NSNotificationCenter removing wrong observers? - ios

Question

Is there any corner case behaviors for removeObserver:name:object:? In the following block of code, my observer isn't being registered properly:
- (void)setPlayerItem:(AVPlayerItem *)playerItem {
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self
selector:#selector(playerItemDidReachEnd:)
name:nil
object:playerItem];
[playerItem addObserver:self
forKeyPath:kStatus
options:0
context:(__bridge void*)self];
[playerItem addObserver:self
forKeyPath:kPlaybackBufferEmpty
options:0
context:(__bridge void*)self]; // For adding a buffering activity indicator
id temp = playerItem_;
playerItem_ = [playerItem retain];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:self name:nil object:temp];
[temp removeObserver:self forKeyPath:kPlaybackBufferEmpty];
[temp removeObserver:self forKeyPath:kStatus];
[temp release];
}
However, if I change the order around to:
- (void)setPlayerItem:(AVPlayerItem *)playerItem {
[playerItem addObserver:self
forKeyPath:kStatus
options:0
context:(__bridge void*)self];
[playerItem addObserver:self
forKeyPath:kPlaybackBufferEmpty
options:0
context:(__bridge void*)self]; // For adding a buffering activity indicator
id temp = playerItem_;
playerItem_ = [playerItem retain];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:self name:nil object:temp];
[temp removeObserver:self forKeyPath:kPlaybackBufferEmpty];
[temp removeObserver:self forKeyPath:kStatus];
[temp release];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self
selector:#selector(playerItemDidReachEnd:)
name:nil
object:playerItem];
}
All the notifications post just fine. This leads me to believe something strange is happening when I call:
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:self name:nil object:temp];
Am I missing something really obvious here? I'm on iOS 6 with no ARC.

Answer 1

Found the answer. Turns out it has to do with passing in nil for the observer name.
Calling [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:self name:nil object:temp];
will remove self from observing any notifications posted by temp.
However, in the corner case that temp is nil, this line of code will remove self as an observer all together.

Answer 2

Name shouldn't be nil. Did you try giving your observer a name?

Answer 3

#Lee is correct that the name should not be nil but it also should not be the name of the observer. Rather it should be the name of the notification that you are registering to observe. e.g., UIDeviceOrientationDidChangeNotification.
Add the name of the notification that you want to observe in that param and also pass it as the name param when you remove observer