I’ve been saying (to myself, anyway) for several years that the main thing stopping me from learning Objective-C and NeXTStep Cocoa programming — that is to say, contemporary Mac programming — was my addiction to the refactoring support I get from Java tools like IDEA and Eclipse. Meanwhile, it’s hasn’t been hard to find Obj-C programmers dismissing any demand for automated refactoring tools as lazy whinging from weak-minded Java monkeys.

But, lo and behold, Apple’s gone and added refactoring support in Xcode 3. It’s fairly limited (where’s my Safe Delete??) so far, but it does include Fowler’s “refactoring Rubicon,” Extract Method. In fact, it extends it to “Extract Function” as well, since Obj-C supports top-level functions. (So Xcode 4 ought to have all kinds of crazy refactorings.)

So, “no refactoring tools” clearly can’t be my excuse any more for not learning Obj-C / Cocoa. Gotta think of something else. “After I learn Flex,” maybe?