Xamarin.iOS: how to determinate the statusbar height in ViewWillTransitionToSize - ios

I have have a View containing:
a MKMapView, to display some items on a map
an UITableView embedded in a UIView, to display the items in a list
The user must be able to display the map or the list, by moving a separator.
This works well, but I encounter an issue after the user rotates the screen: in this case, the list is no longer correctly displayed.
The list's position UIView is setted by specifying it's top margin constraint: the first time I know the status bar height (with UIApplication.SharedApplication.StatusBarFrame.Height).
But after the rotation, I need to recalculate this constraint. For this, I try to recalculate the constraints in ViewWillTransitionToSize().
My problem is that I don't get the expected value during the call to ViewWillTransitionToSize(): the "old" value of StatusBarFrame.Height is setted.
I also try to get the statusbar status
with UIApplication.SharedApplication.StatusBarHidden but the problem is the same.
Is there another way allowing me to get the correct statusbar height during the rotation?

I've tested the statusbar status at the wrong place:
public override void ViewWillTransitionToSize(CoreGraphics.CGSize toSize, IUIViewControllerTransitionCoordinator coordinator)
{
coordinator.AnimateAlongsideTransition((IUIViewControllerTransitionCoordinatorContext obj) => {
// Define any animations you want to perform (equivilent to willRotateToInterfaceOrientation)
// StatusBar status and height is not yet updated
}, (IUIViewControllerTransitionCoordinatorContext obj) => {
// Completition executed after transistion finishes (equivilent to didRotateFromInterfaceOrientation)
// StatusBar status and height is well updated
});
base.ViewWillTransitionToSize(toSize, coordinator);
}
If the test is dont correctly, this works fine.

Related

Change constraint when device is rotated

I'm using the following layout as a custom popup UIView in Xcode 13 (the white background is transparent):
When the screen orientation is changed to landscape mode, the constraint at the top and bottom are still 100pts. Because of that the middle part (yellow, UIView with UIStackView with UITableView,... inside) is really small and a warning shows up in console about the top (red) and bottom (blue) bar:
Unable to simultaneously satisfy constraints.
I know what this warning means. To fix it I created the following function...
private let constraintPortrait:CGFloat = 100
private let constraintLandscape:CGFloat = 10
private func fixConstraints() {
if (UIDevice.current.orientation == .landscapeLeft || UIDevice.current.orientation == .landscapeRight) && UIDevice.current.userInterfaceIdiom == .phone {
topConstraint.constant = constraintLandscape
bottomConstraint.constant = constraintLandscape
} else {
topConstraint.constant = constraintPortrait
bottomConstraint.constant = constraintPortrait
}
}
... and call it both in viewDidLoad and viewDidLayoutSubviews. This was working great but every now and then the warning still popped up, so I added prints to viewDidLoad,... and noticed that the warning is actually printed before my constraint fix is called. I renamend viewDidLayoutSubviews to viewWillLayoutSubviews (UIViewController lifecycle here) and Abracadabra!, the warning was gone.
People usually recommend to use viewDidLayoutSubviews when you want to do stuff after the device was rotated but hardly ever mention viewWillLayoutSubviews and while searching for a reason for that I found this answer, saying not to use the latter to change constraints because it might cause another autolayout pass.
Question:
What should I use instead to prevent the conflicts (without changing the fixed constraints for portrait mode!)? Is there a way to change the top and bottom constraint automatically and solely in the Interface Builder, without using any code and only when actually necessary (-> always keep the 100pts in portrait mode, even with a long table, but switch to 10pts instantly in landscape mode when there isn't enough space)?
viewWillLayoutSubviews is correct. Any layout changes you perform here, including changes of constraints, will be animated automatically in coordination with the rotation animation.
But how will you know that this call to viewWillLayoutSubviews is due to rotation? Implement this method:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uicontentcontainer/1621466-viewwilltransition
Or, on an iPhone, this method:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uicontentcontainer/1621511-willtransition
I like the former because it works on both iPad and iPhone. These are called before viewWillLayoutSubviews, so you can set an instance property to signal to yourself that the size is officially changing. You can work out what's happening by comparing the bounds size height to the bounds size width, and change the constraints accordingly.

Why does sizeThatFits() return a size that is too small?

I'm learning swift with cs193p and I have a problem with UITextView.sizeThatFits(...). It should return a recommended size for popover view to display an [int] array as a text. As you can see in Paul Hegarty's example (https://youtu.be/gjl2gc70YHM?t=1h43m17s), he gets perfectly-fit popover window without scrollbar. I'm using almost the same code that was in this lecture, but instead i've got this:
the text string equals [100], but the sizeThatFits() method is returning a size that is too small to display it nicely, even though there is plenty of free space.
It is getting a bit better after I've added some text, but still not precise and with the scrollbar:
Here is the part of the code where the size is being set:
override var preferredContentSize: CGSize {
get {
if textView != nil && presentingViewController != nil {
// I've added these outputs so I can see the exact numbers to try to understand how this works
print("presentingViewController!.view.bounds.size = \(presentingViewController!.view.bounds.size)")
print("sizeThatFits = \(textView.sizeThatFits(presentingViewController!.view.bounds.size))")
return textView.sizeThatFits(presentingViewController!.view.bounds.size)
} else { return super.preferredContentSize }
}
set { super.preferredContentSize = newValue }
}
What should I do so this will work in the same way as in the lecture?
It looks like there are 16 pt margins between the label and its parent view. You need to take that into account when returning the preferred size of the popover.
You should try both of the following:
Add 32 to the width that's returned from preferredContentSize
In Interface Builder, clear the layout constraints on your UILabel, then re-add top, bottom, leading, and trailing constraints and make sure that "Constrain to Margins" option is not enabled.
Finally, instead of overriding preferredContentSize, you can simply set the preferredContentSize when your view is ready to display, and you can ask Auto Layout to choose the best size:
override func viewDidLayoutSubviews() {
self.preferredContentSize = self.view.systemLayoutSizeFitting(UILayoutFittingCompressedSize)
}
If your layout is configured correctly, systemLayoutSizeFitting(UILayoutFittingCompressedSize) will return the smallest possible size for your view, taking into account all of the margins and sub-views.

Using animateWithDuration when a button is pressed but it has no effect (swift 2)

I'm using the following code to have a label slide onto the screen when a button is pressed, but it's having no effect.
override func viewDidLayoutSubviews() {
summaryLabel.alpha = 0
}
#IBAction func searchButton(sender: AnyObject) {
UIView.animateWithDuration(2) { () -> Void in
self.summaryLabel.center = CGPointMake(self.summaryLabel.center.x - 400, self.summaryLabel.center.y)
self.summaryLabel.alpha = 1
self.summaryLabel.center = CGPointMake(self.summaryLabel.center.x + 400, self.summaryLabel.center.y)
}
//button code continues...
I've tested what's going on by fixing the alpha at 1, but the label just stays where it is and does not move when the button is pressed. What am I missing?
A couple of things:
First of all, your two changes to the view's center cancel each other out. The animation applies the full set of changes that are inside the animation block all in one animation. If the end result is no change, then no change is applied. As Ramy says in his comment, you either need 2 animations, timed so the second one takes place after the first one has completed, or you nee to apply the first change before the animation begins. I would suggest starting with a single change, and a single animation, and get that working first.
Second problem: View controllers use auto layout by default. With auto layout, you can't animate the position of a view directly. It doesn't work reliably. Instead, you have to put a constraint on the view, connect it to an outlet, and the animate a change to the constraint's constant value by changing the constant and calling layoutIfNeeded() inside the animation block. The call to layoutIfNeeded() inside the animation block causes the view's position to be changed, and since it's inside the animation block, the change is applied with animation.

iOS 7: Keeping the displayed items in the viewing area after rotation of UICollectionView

I'm using a UICollectionView with horizontal scrolling (Layout = UICollectionViewFlowLayout). After rotation I adapt the content offset so that the same items are displayed before the rotation. On rotation the width of the items are changed, because there are always seven items on screen. My current approach does work for iOS 8, but not for iOS 7.
On iOS 7 layoutAttributesForItemAtIndexPath always returns the same X position regardless of the orientation. So it seems that some frame is not correctly adapted. The calculation of the size of the items seems to be correct, because they changes accordingly.
This is my code:
My main view controller:
public override void DidRotate (UIInterfaceOrientation fromInterfaceOrientation)
{
base.DidRotate (fromInterfaceOrientation);
myProblematicCollectionView.invalidateLayout ();
}
The method from the collection view:
public void invalidateLayout(){
Layout.InvalidateLayout ();
UICollectionViewLayoutAttributes layoutAttributesForItem = CollectionView.GetLayoutAttributesForItem (NSIndexPath.FromItemSection (0, CurrentVisibleSection));
CollectionView.SetContentOffset (new CGPoint (layoutAttributesForItem.Frame.X, 0), false);
}
The code is in C# but it shouldn't bother you. You can of corse post solutions in Objective-C or Swift.
CurrentVisibleSection is the section with the seven items. It is always up-to-date. When GetLayoutAttributesForItem or layoutAttributesForItemAtIndexPath is called, the GetSizeForItem or collectionView:layout:sizeForItemAtIndexPath: is called before the content offset is set.
Has anyone a clue why I always get the same layout attribute regardless of the orientation?
Edit:
If I use reloadData before calling layoutAttributesForItemAtIndexPath I get the correct size. Do I need this after invalidateLayout?
What I also don't get is that the collection view has the correct size (frame width is correct).

Where to update Autolayout constraints when size changes?

I have several UIViews laid out along the bottom of a containing UIView. I want these views to always be equal width, and always stretch to collectively fill the width of the containing view (like the emoji keyboard buttons at the bottom). The way I'm approaching this is to set equal widths to one of the views, then just update the width constraint of that view to be superviewWidth / numberOfViews which will cause all of the other views to update to that same value.
I am wondering where the code to change the constraint constant needs to go. It needs to be set before the keyboard appears on screen for the first time and update when rotating the device.
My first attempt at a solution was to place it in updateViewConstraints and calculate the width via containerView.frame.size.width. But this method is called twice upon load, the first time it calculates the values correctly, but the second time for some reason the containerView's width is 0.0. Another issue is that when rotating, the containerView's width is not the value that it will be after rotation, it's the current value before rotation. But I don't want to wait until after the rotation completes to update the constraint, because the buttons will be the original size then change which will be jarring to the user.
My question is: where is the most appropriate place to put this code? Is there a better way to calculate what the width will be? I can guarantee it will always be the exact same width as the screen width. And I am using Size Classes in Xcode 6, so willRotateToInterfaceOrientation and similar methods are deprecated.
On all classes that implement the UITraitEnvironment protocol the method traitCollectionDidChange will be called when the trait collection changes, like on rotation. This is the appropiate place to manually update the constraints when using the new Size Classes. You can also animate the transition with the method willTransitionToTraitCollection
Basic example:
class ViewController: UIViewController {
var constraints = [NSLayoutConstraint]()
func updateConstraintsWithTraitCollection(traitCollection: UITraitCollection) {
// Remove old constraints
view.removeConstraints(constraints)
// Create new constraints
}
override func willTransitionToTraitCollection(newCollection: UITraitCollection!,
withTransitionCoordinator coordinator: UIViewControllerTransitionCoordinator!) {
super.willTransitionToTraitCollection(newCollection, withTransitionCoordinator: coordinator)
coordinator.animateAlongsideTransition({ (context: UIViewControllerTransitionCoordinatorContext!) in
self.updateConstraintsWithTraitCollection(newCollection)
self.view.setNeedsLayout()
}, completion: nil)
}
override func traitCollectionDidChange(previousTraitCollection: UITraitCollection!) {
updateConstraintsWithTraitCollection(traitCollection)
}
}
Besides that I want to recommend Cartography, which is a nice library that helps to make auto layout more readable and enjoyable. https://github.com/robb/Cartography
There is no reason to update the width manually:
Place all the views with equal width in your view with no spacing in between each other
Add an equal width constraint to all of them
Add constraints with 0 width for spacing between sides and each other
Lower the priority of one or more of the equal width constraints just in case the width cannot be divided equally.
Then auto layout will handle everything for you.

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