I have an iPhone app that I want to change into an iPad app. I do not want to make it universal. The result should be an iPad only app. The main problem I see is converting all of my .xib files. I realize that I will have to change some things around manually, but I would like as much as possible (including all of the painstakingly made connections in IB) to carry over. Also, if there are unlikely places where I need to change settings, please give me a hint to that as well. Thanks!
Xcode has a convert option. It gives you the choice between a new app or a universal one.
This will convert all your NIBs, but quite how useful that is will depend on how thorough you've been with the sizing options in Interface Builder. For me is mostly worked. A couple of minor tweaks for a couple of views and a complete rewrite for some others.
Of course you'll also have to work with view controllers that "manually" build the view.
The gotchas I found were around orientations (iPad apps should work in all four orientations) and with the screen size. There are also some oddities with the keyboard and modal views if you have any of those (there are a few kinds of modal view, and the keyboard does not always dismiss). As ever when you're making automated changes, testing is key.
The full process took me a lot longer than I was expecting.
Few thoughts for changing iPhone app to iPad app.
Xcode has the provision to change the current iPhone app to iPad app by using "Upgrade current target for iPad" menu command.
http://www.enscand.com/roller/enscand/entry/ready_for_ipad
resize all current view to the ipad size 768*1024(portrait) and then resize all the subviews respectively. the connections doesn't get lost by doing this.
Related
I have an iPhone application developed with iOS and I need to convert the application to universal so the app can appear in the iPad apps section of AppStore.
It just so simple as changing the Device section in my project to universal or I have to re develop the app, create new views, etc?
It depends strictly on your app, but generally speaking, yes, you will need to create new views.
I mean, even if you want to keep exactly the same UI, chances are that it will be more convenient to provide iPad specific versions of your xib files, or adapt the views you created programmatically. This is due to the fact that the iPad is not simply larger: it has got different ratio (3:4 vs. 2:3) and this changes things completely. You might try to play with autoresizing settings for your views and grouping views to make the same xib work as desired on both screens, but I suspect that this is not so easy except for very simple interfaces.
In any case, this is not the end of the story.
Actually, you will not want a "good" app for iPad to have the same UI as the iPhone version, since the larger screen space really screams for using different layout and organization of the information and controls.
As I said, it depends strongly on your app (with games being the strongest exception to the above rule), but in most cases, your app will greatly improve if you redesign it specifically for the iPad, rather than simply adapting it (so that it is not shown in the 1x/2x mode).
The simple answer is yes, just change the device family to Universal and you are done. But this would be pointless and you might even get rejected by Apple.
Take the time to actually create an app that takes advantage of the bigger screen. Use a split view controller and popovers or whatever is appropriate to your app.
Just making your main view bigger is a bad experience for your users.
I've seen tons of questions and answers regarding merging an iPhone and an iPad app into an universal app, but that isn't what I want to do. What I am going to do is use in app purchase to unlock an iPad interface and then display the correct interface using conditionals. If the interface is purchased, the app displays the iPad Nib, and if not, it just displays the same way as an iPhone application does (with the option to scale the app, etc). The conditionals are very simple and I have already implemented them, however the issue I run into is this: If the IAP is NOT purchased, the iPad displays the iPhone Nib, but not in the typical way. It is just in the corner with no option to scale it, rather than in the center with the black border that you usually see. Does anyone know how I can set it up so i fixes this issue? I'm a little stumped to be honest.
The Info.plist file in an iOS app contains a key, UIDeviceFamily, which lists the devices that the app natively supports. If the key's value is 1, or a array containing 1, the app natively supports iPhones and iPods Touch. If the value is 2, or a array containing 2, the app natively supports iPads.
If UIDeviceFamily says the app supports iPads, then it will run the app in native iPad mode, not in iPhone-wrapper mode.
The Info.plist file is part of your app bundle, and you can't modify files in the app bundle.
So there is no way to enable or disable the system's native-iPad support at runtime. You'll have to move your app's top-level view into a wrapper view that centers and scales its child, and use that wrapper view as the UIWindow's subview.
UIDeviceFamily in the Information Property List Key Reference
This isn't possible, unfortunately. The iPad will know that the app is iPad ready and will tell draw the screen at full size. Even if you showed iPhone xib file on the iPad, they would still be scaled to fit the full screen using the UIViewAutoresizingMask params you've set for them.
One thought would be to force the size of your UIWindow to be iPhone sized (remember to account for retina) and centered, but I'm not 100% sure how/if this would work. You may have to change each UIView frame. I'm not sure.
I've seen tons of questions and answers regarding merging an iPhone and an iPad app into an universal app, but that isn't what I want to do. What I am going to do is use in app purchase to unlock an iPad interface and then display the correct interface using conditionals. If the interface is purchased, the app displays the iPad Nib, and if not, it just displays the same way as an iPhone application does (with the option to scale the app, etc). The conditionals are very simple and I have already implemented them, however the issue I run into is this: If the IAP is NOT purchased, the iPad displays the iPhone Nib, but not in the typical way. It is just in the corner with no option to scale it, rather than in the center with the black border that you usually see. Does anyone know how I can set it up so i fixes this issue? I'm a little stumped to be honest.
The Info.plist file in an iOS app contains a key, UIDeviceFamily, which lists the devices that the app natively supports. If the key's value is 1, or a array containing 1, the app natively supports iPhones and iPods Touch. If the value is 2, or a array containing 2, the app natively supports iPads.
If UIDeviceFamily says the app supports iPads, then it will run the app in native iPad mode, not in iPhone-wrapper mode.
The Info.plist file is part of your app bundle, and you can't modify files in the app bundle.
So there is no way to enable or disable the system's native-iPad support at runtime. You'll have to move your app's top-level view into a wrapper view that centers and scales its child, and use that wrapper view as the UIWindow's subview.
UIDeviceFamily in the Information Property List Key Reference
This isn't possible, unfortunately. The iPad will know that the app is iPad ready and will tell draw the screen at full size. Even if you showed iPhone xib file on the iPad, they would still be scaled to fit the full screen using the UIViewAutoresizingMask params you've set for them.
One thought would be to force the size of your UIWindow to be iPhone sized (remember to account for retina) and centered, but I'm not 100% sure how/if this would work. You may have to change each UIView frame. I'm not sure.
I'm a newbie of iOS development and I'm confused regarding universal app.
We can use the same code, same xib file for iPhone 4(retina) and previous iPhones, but why we should write two different xibs for iPhone and iPad? What's the difference?
For iPhone and retina iPhone, we use "point" instead of pixel for the coordinate. Why we can't use the similar method for iPhone and iPad?
For some simple apps, it is possible to design your iPhone UI and reuse the same xib file for the iPad. Just select your Target in XCode and copy the Main Interface text from iPhone / iPod Deployment Info to iPad Deployment Info. If you're using a Main Storyboard, copy that too. However, the iPad does not simply scale everything up from the 320*480 / 640*960 iPhone screen to the 768*1024 / 1536*2048 iPad screen. #elgarva correctly says that this would look terrible. Instead, the iPad version makes use of your autosizing masks to resize or reposition each view.
If all of your views can be considered to be left-middle-right or top-middle-bottom, this may work. If you have anything more complicated, you'll need to design a separate iPad interface.
Duplicating your iPhone UI is not just discouraged for aesthetic reasons - iPhones often end up containing a deep and confusing navigation tree for tasks that the iPad can fit on a single screen.
The main reason, is that if you just scale the elements on the UI to fit the larger screen, it wouldn't look nice... and you don't need to do anything for it to work, it automatically does it for you if your app is iPhone only and installed on an iPad (if the user chooses to).
Having a different XIB lets you rearrange your app, and think it so that you can take advantage of the larger screen. You can probably show more information on one iPad view than on 3 different screens on the iPhone... so, your iPhone app could show basic info and expand it when the user taps on it, while your iPad version could show all the information on load, plus extra graphics that look nice but aren't needed, and wouldn't make sense on the iPhone screen.
PS: If you're starting a new app, I strongly suggest you using the storyboard if your app won't have a lot of views... it's really easy to get started and it lets you see your app flow at a glance.
The ratina display just doubles the resolution of original iPhone. If you don't provide separate graphics for retina display, then system just doubles the resolution of resources.
The points are related to physical size of screen, which is similar in old and new iPhones.
For iPads, the screen size changes. This means that its dimension in points will be different from that of iPhone.
duplicating the xib file and renaming that as filename~ipad.xib is working great for me in ios6.1
I have very simple iPhone app, which uses just UIButtons, UIlabels, UITableView. without any custom controllers and graphics. How can I convert app to universal with that UI?
First update the application target device to Universal.
Update the application target device to Universal.
Check the Info.plist for NSMainNibFile & NSMainNibFile~ipad keys.
For all other views, have two different NIB. For example FirstView.xib & FirstView~ipad.xib. iOS runtime will load the proper view based on the device.
Here is a screenshot of a sample project:
I needed to convert my iPhone App to iPad yesterday and found the easiest way to do it as long as your app is pretty simple. Mine was literally just some tableViews that were set to auto-size. In Targets / Devices just change it from 'iPhone' to 'Universal' and then build your application. This worked very nicely for me. All tableViews were perfectly formatted for the iPad and that is really all I needed.
Note that if you had any other XIB files that were not just tableViews, such as a window with text fields, all you have to do is set them each to resize properly so they stretch and stay at the top and your simple app should be pretty much all set for the iPad.
Obviously you'll need to test it and tweak anything needed but for the most part the above worked magically for me and took literally one second to convert my iPhone app to an iPad app!