Dynamic auto-layout - ios

I'm a new in the programming and I know that there are a lot of staff about auto-layout or manipulation with constraints in the internet/stackoverflow and I searched everywhere however was unable to find answer on my question, so please advise if you can.
For example here is
UI example
So I have a tableView which is top constaints to top of ViewController and textView which is top constraints to bottom of tableView. So the question is, how can I dynamically change constraints based on the size of array in TableView. If TableView is empty, so then assign textView to ViewController, if array of tableView > 0, then assign to bottom of TableView. I tried something like this
#IBOutlet weak var textViewTopConstraints: NSLayoutConstraint! {
didSet {
if array.isEmpty {
textViewTopConstraints.isActive = false
textView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: ViewController.top, constant: 8).isActive = true
} else if imageURL.count > 0 {
textViewTopConstraints.isActive = false
textView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: tableView.bottomAnchor, constant: 8).isActive = true
}
}
}
However it's only working when app is loaded and then didn't call if array is changed. So basically, I can't understand how to call function or something that will track and change my constraints based on the size of my array. If this is a duplicate, could you please guide me to the right link where I can check this information.

Change table view frame and connect constraints between textfield and table view. Link to set table view frame is :- Change UITableView height dynamically

Related

Make View visible outside TableViewCell

Is it possible to have a view inside a tableViewCell and make it visible even outside the tableView-frame?
I would need this for an animation. I tried setting clipsToBounde = false but that didn't solve the issue. The view is still cut outside the tableViewFrame.
My view inside tableViewCell:
func setupLoadingAnimation(){
successAnimation.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
successAnimation.clipsToBounds = false
self.contentView.addSubview(successAnimation)
successAnimation.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: contentView.leadingAnchor, constant: -60).isActive = true
successAnimation.centerYAnchor.constraint(equalTo: contentView.centerYAnchor).isActive = true
successAnimation.widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 160).isActive = true
successAnimation.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 160).isActive = true
successAnimation.isHidden = true
successAnimation.loopMode = .playOnce
}
You'll need to make sure all views in the hierarchy have their clipping set to false. Start with the superview of successAnimation and go up through the hierarchy, this will include the cell's contentView and the table view itself.
Another thing you'll have to look for is that views that are added to the hierarchy later will show on top of others if they are at the same level, and since a table view manages its cells it's hard to know which cells are going to overlap your animation.
To fix this you could call bringSubviewToFront() on your table view and pass the cell, I would do this right before executing the success animation.
Another alternative would be to place the table and success views in a shared parent, that way you only have to make sure that the success view is above the table view once, when you add the views.

How do I limit the size of a UIView in a storyboard designer and the runtime view overall?

I have a custom UIView that's my little component lets call it PlaceholderView.
My UITableViewCell prototype has a Label and a PlaceholderView that sits inside a UIStackView that's vertically axis.
The PlaceholderView, is supposed to call some custom code that goes to a cache to retrieve a specific view then it adds it to the SubView of the PlaceholderView.
I want this subview to take up the whole surface of the entire PlaceholderView. How do I go about doing that? I tried this but not sure if it does the job
if (view != null)
{
AddSubview(view);
view.SizeToFit();
}
Second question. These view's that I am adding, when I create them during design time, I make a new storyboard, drag and drop a ViewController then proceed to place other controls like Labels and Button's on it.
How do I restrict this ViewController's overall height so it's completely fixed size? I know I can set the simulated metrics, and I am also setting the View. Frame's size to restrict the height.
Are there better ways to make these views constrained easier?
Currently, when I am setting these fixed height values, it does cause some weird issues with overlaps if I set UITableView.RowHeigh to AutomaticDimension.
// attaches all sides of the child to its parent view
extension UIView {
func layoutToSuperview() {
guard let view = self.superview else {return}
self.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.topAnchor).isActive = true
self.rightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.rightAnchor).isActive = true
self.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor).isActive = true
self.leftAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leftAnchor).isActive = true
}
}
Usage:
Instead of view.SizeToFit() use view.layoutToSuperview()
I want this subview to take up the whole surface of the entire
PlaceholderView
You can try autolayout:
if (view != null)
{
view.TranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false;
AddSubview(view);
view.LeadingAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(this.LeadingAnchor).Active = true;
view.TopAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(this.TopAnchor).Active = true;
view.TrailingAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(this.TrailingAnchor).Active = true;
view.BottomAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(this.BottomAnchor).Active = true;
}
Are there better ways to make these views constrained easier?
The answer is also auto layout. Set a control's height constraint to claim how much space it wants to take. See this thread for more details: Using Auto Layout in UITableView for dynamic cell layouts & variable row heights.
Though it is native oc, you can see its concept.

How to set alignments right for dynamic UIStackView with inner XIB

My original ViewController consists of only one scrollView like this:
Now I also have my own xib file (CheckBoxView) which mainly consists of one button, see this screenshot:
I dynamically create some UIStackViews and add them to the ScrollView Inside these UIStackViews I add multiple instances of my xib file.
What I want to achieve is, that the StackViews are just vertically stacked. And inside the StackViews the UIViews from my xib-file should also be vertically stacked.
At the moment it looks like this:
So the xib-Views are not in the whole view. Since I am using multi-os-engine I can't provide swift/obj-c code. But here is my Java-Code:
for (ItemConfiguration config : itemInstance.getConfigurations()) {
List<DLRadioButton> radioButtons = new ArrayList<DLRadioButton>();
UIStackView configView = UIStackView.alloc().initWithFrame(new CGRect(new CGPoint(0, barHeight), new CGSize(displayWidth, displayHeight - barHeight)));
configView.setAxis(UILayoutConstraintAxis.Vertical);
configView.setDistribution(UIStackViewDistribution.EqualSpacing);
configView.setAlignment(UIStackViewAlignment.Center);
configView.setSpacing(30);
for (ConfigurationOption option : config.getOptions()) {
UIView checkBox = instantiateFromNib("CheckBoxView");
for (UIView v : checkBox.subviews()) {
if (v instanceof DLRadioButton) {
((DLRadioButton) v).setTitleForState(option.getName(), UIControlState.Normal);
//((DLRadioButton) v).setIconSquare(true);
radioButtons.add((DLRadioButton) v);
}
}
configView.addArrangedSubview(checkBox);
}
// group radiobuttons
//groupRadioButtons(radioButtons);
configView.setTranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints(false);
scrollView().addSubview(configView);
configView.centerXAnchor().constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView().centerXAnchor()).setActive(true);
configView.centerYAnchor().constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView().centerYAnchor()).setActive(true);
}
private UIView instantiateFromNib(String name) {
return (UIView) UINib.nibWithNibNameBundle(name, null).instantiateWithOwnerOptions(null, null).firstObject();
}
How do I need to set the Alignments etc. to Achieve what I want. It should look like this:
I don't know if there is a reason to not use UITableView, that i highly recommend for your case. In case it's not possible, below you can find some pieces of advice that should help.
If you use Auto Layout, you should set constraints for all views instantiated in your code. The constraints must be comprehensive for iOS to know each view's position and size.
Remove redundant constraints
configView.centerXAnchor().constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView().centerXAnchor()).setActive(true);
configView.centerYAnchor().constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView().centerYAnchor()).setActive(true);
These two constraint just doesn't make sense to me. You need the stackviews be stacked within you ScrollView, but not centered. If i understand you goal correctly, this should be removed
Set width/x-position constraints for UIStackViews
configView.setTranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints(false);
scrollView().addSubview(configView);
Right after a stack view is added to the ScrollView, you need to set up constraints for it. I'll provide my code in swift, but it looks quite similar to what your Java code is doing, so hopefully you'll be able to transpile it without difficulties:
NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
configView.leadingAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView.leadingAnchor),
configView.trailingAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView.trailingAnchor)
]);
Set height constraints for UIStackViews
StackViews doesn't change their size whenever you add arranged view in it. So you need to calculate a desired stackview size yourself and specify it explicitly via constraints. It should be enough to accommodate items and spaces between them. I suppose that all items should be of the same size, let it be 32 points, then height should be:
let stackViewHeight = items.count * 32 + stackView.space * (items.count + 1)
And make new height constraint for the stack view:
configView.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: stackViewHeight).isActive = true
Set y-position for UIStackView
This is a little bit more challenging part, but the most important for the views to work properly in a scroll view.
1) Change loop to know the index of a UIStackView
A scroll view should always be aware of height of its content, so you need to understand which stack view is the top one, and which is the bottom. In order to do that, you need to change for each loop to be written as for(;;) loop:
for (int i = 0; i < itemInstance.getConfigurations().length; i++) {
ItemConfiguration config = itemInstance.getConfigurations()[i]
...
}
I'm not aware of which type your array is, so if it doesn't have subscript functionality, just replace it with corresponding method.
2) Set top anchor for stack views
For the first stack view in the array, top anchor should be equal to the scroll view top anchor, for others it should be bottom anchor of the previous stack view + spacing between them (say, 8 points in this example):
if i == 0 {
configView.topAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView.topAnchor, constant: 8).isActive = true
} else {
let previousConfigView = itemInstance.getConfigurations()[i - 1]
configView.topAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(previousConfigView.bottomAnchor, constant: 8).isActive = true
}
3) Set bottom anchor for the last stack view
As was said - for the Scroll View to be aware of content size, we need to specify corresponding constraints:
if i == itemInstance.getConfigurations() - 1 {
configView.bottomAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(scrollView.bottomAnchor, constant: 8).isActive = true
}
Note: please be advised, that all constraints should be set on views that are already added to the scroll view.

Xamarin iOS Autolayout: Resize width and vertical scroll automatically for various devices while keeping the horizontal scroll disabled

I want to create a page which has a vertical but no horizontal scroll. It must adjust width of the content and vertical scroll automatically as per screen size.
Something similar to this:
I can not use UITableView since, my page may not have necessarily homogenous elements. It could have a combination of textfields , dropdown etc.
The previous answer was quite right, but not right at all. Indeed I tried to solve this problem using the method described before, but to make it work, I made some adjustments.
Your view's hierarchy has to be as follow :
UIScrollview :
View1
View2
View3
You don't need a container inside the UIScrollview, because apart the fact that it will be an extraview that you don't need, there is the problem that if you use this container-view you will get problem getting touch events in the views added.
So, let's make a step-by-step process:
Add scrollview to your viewController
The first step is to add the scrollview to your viewController, and we can simply do this programmatically in the following way:
UIScrollView scrollView = new UIScrollView();
scrollView.TranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false;
View.AddSubview(scrollView);
View is the main-view of the viewController you are working in (aka Self.View).
Put attention to set TranslateAutoResizionMaskIntoConstrains property of the scrollview to false, otherwise autoresizing will mess your constraints.
Add constraint (autolayout) to your scrollView
You need to ensure that you layout will adjust for every different iPhone-screen, so simply use auotlayout to pin your scrollView to the viewController main-view (is the View used in the next code sample):
scrollView.TopAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(View.TopAnchor, 0).Active = true;
scrollView.BottomAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(View.BottomAnchor, 0).Active = true;
scrollView.LeadingAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(View.LeadingAnchor, 0).Active = true;
scrollView.TrailingAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(View.TrailingAnchor, 0).Active = true;
In this way your scrollView is pinned to the bound of the main-view.
Create the view to be added
You need to create the view that you will add to the scrollView:
UIView viewToBeAdded = new UIView();
viewToBeAdded.TranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false;
viewToBeAdded.Frame = new CGRect(0, 0, UIScreen.MainScreen.Bounds.Width, 200);
We have created a new UIView that setting its frame large as the screen (UIScreen.MainScreen.Bounds.Width) so it won't scroll horizontally, and with an arbitrary height (200 in the sample).
NOTE : even in this case you have to set TranslateAutoResizingMaskProperty to false, otherwise you will get a mess.
Add the view to the scrollView
Next step is to add our new view to the scrollView as follow:
scrollView.AddSubview(view);
Nothing more.
Set constraint for the view added in relation to the scrollView
Once you have added your view you have to said which will her behavior related to the scrollView. We assume that we will add several view to the scrollView, so we have to made a distinction, to the behavior of the FIRST view, the IN-BETWEEN views, and the LAST view.
So to be clear we assume that we are adding only 3 views, so we will have the three different cases.
FIRST VIEW
The important thing is that the first view has to be pinned to the top of the scrollView, we do this as follow :
firstView.TopAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(scrollView.TopAnchor, 0).Active = true;
and then we set the others constraints:
firstView.WidthAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(firstView.Bounds.Width).Active = true;
firstView.HeightAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(firstView.Bounds.Height).Active = true;
IN-BETWEEN VIEW
The in between views (in our sample the secondView) need to be pinned to the previous view added (in our case the first view). So we do as follow:
secondView.TopAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(firstView.BottomAnchor).Active = true;
So the top of the secondView is pinned to the bottom of the firstView.
And then we add the others constraints:
secondView.WidthAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(secondView.Bounds.Width).Active = true;
secondView.HeightAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(secondView.Bounds.Height).Active = true;
LAST VIEW
The last view (in our case the third view) instead needs to be pinned to the bottom of the previousView (in our case the secondView) and to the bottom of the scrollView.
thirdView.TopAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(secondView.BottomAnchor).Active = true;
thirdView.BottomAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(scrollView.BottomAnchor).Active = true;
And the usual other constraints for width and eight:
thirdView.WidthAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(thirdView.Bounds.Width).Active = true;
thirdView.HeightAnchor.ConstraintEqualTo(thirdView.Bounds.Height).Active = true;
In this way the eight of the scrollView will adapt to the eight of the views added, due to the fact that the views inside are pinned to the top and the bottom of the scrollView.
CONCLUSIONS
If you follow these simple instruction you will get everything work. Remember to disable autoResizingMask, as this is on of the common mistake.
Hope it was helpful.
Cheers
In a custom renderer for Xamarin.Forms i've written my UITableViewController like this:
_controller = new InfoFieldItemsTableViewController();
_controller.TableView.SeparatorStyle = UITableViewCellSeparatorStyle.None;
_controller.TableView.SeparatorColor = UIColor.Clear;
_controller.TableView.AllowsSelection = false;
// http://useyourloaf.com/blog/self-sizing-table-view-cells/
_controller.TableView.RowHeight = UITableView.AutomaticDimension;
In my controller i am doing this to register all potential cell candidates:
private void RegisterCells()
{
foreach (var tuple in InfoFieldCellMapping.Map)
{
this.TableView.RegisterNibForCellReuse(tuple.Value.Item1, tuple.Value.Item2);
}
}
public override void ViewDidLoad()
{
RegisterCells();
base.ViewDidLoad();
}
I am doing this in my controller so cells resize themselves depending on how much height they need:
public override nfloat EstimatedHeight(UITableView tableView, NSIndexPath indexPath)
{
return 100;
}
Now all you need to do is create cell files from within your IDE which should be .xib files and design them in the editor using autolayout (so they can adapt to orientation changes automatically).
Within your TableViews datasource all that's left to do is mapping between your data item and it's corresponding cell similar to:
public override UICollectionViewCell GetCell(UICollectionView collectionView, NSIndexPath indexPath)
{
var dataItem = Items[indexPath.Row];
var key = ""; // use info from data item to figure out which key identifies your table cell to dequeue the correct kind of cell
var cell = collectionView.DequeueReusableCell(key, indexPath) as UICollectionViewCell;
}
That's all you need really. In my scenario i am mapping fields which may contain different controls for date entries, number entries, long texts, short texts etc etc.
I hope that helps
1.Add Leading,Trailing,Top,Bottom Constraints on scrollView to it'superview.
2.Add UIView as containerView of scrollview and add 6 Constraints from containerView to scrollview as below.
a)Leading b)trailing c)top d)bottom e)Center Horizontally.
3.Make sure top elements in container view must bind to top by adding top constraints and also bind bottom most element to bottom of container view by adding bottom constraints.And also all the items between topmost and bottommost in the container view must be vertically connected to each other so it will define the content size of container view.
it will define the actual content height for scrollview.
and finally define content size for scrollview in code.
As I mentioned here .
Refer to Step 1 and Step 2 ,set constraints on Scrollview and containerView.
I remove the margin between Scrollview and View , and I add some controls on the containerView , so it looks like as below:
Notice
Since we set the containerView's width equal to scrollview's width, the width is fixed, so we can scroll vertically not horizontally.
Height of controls and spaces between them should be set clearly, because the contentSize is auto calculated by adding them. (If contentSize is greater than the height of screen ,the scrollview can be scrolled)
I saw you set those constrains on controls , but you can't scroll down to see the controls out of screen, I think you are missing to set bottom margin on the last control(the downmost one).
Let us do a test.
1. We set the margin (between button and textfield ) to 1000 and don't set bottom margin between the textfield and containerView.
Result : can't scroll down to see the textfield out of screen.
2. Set the margin 1000 and add a bottom margin(10) between textfiled and containerView.
Result: can scroll
Demo Link

How to get resizing tableView cell with different content without deleting constraints in iOS

I have tableView cell with different content(views, labels, imageViews) in one cell. But in something cells content can be not full. How can i use resizing cells without removing and adding always constraints? Thanks.
One of possible solutions for this problem:
Add constraints for hidden state with priority 1000
Add extra constraints for resized state with lower priority (ex 750)
Save constraints that is ONLY for hidden state into IBOutlet collection
Save constraints that is ONLY for resized state into another IBOutlet collection
Code:
#IBOutlet var hiddenConstraints: [NSLayoutConstraint] = []
#IBOutlet var visibleConstraints: [NSLayoutConstraint] = []
func hide(_ hide: Bool) {
for hiddenConstraint in self.hiddenConstraints {
hiddenConstraint.isActive = hide
}
for visibleConstraint in self.visibleConstraints {
visibleConstraint.isActive = !hide
}
self.layoutIfNeeded()
}
There is faster solution:
Move content that can be hidden into container view
Set height constraint for container view
Change from code height constraint constant to 0 if hidden or to proper height if visible
Code:
#IBOutlet var heightConstraint: NSLayoutConstraint!
func hide(_ hide: Bool) {
self. heightConstraint.constant = hide ? 0 : 150 //Estimated height
self.layoutIfNeeded()
}
This is not a good approach, as it will lead to constraint crashes at runtime. So I prefer to use first one.
Also you will need to update your cell from table to move other cells up or down.
Ray Wenderlich has a fantastic tutorial on dynamic sizing of table cells that can be found here:
https://www.raywenderlich.com/129059/self-sizing-table-view-cells
TL;DR You need to make sure your cell's content is pinned on all four sides to the cell's content view, as well as setting as high priority vertical hugging, greater than or equal to height constraint on your label.

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