How to fill a path with gradient in drawRect:? - iphone

Question

filling a path with a solid color is easy enough:
CGPoint aPoint;
for (id pointValue in points)
{
aPoint = [pointValue CGPointValue];
CGContextAddLineToPoint(context, aPoint.x, aPoint.y);
}
[[UIColor redColor] setFill];
[[UIColor blackColor] setStroke];
CGContextDrawPath(context, kCGPathFillStroke);
I'd like to draw a gradient instead of solid red, but I am having trouble.
I've tried the code listed in the Question/Answer: Gradients on UIView and UILabels On iPhone
which is:
CAGradientLayer *gradient = [CAGradientLayer layer];
[gradient setFrame:rect];
[gradient setColors:[NSArray arrayWithObjects:(id)[[UIColor blueColor] CGColor],
(id)[[UIColor whiteColor] CGColor], nil]];
[[self layer] setMasksToBounds:YES];
[[self layer] insertSublayer:gradient atIndex:0];
However, this paints the entire view that this is in with the gradient, covering up my original path.

Answer 1

I would clip to the path you want to fill, and use CGContextDrawLinearGradient. Here is a simple implementation of drawRect: as an example:
- (void) drawRect:(CGRect)rect
{
// Create a gradient from white to red
CGFloat colors [] = {
1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0,
1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0
};
CGColorSpaceRef baseSpace = CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceRGB();
CGGradientRef gradient = CGGradientCreateWithColorComponents(baseSpace, colors, NULL, 2);
CGColorSpaceRelease(baseSpace), baseSpace = NULL;
CGContextRef context = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();
CGContextSaveGState(context);
CGContextAddEllipseInRect(context, rect);
CGContextClip(context);
CGPoint startPoint = CGPointMake(CGRectGetMidX(rect), CGRectGetMinY(rect));
CGPoint endPoint = CGPointMake(CGRectGetMidX(rect), CGRectGetMaxY(rect));
CGContextDrawLinearGradient(context, gradient, startPoint, endPoint, 0);
CGGradientRelease(gradient), gradient = NULL;
CGContextRestoreGState(context);
CGContextAddEllipseInRect(context, rect);
CGContextDrawPath(context, kCGPathStroke);
}