I tried writing an Objective-C application intended for server-side deployment, but finding a Foundation library that worked was infuriating. The ones that compiled were not feature complete, and the ones that promised more were not maintained.

It really is a lot easier to write Objective-C code than C++ if you have access to all that Foundation and the associated frameworks provide, but getting it to compile for your target system is not exactly easy. Many of those components simply do not exist outside of OS X.

I'm not even concerned about GUI bindings, as I imagine those would be really awkward.

I feel ya. I've occasionally thought about server-side Obj-C, but usually dismiss it because I enjoy Python and Ruby so much. However, there are several ideas I'd like to build out for cross-platform desktop apps (for developers), and I really wish I could use Obj-C because I just flat-out enjoy programming with that language.

I've not encountered any substantial number of people who fit that description.

You just did.

Beyond that, encountering a 'substantial number' of them is irrelevant. I've not personally encountered a substantial number of people who like programming in Perl, but it is not inconceivable that such people exist.

This is why I finished my comment with this sentence:

"I'm sure there are exceptions, but not enough for GNUStep to get traction."

When we're talking about why GNUStep never took off, "substantial number" is highly relevant.

True. But that same sentiment can be communicated without trying to corral developers into two arbitrary groups. There are plenty of other reasons, in addition to the lack of a substantial number of Objective-C (not just iOS) developers. One of the reasons, I think, is a distinct lack of notability for GNUStep.

Anyway, this is a pretty silly line of disagreement. :)

But that's exactly what I've observed: nearly all ObjC developers fit into one of those two categories, and that's why roughly nobody wants to bother with GNUStep. I suppose I could have made some different point instead, but I'm generally going to make points about the stuff I've seen.

Perhaps the reason those ObjC fans of the language itself seem to be smaller in number by your metric is that there are other reasons for avoiding GNUStep--namely, that it's GNU. If you've grown up with OSX etc., then you're more likely to be BSD type person (thinking primarily from a licensing perspective here), and the FSF's push viral "software freedom" is a big turn-off.

Another excellent reason. I concur.