CLLocationManager didUpdateLocations not being called - ios

Question

I am in the process of learning iOS 8 app development with Swift. I have followed a tutorial on Treehouse that walks you through building a weather app in Swift and iOS 8.
As an improvement to the app, the author/tutor suggests using CLLocationManager to get the location of the device to feed into the weather API instead of the hard coded latitude and longitude values.
So having read various tutorial online, I have gone ahead and attempted to implement this suggested improvement.
I have placed the code responsible for getting the location coordinates inside the AppDelegate.swift file.
AppDelegate.swift Code
import UIKit
import CoreLocation
#UIApplicationMain
class AppDelegate: UIResponder, UIApplicationDelegate, CLLocationManagerDelegate {
var window: UIWindow?
var locationManager: CLLocationManager!
var errorOccured: Bool = false
var foundLocation: Bool = false
var locationStatus: NSString = "Not Started"
var location: CLLocationCoordinate2D?
var locationName: String?
func application(application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [NSObject: AnyObject]?) -> Bool {
// Override point for customization after application launch.
application.setStatusBarHidden(true, withAnimation: .None)
initializeLocationManager()
return true
}
func initializeLocationManager() {
self.locationManager = CLLocationManager()
self.locationManager.delegate = self
self.locationManager.desiredAccuracy = kCLLocationAccuracyKilometer
self.locationManager.requestAlwaysAuthorization()
self.locationManager.startUpdatingLocation()
}
func locationManager(manager: CLLocationManager!, didUpdateLocations locations: [AnyObject]!) {
println("didUpdateLocations running")
if (foundLocation == false) {
self.locationManager.stopUpdatingLocation()
foundLocation = true
var locationArray = locations as NSArray
var locationObj = locationArray.lastObject as CLLocation
var geoCoder = CLGeocoder()
geoCoder.reverseGeocodeLocation(locationObj, completionHandler: { (placemarks, error) -> Void in
var p = placemarks as NSArray
var placemark: CLPlacemark? = p.lastObject as? CLPlacemark
self.locationName = placemark?.name
})
self.location = locationObj.coordinate
}
}
func locationManager(manager: CLLocationManager!, didFailWithError error: NSError!) {
locationManager.stopUpdatingLocation()
if ((error) != nil) {
if (errorOccured == false) {
errorOccured = true
print(error)
}
}
}
// authorization status
func locationManager(manager: CLLocationManager!,
didChangeAuthorizationStatus status: CLAuthorizationStatus) {
var shouldIAllow = false
switch status {
case CLAuthorizationStatus.Restricted:
locationStatus = "Restricted Access to location"
case CLAuthorizationStatus.Denied:
locationStatus = "User denied access to location"
case CLAuthorizationStatus.NotDetermined:
locationStatus = "Status not determined"
default:
locationStatus = "Allowed to location Access"
shouldIAllow = true
}
NSNotificationCenter.defaultCenter().postNotificationName("LabelHasbeenUpdated", object: nil)
if (shouldIAllow == true) {
NSLog("Location to Allowed")
// Start location services
locationManager.startUpdatingLocation()
} else {
NSLog("Denied access: \(locationStatus)")
}
}
}
And then in my ViewController.swift file I want to obtain the location coordinates. Here is the code:
ViewController.swift Code
func getCurrentWeatherData() -> Void {
let baseURL = NSURL(string: "https://api.forecast.io/forecast/\(apiKey)/")
var forecastURL: NSURL
var locName = "London"
let appDelegate = UIApplication.sharedApplication().delegate as AppDelegate
appDelegate.foundLocation = false
if let loc = appDelegate.location {
println("Got Location!") // for debug purposes
var currentLat = loc.latitude
var currentLng = loc.longitude
forecastURL = NSURL(string: "\(currentLat),\(currentLng)", relativeToURL: baseURL)
locName = appDelegate.locationName!
} else {
println("No Location :(") // for debug purposes
var currentLat = "51.513445"
var currentLng = "-0.157828"
forecastURL = NSURL(string: "\(currentLat),\(currentLng)", relativeToURL: baseURL)
}
let sharedSession = NSURLSession.sharedSession()
let downloadTask: NSURLSessionDownloadTask = sharedSession.downloadTaskWithURL(forecastURL, completionHandler: { (location: NSURL!, response: NSURLResponse!, error: NSError!) -> Void in
var urlContents = NSString.stringWithContentsOfURL(location, encoding: NSUTF8StringEncoding, error: nil)
if (error == nil) {
let dataObject = NSData(contentsOfURL: location)
let weatherDictionary: NSDictionary = NSJSONSerialization.JSONObjectWithData(dataObject, options: nil, error: nil) as NSDictionary
let currentWeather = Current(weatherDictionary: weatherDictionary)
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), {
() -> Void in
self.locationNameLabel.text = "\(locName)"
self.temperatureLabel.text = "\(currentWeather.temperature)"
self.iconView.image = currentWeather.icon!
self.currentTimeLabel.text = "At \(currentWeather.currentTime!) it is"
self.humidityLabel.text = "\(currentWeather.humidity)"
self.percipitationLabel.text = "\(currentWeather.percipProbability)"
self.summaryLabel.text = "\(currentWeather.summary)"
// Stop refresh animation
self.refreshActivityIndicator.stopAnimating()
self.refreshActivityIndicator.hidden = true
self.refreshButton.hidden = false
})
} else {
let networkIssueController = UIAlertController(title: "Error", message: "Unable to load data. Connectivity error!", preferredStyle: .Alert)
let okButton = UIAlertAction(title: "OK", style: .Default, handler: nil)
networkIssueController.addAction(okButton)
let cancelButton = UIAlertAction(title: "Cancel", style: .Cancel, handler: nil)
networkIssueController.addAction(cancelButton)
self.presentViewController(networkIssueController, animated: true, completion: nil)
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), { () -> Void in
self.refreshActivityIndicator.stopAnimating()
self.refreshActivityIndicator.hidden = true
self.refreshButton.hidden = false
})
}
})
downloadTask.resume()
}
The above is not working. My didUpdateLocations delegate never gets called. And in the debug console/output I always get No Location :( printed out, suggesting a failure in getting the location, more specifically suggesting that the location property on my AppDelegate is nil.
Things I have done to remedy this:
In the info.plist I have added the two keys NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription and NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription
Ensured that I am connected via WiFi and not Ethernet
And countless other code tweaks, and still nothing.

Answer 1

A couple of observations:
As you point out, if you're going to call requestAlwaysAuthorization, then you must set NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription. If you called requestWhenInUseAuthorization, you'd need NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription. (The fact that you see the confirmation dialog means that you've done this correctly. I assume you are seeing whatever description you supplied in the confirmation alert.)
On your simulator, you may not see location updates like on a device. Test this on an actual device.
When I used your code, I see didUpdateLocations when I called this from a device, but not from the simulator.
Once you solve the issue of not seeing didUpdateLocations being called, there is another issue:
You are posting a notification when the authorization status changes, but not when a location is received asynchronously (i.e. later). Frankly, the latter is the more critical event from the view controller's perspective, so I would have thought that (a) you should post a notification when the location is received; and (b) the view controller should observe this notification. Right now, even if you succeed in getting didUpdateLocations to be called, the view controller won't be notified of such.
Also, your didUpdateLocations is initiating yet another asynchronous process, the geocode of the coordinate. If your view controller needs that, too, you should post a notification inside the completion block of the geocoder.
Frankly, you haven't even shown us the view controller code that adds an observer for whatever notifications that this CLLocationManagerDelegate code will invoke, but I assume you have done that.

Answer 2

Just for the record: I first put the two keys (NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription and NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription) into the test-plist instead of the application-plist..Took me some time to realize.....