Dynamic Dimension of UITableViewCell ok, but how hide them if empty? - ios

Question

I have a UITableView with 3 prototyped cells (ex. 1st cell: image, 2nd cell: Description, 3. Links,...).
I would like to hide them if for a cell the data from the backend is empty (Ex. if there is no image, hide the first cell). In order to do that, I have override the heightForRowAtIndexPath function in this way:
override func tableView(tableView: UITableView, heightForRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) -> CGFloat {
switch (indexPath.row) {
case 0:
if event?.photo_urls.count == 0{
return 0
}
else{
return 80.0
}
case 1:
if event?.description == ""{
return 0
}
else{
return 90.0
}
default:
return 100.0
}
}
and hidden the cell by doing
override func tableView(tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
switch (indexPath.row) {
case 0:
let cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("PhotoCell", forIndexPath: indexPath) as! UITableViewCell
if event?.photo_urls.count != 0 {
// ...
}
else{
cell.hidden = true
}
return cell
case 1:
let cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("DesCell", forIndexPath: indexPath) as! UITableViewCell
if event?.description != "" {
// ...
}
else{
cell.hidden = true
}
return cell
default:
let cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("PhotoCell", forIndexPath: indexPath) as! UITableViewCell
return cell
}
}
Until here no problem, it works properly!
Now, THE PROBLEM is that I would like to make the cells dynamics according to the cell contents (ex. description height). In order to do that, I have used
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
tableView.rowHeight = UITableViewAutomaticDimension
tableView.estimatedRowHeight = 80.0
}
and if I comment the heightForRowAtIndexPath the cells are actually dynamics but I can't hide them anymore.
Do you have any suggestion on how to be able to hide the cells if they are empty and apply the automatic dimension according to their content?

Answer 1

lets say you have dynamic data and you want to show it in tableview so you need to create an array of your data to display.
class ViewController: UIViewController, UITableViewDelegate, UITableViewDataSource {
#IBOutlet
var tableView: UITableView
var items: [String] = ["We", "Heart", "nothing" ,"" ,"imageurl", "", "xyz"]
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
reloadTableAfterSorting()
self.tableView.registerClass(UITableViewCell.self, forCellReuseIdentifier: "cell")
}
func reloadTableAfterSorting(){
for var i = 0; i < self.items.count; i++
{
if self.items[i] == ""{
self.items.removeAtIndex(2)
}
}
self.tableView.reloadData()
}
func tableView(tableView: UITableView, numberOfRowsInSection section: Int) -> Int {
return self.items.count;
}
func tableView(tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
var cell:UITableViewCell = self.tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("cell") as UITableViewCell
cell.textLabel?.text = self.items[indexPath.row]
return cell
}
func tableView(tableView: UITableView, didSelectRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) {
println("You selected cell #\(indexPath.row)!")
}
}

Answer 2

For that i recommend you to sort the array before displaying it in the table view. Hiding the cell is not a good idea and its not good according to Apple recommendations. So you can do one thing except hiding the cell: remove the index from the array. In this way you can always have data to show in table and it will behave properly. So don’t try to hide the cell just pop the index from array.