(I have read other questions and answers on this topic, but most are very old and do not relate to iOS 9 or 10.)
The app design calls for the top half of the display to always contain the same content. (An image being edited by the user.)
The bottom half of the display needs a UITableView. When a UITableViewCell is tapped, the bottom section needs to transition to a new UIViewController with slide-on animation, similar to how UINavigationController push segues work.
Problem: only the bottom view needs to transition to the new view controller(s), and back again. The upper half of the view hierarchy needs to remain unaffected. For this reason, I can't place everything inside a UINavigationController, and I can't have a UINavigationBar at the top of the screen.
Question: what approach should I take in such a situation, where I need only one UIView hierarchy to transition in push-segue fashion, but not anything else? Thanks.
Edited with Solution
Solution follows, for those following along at home.
Yes, you can actually use a UINavigationController for the bottom half.
If you are using Storyboards, the easiest way to do this is to use a container view for each part of the screen which you then can embed a UIViewController in for the top part and a UINavigationController in for the bottom part. If you are doing this programmatically, just add the view controllers as child view controllers to your app's initial view controller (see this answer for more info) which is essentially what the Storyboard will do for you automatically when using a container view.
As a child view controller, the UINavigationController will act independently from the top UIViewController and should behave as expected.
I recommend the programatic approach for the following reasons:
It helps you understand the inner workings of child/parent view controllers much better which will likely save you a significant amount of debugging time down the line.
It makes adding/removing/swapping child view controllers as simple as a few lines of code. Trying to do this with Storyboards is notoriously hacky and cumbersome.
It's much easier to keep track of changes using GIT (most mid-size/larger companies actually prohibit Storyboards for this very reason)
If you want change in part of the screen you can use container view. For details refer Swift - How to link two view controllers into one container view and switch between them using segmented control?
You can use multiple view in one view controller and can give animation like push or pop to show or hide it.
Second approach is you can use Container View which will give exact effect like navigation stack.
Related
New to Swift. I've seen many tutorials on using PageViewController, but they always have the Page View taking up the whole screen.
I'm trying to implement a Page View functionality in only PART of my app, not the entire screen, so that other "static" elements (e.g. a ToolBar) can remain. Something that would look kinda like this...
https://imgur.com/9wM1vll --- (Need more rep. before embedding images)
...where swiping will cause different images to appear as seen in various PageViewController tutorials (e.g. http://www.appcoda.com/uipageviewcontroller-storyboard-tutorial/).
When I start with a Single View Application, I go to Storyboard and try to drag a "Page View Controller" from the Object Library into the ViewController frame, it just "bounces back", i.e. it won't let me add the Page View Controller.
Now, if I add the Page View Controller to the white space around the other View Controller, then this gets back to the tutorials where the PageViewController takes up the entire screen and I don't want that.
How does one achieve this?
Thanks.
Sorry if this is a dupe but I have tried & failed to find anything that answers my question directly. The closest are Implement PageViewController in TableViewController details or Adding a UIPageViewController to a subview, subview only shows edge of pageContentview, but these are not similar enough for me to comprehend, plus they're in Objective C which I've not yet learned.
When I start with a Single View Application, I go to Storyboard and try to drag a "Page View Controller" from the Object Library into the ViewController frame, it just "bounces back", i.e. it won't let me add the Page View Controller.
A page view controller is a view controller. Thus, to make its view occupy only part of the screen, you must obey the rules for view controllers in general: you need a custom parent view controller, and the page view controller must be its child view controller — and you must do the elaborate dance that this entails when you create the child and put its view into the interface.
To get the storyboard to do the dance for you, use a Container View and hook it by its embed segue to the page view controller:
(Still, in my opinion it is always better to learn to do the dance manually, in code, yourself.)
I am subclassing UIApplication to intercept and display touches in my TouchDisplay view. I would like to extend the Application, Window, Delegate or Main ViewController in order to keep my TouchDisplay view on top of all other views. As my and most other applications work, views and controllers are added and removed all the time. I figure the correct answer will be able to deal with these additions and removals and stil keep the TouchDisplay view on top.
Thanks for your help,
Joe
Here are a few approaches you could take for this:
If you're targeting iOS 5+ and iPad only, you can make a top-level view controller which has two contained view controllers. The first would be a view controller for your "TouchDisplay" view. The second would be the application's normal root view controller. (i.e. your existing main view controller; you'll need to set definesPresentationContext to YES on this view controller) Since you're writing the container view controller, you can order those two subviews however you like. There is a WWDC 2011 Talk on view controller containment that goes into great detail about this. This is the most "correct" approach IMHO, because it gives you a view controller for your TouchDisplay view, handles rotation and generally plays nice with others. (This only works on iPad, because on iPhone a new modal view always covers the full screen.)
A more straight-forward approach is to simply add your TouchView to your existing top-level UIWindow as a subview with addSubview:. Most applications don't actually remove the top-level view controller or add new top-level ones; they just present other view controllers from it. A view you add in the top-level window will stay above those. Of course, your app may not follow this rule, in which case you might try option #3 instead. This has rotation gotchas (your view will not auto-rotate when the device rotates, so you need to do this yourself.) You could also force your view back to top, say, on a 1-second timer, if you are having issues with other things covering it. This is also not as nice as option #1 because you don't get a UIViewController, just a UIView.
The most extreme approach is that you can create another UIWindow and give it a higher window level, such as UIWindowLevelAlert and put your TouchDisplay view in that. You can then make the window background transparent, and it will stay above your normal app content. There are lots of gotchas here, especially about auto-rotation and which window is the keyWindow (which is why you should use #1 or #2 instead if you can).
After some time I was able to get my app working. I have made an easy to use overlay that shows touch feedback over your existing application.
You can download the project here:
https://github.com/megaplow/FingerTracks/tree/master/FingerTracks
Happy coding,
Joe
So here is the problem I am trying to solve.
In each viewController I am trying to insert ads and the actual control elements. I finished couple of tutorial on raywenderlinch.com to understand that how people professionally put ads in their app. They used UIViews to have two views under mainview of view controller. So I completely understood that one subview hold the ads and another is holding actual app contents. if Ad is loaded take up the screen or else let other view have all available area.
After I came back to xcode I started coding the way I learned there. but when I was dropping UIView on storyboard, I saw containerView, which I think was not present when the tutorial was written.
So I am here to ask about the both approach and their pros and cons.
So basically its UIView vs ContainerView. Which way I should do, and why ?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
You use UIView when you already have a view and you do not need to have a dedicated view controller to build and handle interactions within it.
From the UIView help page:
UIView object claims a rectangular region of its enclosing superview (its parent in the view hierarchy) and is responsible for all drawing in that region ...
Simplified structure:
YourViewController ---(has)---> UIView
You use UIContainerView when you need to embed another view controller in the one that you already have. The embedded view controller is in charge of returning a view for the region that the UIViewContainer occupies. Therefore, your UIContainerView knows which view controller to use to render UIView inside the region it occupies.
From the UIContainerView help page:
Container View defines a region within a view controller's view subgraph that can include a child view controller.
Simplified structure:
YourViewController ---(has)---> SubViewController ---(has)---> UIView
That SubViewController returns a view and handles its events.
As an alternative answer, you can also consider the use case instead of the technical differences. For example: Why use a container view?
A common use for container views is to reuse (share) a view, directly in the storyboard. Previously, reusing a view required creating a separate "xib" file, and programmatically adding that view when the view controller was loaded.
The above image is from this extremely simple, easy to follow guide that walks you through how to setup a container view that is shared between 2+ view controllers.
A few other thoughts on when to use it:
A navigation bar is part of a UINavigationController, which is a container view controller. So, if you wanted to build a custom alternative, you'd probably use a container view.
A container might help anytime that you want to temporarily show a complex view on top of your current VC but can't/don't want to present another VC modally. This approach still allows you to build that temporary view in interface builder, to setup auto layout constraints for it, etc
I also found a guide explaining that there's a way to switch out different container views based on the situation, allowing your VC to have sub-sections which are very dynamic, yet without having to build those sub-sections programmatically. A picture, from that guide, exhibiting what I'm referring to:
Hopefully this helps people who are trying to figure out when a container view applies to them. If you have other example use cases, please edit/add them or leave them in the comments!
If you see in detail these container view of UIView class type. To get the insights of why we need containerView you should see below portion
In most ways, a container view controller is just like a content view controller. It manages views and content, coordinates with other objects in your app, and responds to events in the responder chain. Before designing a container controller, you should already be familiar with designing content view controllers. The design questions in “Creating Custom Content View Controllers” also apply when creating containers.
for more detail about container view goto link
But before you begin you should have an understanding of
and also you can check this tutorial for how to use container view.
Thus you can go for both the approaches.
Hope this will help you. happy coding :)
Note: I'm not talking about custom view controller transition effects which can be done by using a custom view controllers it's the iOS 5+ API.
I'm talking about transitioning to another view controller, where a view from the presently displayed view controller is animated to the view controller to be presented's view.
EXAMPLE
-you have friendsViewController which displays a list of the current users friends. Each table view cell has a profile picture and name.
-click on a cell, all other cells fade away and the name and picture animate to the top. At this point, UserProfileViewComtroller is displayed.
THEORIES
-I could easily do this by combining the two view controllers, but UserProfileViewComtroller can be launched from other parts of the app.
-if the UserProfileViewControllers view is instantiated, I could convert the coordinates using UIViews methods
I feel like there is a more appropriate/cleaner solution here which is why I'm asking the community for help :)
It seems to me that what you want is exactly about view controllers transition, since you want to do 'something' that would look to the user as if you took a view from old VC and moved it to the new VC.
Then you're in luck, as you're allowed to move a UIView from one view controller to another using [superview addSubview:view] as part of the transition you want to do.
This can be done on any iOS version, although it's easier now as in iOS 7 there's a delegate you write (see <UIViewControllerAnimatedTransitioning> reference) which has access to both VC's view hierarchies and can change them at will (move one view, fade other views) during transition period.
Also, making your new view controller during the transition transparent (or using old controller's snapshot) will help you hide the fact that VC changed.
Not so much an answer but a technique that might inspire a solution. I did an app that had need for a custom transition like this. The original app arranged itself then took a snapshot, so at the last moment the user is looking at an image. The second viewController was created, given coordinates etc, and the image, then shown immediately. It put the image into its view (subview with same bounds).
At this point the second vc has complete control, and can fade in some other content etc. the reverse was more or less as the start - the image is used, swapped, used removed to uncover the real view content.
Note that this took a bit of time to get it working with no glitches etc.
EDIT: if you are concerned in turning the whole original view into an image, then modify the technique. For instance, in the original view, fade all other content to black but the cell, then snapshot the one cell. The second view will start with an all black background, and place the cell image over top it, then go from there.
EDIT2: As mentioned in the comments, you of course push the second view with no animation, so it happens instantaneously. By setting a small image on the second vc, with an agreed upon background, you can quickly "pass the baton" so to speak and let the second controller go to work quickly and seamlessly.
I am subclassing UIApplication to intercept and display touches in my TouchDisplay view. I would like to extend the Application, Window, Delegate or Main ViewController in order to keep my TouchDisplay view on top of all other views. As my and most other applications work, views and controllers are added and removed all the time. I figure the correct answer will be able to deal with these additions and removals and stil keep the TouchDisplay view on top.
Thanks for your help,
Joe
Here are a few approaches you could take for this:
If you're targeting iOS 5+ and iPad only, you can make a top-level view controller which has two contained view controllers. The first would be a view controller for your "TouchDisplay" view. The second would be the application's normal root view controller. (i.e. your existing main view controller; you'll need to set definesPresentationContext to YES on this view controller) Since you're writing the container view controller, you can order those two subviews however you like. There is a WWDC 2011 Talk on view controller containment that goes into great detail about this. This is the most "correct" approach IMHO, because it gives you a view controller for your TouchDisplay view, handles rotation and generally plays nice with others. (This only works on iPad, because on iPhone a new modal view always covers the full screen.)
A more straight-forward approach is to simply add your TouchView to your existing top-level UIWindow as a subview with addSubview:. Most applications don't actually remove the top-level view controller or add new top-level ones; they just present other view controllers from it. A view you add in the top-level window will stay above those. Of course, your app may not follow this rule, in which case you might try option #3 instead. This has rotation gotchas (your view will not auto-rotate when the device rotates, so you need to do this yourself.) You could also force your view back to top, say, on a 1-second timer, if you are having issues with other things covering it. This is also not as nice as option #1 because you don't get a UIViewController, just a UIView.
The most extreme approach is that you can create another UIWindow and give it a higher window level, such as UIWindowLevelAlert and put your TouchDisplay view in that. You can then make the window background transparent, and it will stay above your normal app content. There are lots of gotchas here, especially about auto-rotation and which window is the keyWindow (which is why you should use #1 or #2 instead if you can).
After some time I was able to get my app working. I have made an easy to use overlay that shows touch feedback over your existing application.
You can download the project here:
https://github.com/megaplow/FingerTracks/tree/master/FingerTracks
Happy coding,
Joe