be tempted to end your iPhone development career for now. If it’s not a hit or it isn’t paying the bills now, use the credibility that you have gained by launching an app to sell your coding skills to somebody else with a big idea.