How to initialize UIView from separate file in ViewController? - iphone

I've always used IB but am trying to do everything through code and I'm failing at this task.
I have a ViewController to handle User Inputs and 2 UIViews which will both be visible at the same time(each in a separate header/implementation UIView file):
1 UIView represents a custom tab bar that changes (bottom 50 px)
1 UIView represents the displayed interface (everything above the tab bar)
Each needs to exist within its own frame, initialized from the ViewController so it can control them and what they display.

Bra, UIViewControllers have only one UIView as part of their guts.
That is, "view" ... i.e. ... the actual property view, as in self.view = something or view.hidden = YES.
However you can, of course, add as many subviews as you like to that view.
This is how views are used normally. Almost every .view has subviews inside it.
UIView *bottomThing = [[UIView alloc] init];
bottomThing.frame = CGRectMake whatever
UIView *otherThing = [[UIView alloc] init];
otherThing.frame = CGRectMake whatever
[view addSubview:bottomThing];
[view addSubview:otherThing];
In the example, we added two subviews to our main "built-in" view, which you refer to as simply "view". So we added bottomView to our "view" and we added topView to our "view."
The subviews you add could be either plain old UIView, or, your own special subclass of UIView.
MySpecialView *bottomThing = [[UIView alloc] init];
bottomThing.frame = CGRectMake whatever
ExtraordinaryView *otherThing = [[UIView alloc] init];
otherThing.frame = CGRectMake whatever
[view addSubview:bottomThing];
[view addSubview:otherThing];
(I guess FTR conceivably you could subclass UIViewController to have more than one view inside it, but that's completely pointless and irrelevant to this question.)
From your UIViewController you can manipulate the subviews in any way you want.
For example [bottomThing doStuff:3.7], bottomThing.hidden=YES, etc etc.
Once again it is absolutely normal to add more subviews inside your main "view" - this is the basic way in which iPhone apps are made. There is only one ".view" - you add more views inside it as you wish. Hope It Helps.

UIView *myView = [[UIView alloc] init];
[self.view addSubview:myView];
[myView release];

Related

UIButton in Subview calling properties

It's a little bit to explain why I'd like to implement this design.
But the question I want to ask is : If I have a view and it's controller is ControllerA, and now I want to add a subview in my that view suppose View1. And that subview View1 contains a button, which I set the IBAction point to the ControllerA.
But I found that this View1 button cannot change some properties in original view's object like UIImageview.hidden.
Can't a button in subview alter things inside superview ? Or I need to set up other things to finish this task.
i guess you were try to add a button inside the UIView which is also a subview of View(UIViewController).
as you told whenever you try to access your Button property then you could not do same.
this is happening because whenevre we create anything through the XIb if we want access that UIControl or whatever then we have make Reference of that in Our Source Code.so you'll have hook up the UIButton with reference from the Xcode.
As i am doing in below Image.
I hope i got your Point. it'll be helpful to you
It's hard to understand exactly what you're saying but it sounds like you're trying to access a subview of a UIView instance outside of that UIView. If it is not a UIView subclass where you have an ivar/property reference to that subview, you can try giving it a tag and accessing it that way.
example:
UIView *topLevelView = [[UIView alloc] init];
UIView *viewA = [[UIView alloc] init];
UIView *otherView = [[UIView alloc] init];
otherView.tag = 5;
[topLevelView addSubview:viewA];
[topLevelView addSubview:otherView];
UIView *viewASubview = [[UIView alloc] init];
[viewA addSubview:viewASubview];
UIView *referenceToOtherView = [viewASubview.superview.superview viewWithTag:5];
UIView *anotherReferenceToOtherView = [topLevelView viewWithTag:5];

Bug with UIView frame property?

I am initializing a new UIViewCOntroller object.
then attempting to set its view's position of stage but I am having some trouble.
here is the code I am using
Note: this code is placed in the application main UIViewController's viewDidLoad method
UIViewController * cont = [[UIViewController alloc] init];
cont.view.backgroundColor = [UIColor redColor];
CGRect rect = CGRectMake(100, 0, 320, 480);
cont.view.frame = rect;
this code is still positioning the subview at (0,0) instead of (100,0)
However, if I introduce a decimal, such as using 320.01 (for the width value) or 480.01 (for the height value). The view would be positioned correctly.
It seems that if I use a size with an exact width:320.0 height: 480.0,
the origin will always be set to (0,0) !!!
This is a bit strange. I was hoping that someone could explain why this is happening, and possibly how it may be resolved.
Cheers ....
NSLog the value of cont.view and I think you will find it to be nil, which explains why nothing's happening. This is not the normal way to create a UIViewController -- it's not wrong to create one programmatically, but 99.99% of the time UIViewController subclasses are created with the main UIView in a .xib file. A freshly created UIViewController object has a nil "view" member, so you've got to initialize it somehow, either by loading a .xib:
MyViewController *vc = [[[MyViewController alloc] initWithNibName#"MyViewController" bundle:nil] autorelease];
or manually creating the view:
MyViewController *vc = [[[MyViewController alloc] init] autorelease];
UIView *theView = [[[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:viewframe] autorelease];
vc.view = theView;
Then you can move the view's frame to your heart's content, but moving the base view of a view controller is usually not what you want to do, you want to create sub-views and move those around.
[[UIViewController alloc]init] is wrong. The designated initializer for UIViewController is initWithNibName:(NSString *)nibName bundle:(NSBundle *)nibBundle. Even that does not necessarily initialize the view outlet to an actual UIView immediately. You need to subclass UIViewController and perform your customisations in the viewDidLoad method of that subclass.
In the interim is likely that view is nil so you can try setting whatever properties of it you like without anything ever happening.
I think you should be able to use
-(void) loadView {
[super loadView];
//create your views programmatically here
}
in order to create your viewController programmatically and avoid the IB. Normally the IB calls this method for you when your 'view' property is nil, however if you're avoid the IB make sure to include the above method so your view property is not nil.

Does UIViewController root UIView autosize?

Previously when setting up controllers programatically I have always set the size and position of the root UIView element (i.e.)
// UIViewController -loadView
CGRect viewFrame = CGRectMake(0, 20, 320, 460);
UIView *view = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:viewFrame];
[self setView:view];
[view release];
I have just noticed (and I wonder if anyone can confirm) that if your adding the root UIView to a controller that you don't need to set the size or position as it autosizes to the space available. (i.e.)
// UIViewController -loadView
UIView *view = [[UIView alloc] init];
[self setView:view];
[view release];
I understand that subsequent UIViews (i.e. UIButton, UILabel etc.) will need to be positioned and sized, I just want to make sure I am understanding the behaviour I am currently seeing.
It does resize the frame of the view.
UIView *view1 = [[UIView alloc] init];
NSLog(#"ViewFrame before set:%#",NSStringFromCGRect(view1.frame));
[self setView:view1];
NSLog(#"ViewFrame after set:%#",NSStringFromCGRect(view1.frame));
[view1 release];
But I could not find anything in docs that justify this.
Size of the root view of any UIViewController is managed by that controller's parent instance, that may be another controller or window. It determines the size automatically. For example, if you are creating UITabBarController, it determines sizes of all its child controllers' root views. Or, if you write your own container view controller it must determine sizes of root views of its child controllers.
See "View Management" section in this topic:
UIViewController Class Reference

Wrong size of UITableView using autoresizingMask

I have a UITableView which is not being resized properly using autoresizeMask (in iPhone 3.0).
The UITableView is inside a UIViewController inside a UINavigationController inside a UITabBarController, all of which are being created programatically. The status bar is visible.
The code of the UIViewController is basically:
- (void)loadView {
UIView* rootView = [[UIView alloc] init];
self.view = rootView;
[rootView release];
}
- (void)viewDidLoad {
[super viewDidLoad];
// table = [[UITableView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 320, 480-20-49-44)];
table = [[UITableView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 320, 100)]; table.autoresizingMask = UIViewAutoresizingFlexibleHeight;
[self.view addSubview:table];
}
When created like this, the UITableView is slightly bigger than the available space. If I'm not mistaken, it's exactly 44 pixels bigger, the size of the navigation bar.
However, if I uncomment the commented line and comment the next line the size of the UITableView is exactly right. I would prefer to use autoresizingMask instead of manually calculating the size of the UITableView. What am I doing wrong?
Thank you in advance!
The problem seems to be that I wasn't setting the frame of the root view in loadView. If you define such frame, and then define the frame of the subviews in relation to that frame, then the autoresize masks will correctly resize the subviews according to how the root view was resized by the framework.
For example:
- (void)loadView {
UIView* rootView = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 320, 480)];
self.view = rootView;
[rootView release];
}
- (void)viewDidLoad {
[super viewDidLoad];
table = [[UITableView alloc] initWithFrame:self.view.frame];
table.autoresizingMask = UIViewAutoresizingFlexibleHeight;
[self.view addSubview:table];
}
Thanks to Colin Gislason who pointed me in the right direction.
The autoresizing mask will not help you with the initial size of the table view. The table view is created with the frame that you give it. The autoresizing mask defines the rules for resizing this frame relative to the parent view when the parent's frame changes.
So if I define a table that is 320x100 it will stay that size unless I change it explicitly or the parent view's frame changes.
Depending on the other views, you could do the calculation based on the other views held by the parent or by the parent's frame itself.
Create UIViewController subclass instand of UITableViewController Subclass.
insert UITableView instance.
in NIB simply drag and drop UIView
on top of that wier place the existing UITableVIew object.
set the size of the uitableview via nib or viewDidLoad method.
set the reference , dataSource and delegate via nib.
now its simply transfer the UIViewController class and the can change tableview size as you wish.

UIViewController: set self.view to my view or add my view as subview?

I have a question about UIViewController's subview, I created a UIView subclass MainView, which has the exact size of the screen, I wonder which is a better way of adding MainView, consider the following factors:
1 As MainView has same size as the whole screen, the MainView itself may have subviews, but there is no views at the save level as MainView(ie I don't need to add other subviews to self.view).
2 If I use self.view = mainView, do I put the code in loadView(as the viewDidLoad method means the view(self.view) is already loaded)? I see the loadView method is commented out by default, if I add the code to this method, what other code do I need to put together(e.g. initialize other aspects of the application)?
3 If I add mainView via [self addSubview:mainView], are there actually two off screen buffer? One for self.view, one for mainView, both has same size as the screen and one is layered on top of the other(so it wastes memory)?
Thanks a lot!
I'm not sure I completely understand what you're asking, but I'll try to answer a few of the questions you have.
First of all, if you have multiple UIViews on the screen they are all loaded into memory. You have to do -removeFromSuperview and release them to get the memory back.
You can assign your UIView as the UIViewController's view. For example:
MainView *mainView = [[MainView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(320.0, 480.0)];
self.view = mainView;
[mainView release]; //since the .view property is a retained property
in that case, you have have the view's initialization code in the -init method. Just redefine it like:
- (id)initWithFrame:(CGRect)frame
{
if (self = [super initWithFrame:frame]) {
//initializations
}
return self;
}
You must implement loadView if you did initialize your view controller with a NIB.
UIViewController takes care of sizing its "main" view appropriately. This is all you need to do:
- (void)loadView
{
UIView* mainView = [[[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectZero] autorelease];
self.view = mainView;
}
I'd solve all of this by doing it in a xib! If you create a UIView in your xib, you can then change it's class (when you select the UIView there should be a text field in the Class Identity section of the Identity inspector* - type 'MainView' here!)
Then, create your view controller by calling
myViewController = [[MainViewController alloc] initWithNibName:#"MyNibName" bundle:nil];
That should solve your problems; it's the main subview of your view controller (directly accessable from self.view) and you don't need to worry about memory usage, there's only one view :)
Sam
NB * Click tools -> Identity Inspector. I didn't know it was called this until I had to write this answer!
Yes, the first code-snippet shown above is the "standard" approach, AFAIK, when not using (evil!) NIB files -- i.e. when alloc'ing your view in-code, via loadView.
Note it seems one can also get away with the following, instead of hard-coding the screen-rect size:
UIView *myView = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:[UIScreen mainScreen].applicationFrame];
self.view = myView;
[myView release];
Note you definitely want to do the [myView release] call since, indeed, as pointed out above, self.view (for UIView) is a retained property.
Cheers, -dk
Perhaps the most important thing to do is make sure you have the following:
self.view.userInteractionEnabled = YES;
While it might not be required all of the time, it fixes the issue where self.view is unresponsive. This issue pops up occasionally.