I'm trying to implementing master-detail scenes where the detail scene can be tabbed to show three different scenes. The example is a list of stories and for each story, I am interested to present an introduction, author info and reviews. So the scenes are as the following:
Master scene: a list of stories
When a story is selected:
Detail - Introduction scene (about the selected story)
Detail - Author scene (about the author)
Detail - Reviews scene (a list of reviews)
I attached the storyboard that I used to kind of achieve this:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6I7Mlt7gqCBVTFZR2lsX0Q4MUk/edit?usp=sharing
I also attached the resultant scene on the iPhone simulator that showed the Detail - Author scene:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6I7Mlt7gqCBQWhLTlNwWjZ2TG8/edit?pli=1
My problem is with there are 2 navigation bars presented in the detail - author scene: The top one with Stories back button, and the bottom one with Author label and B button. I want them to be collapsed into just one navigation bar. This means that when I click on a story from the Stories scene to transition to the detail author view, there will be only one navigation bar that has the Stories back button, the Author label, and the B button.
My question is: How can I collapse these two navigation bars together? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
The problem is that you have a root navigation controller and you also have a navigation controller in each tab of the tab controller, then you show them both at the same time.
You could try a couple of things:
Hide the root nav controllers nav bar when the tab view is on display. This could be manual or by presenting modally. In either case you will need a done / back button to dismiss. The modal option could be done in the storyboard.
Add a delegate to the tab bar controller. Remove the nav controllers from each tab. When the tab changes, get the new view controller and set its navigationItem onto the root nav controllers nav bar.
Back button items are only shown when there is something to go back to. You can add left button items. You may be able to connect them to an unwind segue or you might need to add a method to each view controller which does:
[self.tabBarController.navigationController popViewControllerAnimated:YES];
I figured out one solution:
Objectives: When combining a Master-Detail scheme with the Detail part spreads to several scenes via tab bar controller using Push segue from Master to the tab bar scene, I want to: 1). retain the back button from the push segue, 2). set the navigation item on the tab bar scene to whichever detail scene that is visible, 3). set the right button on the detail scene. Another objective is to just use Storyboard to convey the GUI design and interaction flow, without getting into the code.
Problems: There were many problems with which controllers to use. (And one can play with the Xocde project that I uploaded here to see them.) One good solution is to use a navigation controller for each detail scene, which enables the bar button item to be added to the navigation bar on the detail scene (do not add a navigation bar to the detail scene yourself). Just from Storyboard, this worked fine, except that the navigation bar from the navigation scene would show up under the navigation bar from the tab bar scene, and the upper navigation bar wouldn't have the correct title or the correct button on it.
Solutions: The basic use of all the scenes as described in the original post is fine. For the programmatic changes part, create a view controller .h and .m for the detail scene. Then in the viewDidAppear method, retrieve the bar button that was added to the right side of the detail scene's navigation bar, and then assign it to the right bar button item on the tab bar scene's navigation bar.
The code snippet is as the follows - this is applicable to scenes that I described earlier:
UIBarButtonItem *detailButton = self.navigationItem.rightBarButtonItem;
self.parentViewController.parentViewController.navigationItem.rightBarButtonItem = detailButton;
On the Storyboard canvas, select the navigation scene, and make sure it's navigation bar is turned off.
One thing that I particularly liked abut this that the separation of the GUI design and flow are totally there.
Hope this helps.
Related
In the current version of Xcode a few things seems to work a bit different.
I have a little problem working with a simple navigation. This is what I do:
I have a Storyboard with two scenes.
I connect the scenes with a segue of type "Show".
(In the past I did use "Push" but that is deprecated now.)
I select the first scene and choose "Embed in Navigation Controller.
Now both scenes will get a gray bar at the top but only the first scene will also get a Navigation Item.
Only for the first scene I am able to edit a title attribute and only for the first scene I am able to add a Bar Button.
Navigation itself works fine. The title of the first scene is the text of the Back-button in the second scene.
Why has the second scene no Navigation Item?
Is it because of the segue type?
Yeah, its a bug in Xcode from version 6. If you want Navigation Item in second view controller too, then there is a hack to get it.
Change the seque type from show to push. Now Navigation Item will appear in second VC too. You can again change the seque type from push to show, the Navigation Item will still present in second VC.
IB will automatically add UINavigationItem to root view controller of your UINavigationController.
To the rest of your controllers in navigation flow you need to add UINavigationItem manually from IB Object library.
What I do is to drag a navigation item from the list of controls to the top, gray bar on the second ViewController. Then you can drag other items such as bar buttons onto it, as well as being able to edit the title.
I'm trying to create a tabbed application with navigation elements inside the tab bar, as seen in the picture below (the red bar) using Swift/XCode 6.2. Basically those three icons in the middle will direct the user to different view controllers. The other two icons would be context-based. For example, on a table view page you would see the menu icon and add new icon as seen in the image. However, clicking on a row would change the menu icon to a back icon, and the add icon to something else.
That's the general idea, but I'm having a very hard time implementing something even close to this. The first issue is that whenever I embed a view in a Tab Bar Controller, I can't move the tab bar to the top. However, when I create a custom UITabView in a View Controller, Control + Click and dragging a Tab Bar Item to another view doesn't create a segue. I haven't even begun to tackle having the navigation elements inside the bar.
I guess what I'm asking is just for a little guidance on what route to take to tackle this. I'm assuming I can't use a Tab Bar Controller or Navigation Controller because it doesn't seem like I can customize them all that much. So custom Tab Bar and Navigation Bars, and then implemnt the segues and button changes programmatically?
Thanks.
I will try to guide you from an architectural perspective (so you won't find much code below).
Using a UITabBarController
In order to achieve what you are suggesting, you are right you cannot use a UITabBarController straight away, among several reasons, the most immediate one is that they are meant to be always at the bottom and you want it in top (check Apple's docs). The good news is that probably you don't need it!
Note: If you still want to go with a UITabBarController for whatever reason, please see #Matt's answer.
Using a UINavigationController
You can use a UINavigationController to solve this task, since the UINavigationBar of a UINavigationController can be customized. There are multiple ways on how you can organize your view's hierarchy to achieve what you propose, but let me elaborate one option:
To customize a UINavigationBar's to add buttons, you just need to set its navigationItem's title view:
// Assuming viewWithTopButtons is a view containing the 3 top buttons
self.navigationItem.titleView = viewWithTopButtons
To add the burger menu functionality on a UINavigationController you can find several posts on how to do it and infinite frameworks you can use. Check this other SO Question for a more detailed answer (e.g. MMDrawerController, ECSlidingViewController to mention a couple).
About organizing your view hierarchy, it really depends on if when the user taps one of the main top buttons, it will always go to the first view controller in the new section or if you want to bring him back to the last view in the section where he was.
3.1 Switching sections displays the first view of the new section
Your app's UIWindow will have a single UINavigationController on top of the hierarchy. Then each of the 3 top buttons, when tapped, will change the root view controller of the UINavigationController.
Then, when the user changes section, the current navigation hierarchy is discarded by setting the new section view controller as the UINavigationController root view controller.
self.navigationController = [sectionFirstViewController]
3.2 Switching sections displays the last displayed view in the new section
This will require a slightly modified version of the above, where your each of your sections will have its own UINavigationController, so you can always keep a navigation hierarchy per section.
Then, when the user taps one of the top buttons to switch section, instead of changing as previously described, you will change the UIWindowroot view controller to the new section's UINavigationController.
window.rootViewController = sectionNavigationController
Using a custom implementation
Of course, the last and also very valid option would be that you implement yourself your own component to achieve your requirements. This is probably the option requiring the biggest effort in exchange of the highest customizability.
Choosing this option is definitely not recommend to less experienced developers.
I'd like to take a stab at this--I think it is possible to use a tab bar controller here.
Your topmost-level view controller will be a UITabBarController with a hidden UITabBar.
Each tab is contained in a UINavigationController.
All view controllers in the navigation controller will be a subclass of a view controller (say, SwitchableViewController).
In SwitchableViewController's viewDidLoad, you set the navigation item's title view (i.e. whatever's at the center; self.navigationItem.titleView) to be the view that holds the three center buttons. Could be a UISegmentedControl, or a custom view.
Whenever you tap on any of the buttons, you change the topmost UITabBarController's selected index to the view controller you want to show.
Issues you may encounter:
Table views inside tabs will have a scrollIndicatorOffset at the bottom even if the tab bar is hidden.
Solution: Play around with the automaticallyAdjustsScrollViewInsets of the tab bar controller, or the inner view controller. https://stackoverflow.com/a/29264073/855680
Your title view will be animated every time you push a new view controller in the navigation stack.
Solution: Take a look at creating a custom transition animation for the UINavigationController.
I am developing an app that consists of a Tab Bar Controller that points to 3 view controllers (all with tabs). In one of these tab views I've made a button and I want it to open a new view (without a tab at the bottom). This new view would need a navigation bar with a back button to return to the previous view, so I was thinking I need to create a navigation controller?
Essentially this is what I'm trying to do (I apologize for the poorly drawn diagram).
How can I get this new view (entirely independent of the tab bar controller) to display programatically? Would this require a navigation controller?
You are describing a presented view controller. Call presentViewController:animated:completion:.
I very frequently do this with a navigation bar and a Back or Done button, just as you describe. But it's not a navigation controller or navigation interface; it's just a convenient way of showing the user how to get back.
For example, this is a presented view in one of my apps. The top is a navigation bar, and the cancel button gets us back (call dismissViewController...). The rest is a scrolling view (a UICollectionView) of buttons.
[myTabBar setSelectedIndex:1]
You may have to access the tabBar like self.tabBarController so… [self.tabBarController setSelectedIndex:1];
1 is index 1 in the tabbar's stack (this is like tapping a tabBar button manually)
My iOS 5 app uses storyboarding with a UITabBarController. There are three "tabs" each displaying a view controller which has been linked using a relationship back to the UITabBarController. At the moment each view controller appears when you tap the relevant tab, as expected. However, for a more gracious transition I would like to slide the view controllers on and off screen.
By way of example, if I am currently on Tab 0 and then select Tab 1 the view controller on screen (for Tab 0) should slide off to the left-hand side of the screen, and the new view controller (for Tab 1) should slide on from the right-hand side of the screen.
I have been able to achieve this behaviour using a custom UIView as the tab bar but would like to know whether this is possible with a custom segue in storyboarding, as that would certainly save a lot of coding (and also would keep things a fair bit neater in the project)?
Thanks in advance for any assistance.
I am trying to do the same thing.
Unfortunately I think the relationship segue does not allow any customization as it just connect tab bar and the tab bar items together, and not a transition.
My guess is we have to do the transition ourselves when the view appeared.
I have an application with 5 UIViewControllers each inside a corresponding UINavigationController, all tucked inside a UITabBarController that displays 5 tabs at the bottom of the screen.
I want to display another UIViewController (inside a UINavigationController) when a dialog button is pressed.
This view should only be loaded and unloaded programatically; i.e. it should not appear in the tab bar. However, I want the tab bar to be visible always.
If I add the [UINavigationController view] to [self window] the UITabBar is covered. If I add it to any other layer, the UINavigationController adds on the compensation it has for the status bar so appears further down than expected.
A solution would be to have the 6th UINavigationController added to the UITabBar with the others, but with its tabBarItem hidden. Then I can show it and hide it using the tabBars selectedIndex property.
Accessing the tabBarItem through the UIViewController shows no obvious way of doing this.
#wisequark, I think you completely misunderstood and you have almost rewritten the architecture of my application. However I have a separate navigation controller for each view as they are mutually exclusive and there is no concept of "drilling down".
#Kendall, This is what I expect I will have to do - have the modal view appear with a hide button to bring back the normal interface. But it would be nice to keep the tab bar always visible, so I was just wondering if anyone knew of a way.
It sounds as though you have a mess on your hands. A UINavigationController is a distinct object that is very different from a UITabBarController. In general, your application should have a tab controller, one of who's tab's loads a UINavigationController which in turn loads it's views - not that both maintain management over the different views. It is also improper to refer to the display of a UIViewController as such an object doesn't have a visual representation. In the case of a UINavigationController, the navigation controller object is responsible for displaying a navigation bar and a table view (in the most common case) and for managing the display of all the views in the navigation hierarchy. It itself has no corresponding representation on screen. Similarly, a UITabBarController presents a tab bar and is responsible for the loading and unloading of the views and/or view controllers attached to the tab buttons. If we were to present this as an image, it would look something like this -
alt text http://img.skitch.com/20081112-2sqp7q4wafa34te1ga337u4k8.png
Well, it sounds like what you really want to do is present a modal view with the tab bar still visible. You could add your view as a subview of the tab bar controller's view. The tab bar's view is, oddly enough, not the tab bar itself but rather a view containing the tab bar and the selected item's view.
Alternatively, you could try calling presentModalViewController:animated: with the selected tab (i.e. [tabBarController.selectedViewController presentModalViewController:animated:]) as the receiver instead of the tab bar. I seem to recall doing this once (quite by accident) and the tab bar remained visible.
One more thought: since each of your five view controllers is a UINavigationController, you could always pushViewController:animated: onto the selected view controller, then hide the back button. Your view will just appear without animation. But you'll need to remember to pop your view controller off the stack whenever the user switches to another tab. That might take a bit more work.
The best idea I could think of would be to either push a modal navigation controller for your view (which would hide the tab bar which you do not want), or to get the tab bar controller current selected view controller (really your navigation controller for a tab) and push your new view controller on there - and then pop that view when another tab is selected with a tab bar delegate.
It seems wierd to me to push the view onto random tabs though, if the view is created from a dialog that is modal, I don't see why the view itself should not also be modal and hide tabs.