Should I use dequeReusableCellWithIdentifier? - ios

Question

I know this question is dumb. But suddenly got stuck up with this question.
When I use dequeReusableCellWithIdentifier, the cells are reused. To be more specific, first 'n' set of cells is reused - along with their references
As the same references are reused, I can't actually store local variables to the cells. I actually need to assign them everytime in cellForRowAtIndexPath
Assume I'm using a custom complex UITableviewcell. (I know we should reduce complexity. But still...)
Some views are to be added to the cell.
Best example i could think of is an image slider.
So the number of images in the image slider differs based on the datasource. So i need to add the views in cellForRowAtIndexPath. Can't avoid it.
Since the same reference of cells are reused, I need to add these views everytime cellForRowAtIndexPath is called. I think that is a bit of heavy load.
I thought of using drawRect method, but it does not work with UITableViewAutomaticDimension
If I don't use dequeReusableCell, I will have individual referenced cells, but it will cost the memory and performance.
So what is the best solution?
Can I use dequeReusableCell and still need not rewrite its content?
Edit 1:
By mentioning dequeReusableCell, I did mention dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier - forIndexPath. I'm sorry for the confusion.
Edit 2:
I feel, I'm not so clear in my question.
Lets consider I have a array in my viewcontroller.
I'm configuring my cell in cellForRowAtIndexPath with dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier - forIndexPath
So what happens is, everytime i scroll, when the invisible rows become visible, cellForRowAtIndexPath is called.
Lets say I have a image slider with n imageviews. For each cell, this 'n' differs. So I'm forced to draw the cell's view based on its dataSource.
So everytime the tableView calls cellForRowAtIndexPath, the cell is configured again and again.
I want to avoid this to improve performance.

Answer 1

what I do in this case is the following:
I always use dequeReusableCell:, for reasons you already said
I write a cleanCell method in the custom UITableViewCell class in order to clean everything has been already set on the cell (just to make it ready for reuse)
then in the cellForRowAtIndexPath: I configure my cell as desired

Answer 2

That's what I would do: I would move the logic of adding those heavy views inside the cell's class itself. So that in cellForRowAtIndexPath I would just set an object that has to be displayed inside the cell, and cell would create all the necessary views on its own (it's a view layer, after all). So inside cellForRowAtIndexPath it would look something like this:
cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier...forIndexPath...];
cell.modelObject = myModelObject;
and that's it.
Then inside the cell class I would implement optimizations for switching between different model objects. Like, you could defer releasing the heavy views, and reuse them, when the cell is reused.
To be honest, I don't get your example with the slider, but let's suppose you have a star rating with 5 stars, which can be visible or not. There are various way to do it, but let's assume you're just adding / removing a UIImageView for each star. The way you do it now, you would have an empty cell and create / add views in cellForRow. What I'm suggesting is to have 5 UIImageViews as part of your cell, and inside the cell set their visibility based on the modelObject.rating. Something like that. I hope, it helps to illustrate my point :)
UPDATE: when your cell can have an arbitary number of images inside of it, I would probably create them inside the cell's class. So, for instance, for the first model object we need 3 image views. So we create them. But then we don't release them in prepareForReuse, we wait for the next model object to come. And if it has, say, 1 image, we release 2 image views (or we don't, so that we didn't have to recreate them later, it depends on what is more critical: performance, or memory usage), and if it needs 5, we create two more. And if it needs 3, we're all set already.

Answer 3

In your case you should use dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier(_ identifier: String, forIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) method. This method automatically decides whether the cell needs to be created or dequeued.
I need to add these views everytime cellForRowAtIndexPath is called. I think that is a bit of heavy load.
You don't need to add those views every time cellForRowAtIndexPath gets called. Those views should be already added as a cell is instantiated. In cellForRowAtIndexPath you only assign images and other values to those views.
In case if you use storyboards and prototype cells your code should look like this:
var items = [UIImage]()
func tableView(tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
let cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("ImageCell", forIndexPath: indexPath)
let item = items[indexPath.row]
let recipient = item.recipients.first
// I have given my UIImageView tag = 101 to easily access it from the view controller.
// This allows me to avoid defining a custom UITableViewCell subclass for simple cells.
if let imageView = cell.viewWithTag(101) as? UIImageView {
imageView.image = item
}
return cell
}

Answer 4

1)I think you need to use "lazy load" of cells.
http://www.theappguruz.com/blog/ios-lazy-loading-images (for example)
2) You can create a property in your viewController, and create an NSMutableDictionary property, which will store the some data by the some key,
if your model have things like "ID" of the cells or you can use indexPath.row for it, then you can load it only one time, and next time when -cellForRow will be called, you can retrieve data from your dictionary by the
[self.dataDictionary objectForKey:#"cellID"];
And with this you, solve your repeating load.
In -cellForRow you can set the check,like.
if ([self.dataDictionary objectForKey:#"cellID"]) {
cell.cellImage = [self.dataDictionary objectForKey:#"cellID"];
} else {
UIImage *img = [uiimage load_image];
cell.cellImage = img;
[self.dataDictionary setObject:img forKey:#"cellID"];
}
And so on. Its like example, the dataType's you can choose by yourself, it's example.

Answer 5

Thanks for everyone helping me out. I think the better answer was from #Eiko.
When you use reusable cells, it must be completely reusable. If you are going to change its views based on the data, you either have to use a new identifier or avoid using reusable cells.
But avoiding reusable cells, will take a load. So you should either use different identifiers for similar cells or as #FreeNickName told - you can use an intermediate configuration and alter it on your need.