didEnterRegion and startRangingForBeacons not being called - ios

Question

I've been having trouble figuring out why startRangingBeaconsInRegion is never called. I know for certain the startMonitoringForRegion is called, and I tried outputting the mRegionsArray as a string and it worked. But the didEnterRegion is not being called however. And I tried walking around back and forth trying to get a signal from my beacons (ie, entering the region), but no luck. I can't wrap my head around what might be wrong, went through a lot of questions on here and none of them mirrored my issue.
I have a Beacons table view and each cell is supposed to contain information (major, minor) on each beacon. Except, these cells aren't being filled because the ranging is not happening. :( I even tried to change it so it only detects one beacon. I know the problem doesn't lie within the Beacon class I created because the loadTestData() function works...
If anyone can help, it would be much appreciated.
BeaconTableViewController.h
#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>
#import <CoreLocation/CoreLocation.h>
#interface BeaconTableViewController : UITableViewController <CLLocationManagerDelegate>
#property (strong, nonatomic) CLBeaconRegion *beaconRegion;
#property (strong, nonatomic) CLLocationManager *locationManager;
#end
BeaconTableViewController.m
#import "BeaconTableViewController.h"
#import "Beacon.h"
#import "BeaconTableViewCell.h"
#interface BeaconTableViewController () <UITableViewDataSource, UITableViewDelegate>
#property (weak, nonatomic) IBOutlet UITableView *beaconsTableView;
#property (strong, nonatomic) NSMutableArray *beacons;
#end
#implementation BeaconTableViewController
- (void)loadTestData {
self.beacons = [[NSMutableArray alloc] init];
Beacon *beacon1 = [[Beacon alloc] init];
beacon1.major = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:21311];
beacon1.minor = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:21331];
[self.beacons addObject:beacon1];
Beacon *beacon2 = [[Beacon alloc] init];
beacon2.major = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:10011];
beacon2.minor = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:10012];
[self.beacons addObject:beacon2];
Beacon *beacon3 = [[Beacon alloc] init];
beacon3.major = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:65535];
beacon3.minor = [[NSNumber alloc] initWithInt:30136];
[self.beacons addObject:beacon3];
[self.beaconsTableView beginUpdates];
NSIndexPath *newIndexPath = [NSIndexPath indexPathForRow:self.beacons.count-1 inSection:0];
[self.beaconsTableView insertRowsAtIndexPaths:#[newIndexPath]
withRowAnimation:UITableViewRowAnimationAutomatic];
[self.beaconsTableView endUpdates];
}
- (void)initRegion {
NSUUID *uuid = [[NSUUID alloc] initWithUUIDString:#"E2C56DB5-DFFB-48D2-B060-D0F5A71096E0"];
self.beaconRegion = [[CLBeaconRegion alloc] initWithProximityUUID:uuid identifier:#"AB Region"];
[self.locationManager startMonitoringForRegion:self.beaconRegion];
}
- (void) locationManager:(CLLocationManager *)manager didStartMonitoringForRegion:(CLRegion *)region {
UIAlertView *alertMonitoring = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"User Notification"
message:#"Started monitoring for region."
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:#"OK"
otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alertMonitoring show];
NSSet *mRegions = [self.locationManager monitoredRegions];
NSArray *mRegionsArray = [mRegions allObjects];
NSString *str = [mRegionsArray componentsJoinedByString:#","];
UIAlertView *alertRegion = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"User Notification"
message:str
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:#"OK"
otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alertRegion show];
}
- (void)locationManager:(CLLocationManager *)manager didRangeBeacons:(NSArray *)beacons inRegion:(CLBeaconRegion *)region {
UIAlertView *alertRanging = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"User Notification"
message:#"Started ranging."
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:#"OK"
otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alertRanging show];
CLBeacon *foundBeacon = [beacons firstObject];
Beacon *beacon;
beacon.major = foundBeacon.major;
beacon.minor = foundBeacon.minor;
UIAlertView *alertBeaconFound = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"User Notification"
message:[[[#"Major: " stringByAppendingString:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#", beacon.major]] stringByAppendingString:#", Minor: "] stringByAppendingString:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#", beacon.minor]]
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:#"OK"
otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alertBeaconFound show];
[self.beacons addObject:beacon];
[self.beaconsTableView beginUpdates];
NSIndexPath *newIndexPath = [NSIndexPath indexPathForRow:self.beacons.count-1 inSection:1];
[self.beaconsTableView insertRowsAtIndexPaths:#[newIndexPath]
withRowAnimation:UITableViewRowAnimationAutomatic];
[self.beaconsTableView endUpdates];
}
- (void)locationManager:(CLLocationManager *)manager didEnterRegion:(CLRegion *)region {
UIAlertView *alert = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"User Notification"
message:#"Did enter region."
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:#"OK"
otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alert show];
[self.locationManager startRangingBeaconsInRegion:self.beaconRegion];
}
- (void)locationManager:(CLLocationManager *)manager didExitRegion:(CLRegion *)region {
[self.locationManager stopRangingBeaconsInRegion:self.beaconRegion];
}
- (void)viewDidLoad {
[super viewDidLoad];
// [self loadTestData];
self.locationManager = [[CLLocationManager alloc] init];
self.locationManager.delegate = self;
[self initRegion];
}
- (void)didReceiveMemoryWarning {
[super didReceiveMemoryWarning];
}
#pragma mark - Table view data source
- (NSInteger)numberOfSectionsInTableView:(UITableView *)tableView {
return 1;
}
- (NSInteger)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView numberOfRowsInSection:(NSInteger)section {
return [self.beacons count];
}
- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
BeaconTableViewCell *cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:#"BeaconCell" forIndexPath:indexPath];
Beacon *beacon = [self.beacons objectAtIndex:indexPath.row];
cell.beacon = beacon;
return cell;
}

Answer 1

Under iOS 8, Apple added some new requirements to using the location manager (And iBeacons are a Location Manager function)
You have to add the keys NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription and/or NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription to your info.plist file, and then before trying to start monitoring beacons you have to check the authorization status and if it is kCLAuthorizationStatusNotDetermined, you have to make a new call, either requestAlwaysAuthorization or requestWhenInUseAuthorization
The code might look something like this:
CLAuthorizationStatus status =[CLLocationManager authorizationStatus];
if (status ==kCLAuthorizationStatusDenied)
{
NSLog(#"Location manager denied");
}
theLocManager = [[CLLocationManager alloc] init];
theLocManager.delegate = self;
if (status == kCLAuthorizationStatusNotDetermined
&& [theLocManager respondsToSelector: #selector(requestAlwaysAuthorization)])
[theLocManager requestAlwaysAuthorization];
(You have to add the check to make sure the location manage responds to the requestAlwaysAuthorization or requestWhenInUseAuthorization method, since they are only available in iOS >= 8.)
The thing I don't like about this OS change is that if you don't make the request call, your calls to start monitoring beacons fail silently.