I disagree. There are tools out there that can code for console, desktop, web, and mobile applications and for Mac, Windows, and Linux. Xojo is one such tool and a lot of 'occasional' and professional developers use it. It's not a tool that fits everyone's needs but it certainly fits many of them.
You are asking for a number things that are in the wheelhouse of Xojo (www.xojo.com). It creates compiled applications that run on Mac, Windows, Linux for console, desktop, and web apps (on the server), and soon iOS (in testing now). The IDE itself is the same on all three platforms and compiles apps into all three platforms regardless of host platform. So it doesn't matter if you are using Windows to create a Mac or Linux application and visa-versa. We generally develop on Mac OS X and use VMWare running various versions of Windows and Linux (and old versions of Mac OS X) to do testing.
The same IDE creates console, desktop, and web apps. There are platform differences but the framework is mostly the same between all of them. This means that creating a rich UI on a desktop app is very similar to a rich UI on a web app and so on. File handling, database I/O, sockets, email, etc are the same on all platforms too so once you learn one you pretty much know the other platforms and targets too.
Learning the language is very easy. It is a modern object oriented language that has a lot of stable and mature features. The Xojo IDE has a decent auto-complete so it is easy to figure out. The Xojo community is also very friendly and helpful and I highly recommend that you check out their forums when you have questions.
So where do I fit in all this? I've been a Xojo developer for fourteen years and a Xojo consultant, trainer for twelve, and been blogging about Xojo (then Real Studio) since 2005. My firm has done commercial projects of all types all over the world for clients from big to small. We also offer training videos for people who like to learn via video and also offer one-on-one training. Three of our four Xojo developers have spoken at developers conferences.
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I disagree. There are tools out there that can code for console, desktop, web, and mobile applications and for Mac, Windows, and Linux. Xojo is one such tool and a lot of 'occasional' and professional developers use it. It's not a tool that fits everyone's needs but it certainly fits many of them.
You are asking for a number things that are in the wheelhouse of Xojo (www.xojo.com). It creates compiled applications that run on Mac, Windows, Linux for console, desktop, and web apps (on the server), and soon iOS (in testing now). The IDE itself is the same on all three platforms and compiles apps into all three platforms regardless of host platform. So it doesn't matter if you are using Windows to create a Mac or Linux application and visa-versa. We generally develop on Mac OS X and use VMWare running various versions of Windows and Linux (and old versions of Mac OS X) to do testing. The same IDE creates console, desktop, and web apps. There are platform differences but the framework is mostly the same between all of them. This means that creating a rich UI on a desktop app is very similar to a rich UI on a web app and so on. File handling, database I/O, sockets, email, etc are the same on all platforms too so once you learn one you pretty much know the other platforms and targets too. Learning the language is very easy. It is a modern object oriented language that has a lot of stable and mature features. The Xojo IDE has a decent auto-complete so it is easy to figure out. The Xojo community is also very friendly and helpful and I highly recommend that you check out their forums when you have questions. So where do I fit in all this? I've been a Xojo developer for fourteen years and a Xojo consultant, trainer for twelve, and been blogging about Xojo (then Real Studio) since 2005. My firm has done commercial projects of all types all over the world for clients from big to small. We also offer training videos for people who like to learn via video and also offer one-on-one training. Three of our four Xojo developers have spoken at developers conferences.