Adding labels and textviews in a stack view programmatically in swift - swift

Question

How can I do to have a title, followed by a few lines of text, followed by a title again and again few lines of text constrained in the middle of a view controller programmatically?
My goal is to have bolded for the titles, and it would be nice to have the textview lines incremented also.
My idea was to create 2 labels, and 2 textviews. And adding those to a textview in this order: label1, t1, label2, t2.
But it doesn't seem to work. I try to avoid defining the same textviews and labels many times. textviews add up if I copy its definition twice but not for labels (maybe it is view related?)
I tried with UIbuttons and it worked.
This is what I tried so far:
import UIKit
class HowToSetupProIGVC: UIViewController {
deinit {print("deinit")}
let textView: UITextView = {
let textView = UITextView()
textView.backgroundColor = .blue //bkgdColor
textView.textAlignment = .left
//textView.frame = CGRect(x: 5, y: 5, width: 5, height: 5)
textView.tintColor = .black
textView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false //enable autolayout
textView.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 100).isActive = true
textView.widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 300).isActive = true
return textView
}()
let label: UILabel = {
let l = UILabel(frame:CGRect.zero)
//l.frame = CGRect(x: 5, y: 5, width: 5, height: 5)
l.backgroundColor = .green //bkgdColor
l.font = UIFont.preferredFont(forTextStyle: .headline)
l.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false //enable autolayout
l.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 22).isActive = true
l.widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 300).isActive = true
return l
}()
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
self.modalUI(arrowButton: false)
self.view.backgroundColor = bkgdColor
customStackHTSProIG ()
}
}
extension HowToSetupProIGVC {
func customStackHTSProIG () {
let label1 = label
let label2 = label
let t1 = textView
let t2 = textView
label1.text = "Title1:"
label2.text = "title2:"
t1.text = """
1. On your profile tap menu
2. Tap settings
3. Tap accounts
4. Tap set up professional account
"""
t2.text = """
1. On your profile tap "Edit profile"
2. Link your created page to your account
"""
//StackView
let stackHTS = UIStackView()
stackHTS.axis = NSLayoutConstraint.Axis.vertical
stackHTS.distribution = .fillEqually
stackHTS.alignment = .center
stackHTS.spacing = 5
stackHTS.backgroundColor = .red
//Add StackView + elements
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(label1)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(t1)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(label2)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(t2)
self.view.addSubview(stackHTS)
//Constraints StackView
stackHTS.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
stackHTS.centerYAnchor.constraint(equalTo: self.view.centerYAnchor).isActive = true
stackHTS.centerXAnchor.constraint(equalTo: self.view.centerXAnchor).isActive = true
//stackHTS.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 88).isActive = true
}
}

Answer 1

UILabel & UITextView are both UIKit classes written in Objective-C. They are reference types, NOT value types.
When you write following -
let label1 = label
let label2 = label
let t1 = textView
let t2 = textView
Both label1 & label2 are pointing to the one & same instance of UILabel. So is the case for t1 & t2 as well.
When you add them like this -
//Add StackView + elements
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(label1)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(t1)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(label2)
stackHTS.addArrangedSubview(t2)
You expect 2 labels and 2 textViews to be added to the StackView. You are adding only 1 label and 1 textView though.
You expect to see all of following -
label1.text = "Title1:"
label2.text = "title2:"
t1.text = """
1. On your profile tap menu
2. Tap settings
3. Tap accounts
4. Tap set up professional account
"""
t2.text = """
1. On your profile tap "Edit profile"
2. Link your created page to your account
"""
However you are only seeing following -
label2.text = "title2:"
t2.text = """
1. On your profile tap "Edit profile"
2. Link your created page to your account
"""
Solutions -
Create two separate instances of UITextView & UILabel like you have already done for the first two and Add these new instances to stack view as well.
Use one UILabel and remove everything else. Use NSAttributedString API to stylize your text as you want for different sections / paragraphs and assign it to UILabel.attributedText.