How do I get text from UITextField in an UIAlertView - iphone

Question

I'm trying to add a new cell to a tableview, and pop up an alert with a UITextField to allow the user to input the title they wish to give the new cell. I have code to pop up an alert with a UITextField when the "+" button is pressed, and the code to add a new cell, however I don't know how to get the text from the UITextField to insert it into the cell's title.
This is my code to pop up the alert:
UIAlertView* alertPopUp = [[UIAlertView alloc] init];
[alertPopUp setDelegate:self];
[alertPopUp setTitle:#"Enter event title"];
[alertPopUp setMessage:#" "];
[alertPopUp addButtonWithTitle:#"Cancel"];
[alertPopUp addButtonWithTitle:#"OK"];
UITextField * eventNameField = [[UITextField alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(20.0, 45.0, 245.0, 25.0)];
[eventNameField setBackgroundColor:[UIColor whiteColor]];
[alertPopUp addSubview:eventNameField];
[alertPopUp show];
and my alertView action is:
- (void)alertView:(UIAlertView *)alertView clickedButtonAtIndex:(NSInteger)buttonIndex {
NSString *buttonTitle=[alertView buttonTitleAtIndex:buttonIndex];
if([buttonTitle isEqualToString:#"Cancel"]) {
return;
}
else if([buttonTitle isEqualToString:#"Ok"]) {
}
}
What can I do to get the text from eventNameField when "Ok" is pressed and add it to a mutablearray named eventList? Thanks!

Answer 1

Set the tag on eventNameField to something meaningful
eventNameField.tag = 1001;
Then inside of the alertViewDelegate you can get the TextField by using - [UIView viewWithTag:]
UITextField* textField = (UITextField*)[alertView viewWithTag:1001];

Answer 2

eventNameField.text should give you the value
//declare the array
NSMutableArray* eventList = [NSMutableArray array];
//set its value
[eventList addObject:eventNameField.text];

Answer 3

DHamrick probably has the better solution, but found one more that could work.
You can get all the subviews inside alertView with [alertView subviews] (returns a NSCFArray), then you just have to find the one that is of class UITextField, in your case you could get it with:
[[[alertView subviews] objectAtIndex:4] text]

Answer 4

The old answers don't take advantage of changes in UIAlertView.
In iOS 5 and beyond, there is an easier way of using UITextfield on an alert view:
UIAlertView *alertPopUp = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"Enter event title" message:#"" delegate:nil cancelButtonTitle:#"Cancel" otherButtonTitles:#"OK", nil];
alertPopUp.alertViewStyle = UIAlertViewStylePlainTextInput;
self.alertTextField = [message textFieldAtIndex:0];
self.alertTextField.keyboardType = UIKeyboardTypeAlphabet;
alertPopUp.delegate = self;
[alertPopUp show];
[self.alertTextField becomeFirstResponder];
where alertTextField was set up like this:
#propery (nonatomic, strong) UITextField *alertTextField;
Then you can access alertTextField in your delegate response:
- (void)alertView:(UIAlertView *)alertView clickedButtonAtIndex:(NSInteger)buttonIndex {
NSString *buttonTitle=[alertView buttonTitleAtIndex:buttonIndex];
if([buttonTitle isEqualToString:#"Cancel"]) {
return;
}
else if([buttonTitle isEqualToString:#"Ok"]) {
NSLog(#"your text string is %#", self.alertTextField.text);
}
}
You could also just give the alertView a unique tag, and compare tag numbers, rather than save a reference to it using #property.