Visibility between UITableCell and UIViewController - ios

Question

I don't know if this is considered to be an accepted Objective-C practice or not, so I'm open to other ideas. Here is the idea. I have a table that gets is cells from a custom UITableViewCell. Each of these cells presents an event that the user can attend. As such, I'd like for the user to be able to add them to their calendar directly from the table view.
To accomplish this, I put a button on each table cell - an "add to calendar button". What I am stuck on is how to wire an action from this button back to the UIViewController where the UITableView is a subview. The button is part of a UITableView class and doesn't have visibility to the UIViewController.
I've been trying to implement the delegate pattern suggested by Aaron below. I'm almost there, but something is still disconnected. Here is what I have:
New protocol EventDelegate.h
#protocol EventDelegate <NSObject>
- (void) addToCalendar : (NSString *) strDate;
#end
In MyTableCell.h, I have added this property:
#property (nonatomic, strong) id<EventDelegate> eventDelegate;
In MyTableCell.m, I have added this method:
- (IBAction)addToCalendar:(UIButton *)sender
{
NSLog(#"calling addToCalendar delegate %#", _dayAndTime.text);
[self.eventDelegate addToCalendar:_dayAndTime.text];
}
All is well to this point. When I click on the button that I added to the table cell, I get the output calling addToCalendar delegate Monday, January 13
Over in MyViewController.h, I changed it look like this:
#interface TrainingScheduleViewController : UIViewController <UITableViewDelegate, UITableViewDataSource, EventDelegate>
- (void) addToCalendar:(NSString *)strDate;
#end
And finally, in MyViewController.m I added the method body:
- (void) addToCalendar:(NSString *)strDate
{
NSLog(#"inside delegate");
NSLog(#"%#", strDate);
}
The part that I think might be the problem is where Aaron suggests adding this line of code:
[tableViewController setEventDelegate:self];
First, I'm not sure where to add this line. I put it in viewDidLoad. The compiler wouldn't let me type it verbatim, so the closest thing that I could find was this line:
[self.tableView setDelegate:self];
Maybe I need an additional outlet?
I have to be almost there, but I just don't see what I am still missing. Can anyone help me? Thanks!

Answer 1

Here is some example code that I pulled from my "cellForRowAtIndexPath" method. This is from a table that was built in IB and uses a prototype cell, but the idea is the same no matter how you implement. In this case, I use a tag to identify the button, then reference it when the cell is created:
- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath
{
UITableViewCell *cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:#"Cell" forIndexPath:indexPath];
UIButtonRed *actionButton = (UIButtonRed *)[cell.contentView viewWithTag:4];
[actionButton addTarget:self action:#selector(initializeReorder:) forControlEvents:UIControlEventTouchDown];
return cell;
}
The initializeReorder: method automatically receives (id)sender as a parameter. You can cast that to a table cell and inspect it to get the rest of your info:
- (void)initializeReorder:(id)sender
{
UIButtonRed *actionButton = (UIButtonRed*)sender;
UITableViewCell *cell = (UITableViewCell*)actionButton.superview.superview;
NSIndexPath* cellPath = [self.tableView indexPathForCell:cell];
...
}

Answer 2

Create a protocol for this.
I would define a protocol like this:
#protocol MyEventDelegate <NSObject>
- (void)addToCalendar:(Event*)event;
#end
And add a delegate property to both your UITableViewController class and your MyTableCell class:
#property (nonatomic, strong) id<MyEventDelegate> eventDelegate;
MyViewController should conform to this protocol and implement addToCalendar:
#interface MyViewController : UIViewController <MyEventDelegate>
When your MyViewController object sets up the UITableViewController, pass in a reference to itself:
[tableViewController setEventDelegate:self];
and when your UITableViewController creates each cell, pass it on:
[cell setEventDelegate:self.eventDelegate];
Now, when the IBAction is called in your cell, the cell can call the delegate method on MyViewController like so:
[self.eventDelegate addToCalendar:event];