How to programmatically save the content written in TextView to a text file when terminating the app? - swift

Question

I want to save the content of the text view when the user closes the app.
I used the following codes to do so, but I cannot get the up-to-date string of the textview when closing the app. So, the produced text file is blank.
How should I access to the NSTextView from AppDelegate to save its content?
ViewController.swift
import Cocoa
class ViewController: NSViewController {
static var textViewString: String = ""
#IBOutlet var textView: NSTextView!{
didSet{
ViewController.textViewString = textView.string
}
}
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
// Do any additional setup after loading the view.
// start with hidden and show after moving to the main screen
DispatchQueue.main.async {
//keep the window top
self.view.window?.level = .floating
//set up the main display as the display where window shows up
let screens = NSScreen.screens
var pos = NSPoint()
pos.x = screens[0].visibleFrame.midX
pos.y = screens[0].visibleFrame.midY
self.view.window?.setFrameOrigin(pos)
self.view.window?.zoom(self)
self.view.window?.level = .floating
//self.view.window?.backgroundColor = NSColor.white
//stop the user from moving window
self.view.window?.isMovable = false
//disable resizable mode
self.view.window?.styleMask.remove(.resizable)
self.view.window?.setIsVisible(true)
}
//set up font for the reflectionForm
textView.font = NSFont.systemFont(ofSize: 30)
}
override var representedObject: Any? {
didSet {
// Update the view, if already loaded.
}
}
func saveTextViewString(){
if let documentDirectoryFileURL = NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(FileManager.SearchPathDirectory.documentDirectory, FileManager.SearchPathDomainMask.userDomainMask, true).last {
let fileName = "savedText.txt"
let targetTextFilePath = documentDirectoryFileURL + "/" + fileName
do {
try ViewController.textViewString.write(toFile: targetTextFilePath, atomically: true, encoding: String.Encoding.utf8)
print("successfully recorded: \(ViewController.textViewString.description) at \(fileName.utf8CString)")
} catch let error as NSError {
print("failed to write: \(error)")
}
}
}
}
AppDelegate.swift
import Cocoa
#main
class AppDelegate: NSObject, NSApplicationDelegate {
func applicationDidFinishLaunching(_ aNotification: Notification) {
// Insert code here to initialize your application
}
func applicationWillTerminate(_ aNotification: Notification) {
// Insert code here to tear down your application
//save the string in the textview into a text file
ViewController().saveTextViewString()
}
func applicationSupportsSecureRestorableState(_ app: NSApplication) -> Bool {
return true
}
}

Answer 1

Thank you for the #jnpdx's comments, I was able to solve this by just declaring ViewController in the AppDelegate by stating var viewController: ViewController!
ViewController.swift
import Cocoa
class ViewController: NSViewController {
#IBOutlet var textView: NSTextView!
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
// Do any additional setup after loading the view.
// start with hidden and show after moving to the main screen
DispatchQueue.main.async {
//keep the window top
self.view.window?.level = .floating
//set up the main display as the display where window shows up
let screens = NSScreen.screens
var pos = NSPoint()
pos.x = screens[0].visibleFrame.midX
pos.y = screens[0].visibleFrame.midY
self.view.window?.setFrameOrigin(pos)
self.view.window?.zoom(self)
self.view.window?.level = .floating
//self.view.window?.backgroundColor = NSColor.white
//stop the user from moving window
self.view.window?.isMovable = false
//disable resizable mode
self.view.window?.styleMask.remove(.resizable)
self.view.window?.setIsVisible(true)
}
//set up font for the reflectionForm
textView.font = NSFont.systemFont(ofSize: 30)
}
override var representedObject: Any? {
didSet {
// Update the view, if already loaded.
}
}
func saveTextViewString(){
if let documentDirectoryFileURL = NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(FileManager.SearchPathDirectory.documentDirectory, FileManager.SearchPathDomainMask.userDomainMask, true).last {
let fileName = "savedText.txt"
let targetTextFilePath = documentDirectoryFileURL + "/" + fileName
do {
try textView.string.write(toFile: targetTextFilePath, atomically: true, encoding: String.Encoding.utf8)
print("successfully recorded: \(textView.string.description) at \(fileName.utf8CString)")
} catch let error as NSError {
print("failed to write: \(error)")
}
}
}
}
AppDelegate.swift
import Cocoa
#main
class AppDelegate: NSObject, NSApplicationDelegate {
//connect viewController with ViewController
var viewController: ViewController!
func applicationDidFinishLaunching(_ aNotification: Notification) {
// Insert code here to initialize your application
}
func applicationWillTerminate(_ aNotification: Notification) {
// Insert code here to tear down your application
//save the string in the textview into a text file
viewController.saveTextViewString()
}
func applicationSupportsSecureRestorableState(_ app: NSApplication) -> Bool {
return true
}
}