How to handle a built in AlertController / Email Prompt from appearing behind my view - swift

Question

My app contains a modal UIView that can be presented from anywhere. How this works is the present method attaches the view as a subview on the key window:
func present(_ completion: ((Bool) -> ())? = { _ in }) {
guard !isPresented else {
return
}
if !isBackgroundReady {
initializeBackground()
}
UIApplication.shared.keyWindow?.addSubview(backgroundView)
UIApplication.shared.keyWindow?.addSubview(self)
UIView.animate(withDuration: 0.3, animations: {
self.backgroundView.alpha = 0.35
self.alpha = 1.0
}, completion: { _ in
self.isPresented = true
completion?(true)
})
}
private func initializeBackground() {
backgroundView.backgroundColor = UIColor.black
backgroundView.alpha = 0.0
backgroundView.frame = CGRect(x: UIScreen.main.bounds.midX, y: UIScreen.main.bounds.midY, width: UIScreen.main.bounds.width * 1.2, height: UIScreen.main.bounds.height * 1.2)
backgroundView.center = CGPoint(x: UIScreen.main.bounds.midX, y: UIScreen.main.bounds.midY)
}
This modal contains an email link that users can click that opens up an email prompt (or an email action sheet if they long press it). This link is added by using the an NSAttributedString and it's .link attribute on a UITextView:
let supportString = NSMutableAttributedString(
string: "general.supportEmail".localized(),
attributes: [
.link: "mailto:\("general.supportEmail".localized())",
]
)
supportTextView.attributedText = supportString
However, when the email prompt or action sheet appears, it is displayed behind the modal view:
Is it possible to get the prompt/action sheet to appear above the modal view with the current way I present the modal, or will I need to add some sort of recognizer somewhere that detects when one of these views appears and temporarily dismiss the modal until my app view comes back into focus? If it's the later, how would I accomplish that?

Answer 1

The quick answer as to why this is happening is that you are presenting your custom modal view on top of the Window, which will be on top of everything, and your UIAlertController will be presented on the UIViewController presenting it (which is below your custom view).
One quick solution would be to always add your custom view as a subview on the current "top" UIViewController. You can do that with a UIViewController extension - something like this:
extension UIViewController {
static func topViewController(_ viewController: UIViewController? = nil) -> UIViewController? {
let viewController = viewController ?? UIApplication.shared.keyWindow?.rootViewController
if let navigationController = viewController as? UINavigationController, !navigationController.viewControllers.isEmpty {
return self.topViewController(navigationController.viewControllers.last)
} else if let tabBarController = viewController as? UITabBarController,
let selectedController = tabBarController.selectedViewController
{
return self.topViewController(selectedController)
} else if let presentedController = viewController?.presentedViewController {
return self.topViewController(presentedController)
}
return viewController
}
}
This extension will handle any UIViewController that is "on top", whether it's in a UINavigationController, a UITabBarController, or just presented modally, etc. Should cover all cases.
After that you can adjust your present method to take this into account:
func present(_ completion: ((Bool) -> ())? = { _ in }) {
guard !isPresented else {
return
}
if !isBackgroundReady {
initializeBackground()
}
guard let topViewController = UIViewController.topViewController() else { return }
topViewController.view.addSubview(backgroundView)
topViewController.view.addSubview(self)
UIView.animate(withDuration: 0.3, animations: {
self.backgroundView.alpha = 0.35
self.alpha = 1.0
}, completion: { _ in
self.isPresented = true
completion?(true)
})
}

Answer 2

Instead of adding in the window, add the modal in the navicontroller -> topviewcontroller.
Link: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uinavigationcontroller/1621849-topviewcontroller.
This might help you.