Cycling through same scene on storyboard - objective-c

I have a single storyboard scene that will be displayed over and over again as the user pages through data fetched from a database. When the user hits the next button, the scene segues to itself and displays the next record.
The code may not be pretty but the end result looks right, with the navigation controller handling the animation. But now that I've got it working, I'm sure it's not the right approach - I'm using a navigation controller to pop this same scene over and over, when there's no reason for the popped scene to be held in memory (data is retrieved each time it's pushed or popped).
Curious whether anyone else has done something similar and hoping for some advice on what the best approach may be. I've thought about simulating the look of the scene being popped and pushed by animating a subview - is there a third, better option? Thanks.
UPDATE
Testing has proven that the navigation controller is handling its own memory management just fine.
The view I'm working with isn't that demanding memory-wise. If anyone with a similar query has views that are, and are concerned about exceeding memory limit - this would be a good link to check out:
Memory Consumption of UINavigationController

Related

MemoryManagement with UINavigationController

I have an "issue" with my NavigationController. Actually it seems to me, that this behavior seems to be intended.
My App uses a SplitViewController, using a TableViewController for the MasterView and a NavigationController for the DetailView.
I have 4 views, which i can switch from each to another. What I observed is that every time I use one of the NavigationController buttons to change the View the memory consumption increases by almost 1.5MB.
Using the back-button of the NavigationController the views seem to get released correctly as the used memory decreases.
I read that the views are put on a stack every time i switch them, but actually that is not what I need (At least I hope so, because at a certain degree I rely on the viewdidload-method to update the content, which I pass via NSNotification to each view. At that point it would be nice if all views could share that passed userInfo, but that's a different story...).
So what I'm looking for is a way to replace the newest ViewController on the NavigationController view stack by the one. I don't need a history of like 100 views where like 40 views always are actually the same. I only found answers about memory not getting released after using the back button. Therefore I assume the current behavior is the intended one.
what I'm looking for is a way to replace the newest ViewController on the NavigationController view stack by the one
setViewControllers:animated: lets you construct the stack however you like.
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/uikit/reference/UINavigationController_Class/Reference/Reference.html#//apple_ref/occ/instm/UINavigationController/setViewControllers:animated:

How come my uitextfield(s) keeps being disabled after model?

I made an app for my wife to track inventory. it has a couple of view controllers to enter a new item, display all items, search items, and display selected item. After switching through each view a couple of times (no particular order) all of the textfields become disabled (you cannot select them to change the value) across ALL of the view controllers. The buttons still work however. I have it setup so that when the user enters info into a particular cell, it saves it into memory so that if they switch views and then come back, the cells will get the data in the viewdidload method. Please Help!
*edit - I am using storyboard with a bunch of segues (i'm new to programming and self taught, so idk if this is the right way or not)... here is a pic of my storyboard
http://i.imgur.com/aT3PR0i.png
Ok, with a look at your storyboard, I think I see your problem. If your storyboard looks like somebody spilled spaghetti on it, it's not designed correctly. Specifically, it looks like you're going "backwards" (to controllers you've already been to) using segues -- that's not good. SEGUES ALWAYS INSTANTIATE NEW CONTROLLERS! So, if you go around in a circle a few times, you're adding more and more controllers to your project. To go backwards using segues, you need to use an unwind segue -- it's the only one that is an exception to the rule that segues always instantiate new controllers. The other ways to go backwards, without segues, are popping with navigation controllers, and dismissing modal controllers.
I can't really diagnose your immediate problem without a lot more information, but redesigning the storyboard using unwind segues would probably fix your problem.

Two view controllers (with nibs) acting on the screen at the same time

Just as a disclaimer, I am an iOS beginner, in a pretty unique position. I'm an intern learning on the job, with a hard deadline for a test app, with specific specs. So I unfortunately don't have the luxury of learning all that I should about xCode and objective C.
Anyways, I am trying to create a navigation menu similar to the iPad's slide out menu. I've looked at plenty of sample code given in response to questions like this in the past. It all works perfectly fine, but I can't understand all of what they're doing. I think this results from being fairly bewildered by view controllers and delegates. And, since I'm supposed to be writing this all by myself, I can't just build off of their existing code.
My plan for this working is to have one main view controller, containing the navigation menu in a table view. This is hidden behind a normal UIView, until a button is pressed, at which point the normal UIView slides offscreen enough to reveal the menu. Upon selection of a menu item, the normal UIView would slide back to its original position, and be replaced by the relevant UIView, controlled by its view controller. In other words, clicking on the menu item relating to "Home" would load the homeViewController.xib, controlled by the homeViewController. This would be loaded in that normal UIView subview, on top of the tableView.
I'm able to load a view in that normal UIView as a result of a button press.
homeViewController *_homeViewController = [[homeViewController alloc]initWithNibName:#"homeViewController"];
[self frontView] = _homeViewController.view;
There may be some syntax errors in that code, since its from memory. I'm not able to access the computer with my code on it at the moment, but that's the general gist. Basically, that places the home view nib on the frontView (that normal UIView that's over the table view), but its not connected to homeViewController. Or at least I think that's the issue, when I press a button, that's correctly connected between the nib and the homeViewController.h, and only set to NSLog in the .m file, the application crashes.
Any idea how to connect this nib to its viewController when displayed in this way? Or, to create the nib in IB, without the associated .h and .m files, and use the main view controller as the homeViewController as well? Or, if my logic is inherently flawed, what SHOULD I do? Something with NavigationControllers?
EDIT:
I also tried a new approach- changing homeViewController's file owner to viewController, and connecting the button on homeViewController's action to viewController. This too caused a crash upon pressing the button. I really think the issue is with having multiple view controllers acting on screen at once, or having multiple views from separate nibs, controlled by one view controller on screen at once.
I suspect that your immediate problem is that _homeViewController is being freed as soon as you leave whatever method that code is in. To fix this, create a strong property in this class that holds the _homeViewController for as long as its view is needed and allocate it to that property rather than a local variable. That way, buttons (or whatever) that are part of that view still have a valid controller object backing them.
In the long run, pushing or presenting view controllers when you need the screen to change is a much better strategy but, as I said, the immediate problem.... :)

add a subview to a not-showed uiview

I'm dealing with a weird problem: I've got a UIViewController to handle a list of items to download via inapp purchase.
When a user choses the product to buy, all the purchase flow begins. At this particular moment, I push a UILabel and a progress bar to display the current state of the download.
If, before that, a user choses to go in another part of the application (i.e. by tapping an item form the tab bar menu ), the application continues the purchasing process from there (that is reduced down to saying yes to a couple of dialog boxes and inputing the itunes store account credentials).
The process (that is attached to a background thread) runs smoothly till the end of it, but if the user comes back to the store view the UILabel and the progress bar are not show, I mean, they are initialized and running but they're not visible.
Is there a right way to behave in that circumstance?
Do I have to force the refresh of the view, or do I have to remove'em from the superView and push'em back again?
thank in advance,
hope I'd be clear enough, otherwise don't be afraid to ask, I'll be glad to
explain myself in a more deep and clear way.
-k-
Without a code it is difficult to give you the exact solution.
A possibility is that when you moved out from the original UIViewController the system did unload the view on that controller. It is possible that with this unload the progress bar and label were not destroyed (because over-retained by your view controller or not nil-ed in the viewDidUnload method) but when you entered in the view controller again the view was reloaded from scratch (typically from the nib) with new progress and labels.
So it is correct that you retained the progress bar and label (even if there are better ways to achieve the same result) but you must add them to the view controller view in the viewDidLoad method. A typical way to do this is to store a "active" progress bar in a dictionary and when the view is reloaded from the nib it must be added to it. As soon as the download finish you can remove the progress from both the dictionary and the view. There are other ways to accomplish the same result, so my suggestion is just to give you an idea.
So in order to see if my answer is correct, you must check the viewDidUnload method, add a breakpoint on it and see, once it has been triggered and when you come back to your original view, if the progress bar has disappeared or not.
Hello Holographix u havnt posted any code so it would be difficult to tell
well it seems like the object of Uilabel and progress bar are getting released the time u comes back to the view.

IOS menu/design

Relevant Data:
I'm making a simple game, using OpenglES. The game itself is done, however I would like to have a main menu as well as some other screens designed in IB. So far I have a death/score screen that is displayed with a simple modelviewcontroller.
I haven't done a ton with GUI building or much programming on the platform outside of C code (posix sockets) and some examples from some books. So I'm not sure how I would go about having lots of views- usually I just use a model view, and it's gotten me along just fine so far. However I don't think that would be the best route here.
Situation:
I have a view controller that shows my main menu- the main menu branches off to the main game, a settings screen, and a high score screen. The main game is made in opengl, and I haven't made the settings view yet, but it likely will be as well. How should I switch between the views? Presenting the main view from the app delegate is as simple as setting the root view controller = newly created view controller, should I do the same thing here? If I do that can I remove the resources from the menu view controller?
Sorry if this is an extremely simple question, I just don't quite get the process.
I'm not entirely sure what you want to do, but an easy way to show a new view controller is:
SecondViewController *aSecondViewController = [[SecondViewController alloc]
initWithNibName:#"SecondView" bundle:nil];
[self presentModalViewController:aSecondViewController animated:YES];
I hope that helps.
How should I switch between the views?
In the vast majority of cases, you should be using a UINavigationController. Your initial controller would be the main menu. When you want to go into a particular section of your application, you push a new view controller onto the stack. When you want to come back out, you pop it off the stack.
Besides navigation and presenting modally that others have mentioned, another option is to swap out views. May or may not fit your app's flow but wanted to point out another option for you to consider
Best practice for switching iPhone views?
If you are already limiting the game to iOS 5 for some other reason you should look into UIStoryboard. If you don't currently require iOS5 the "simplest" way is to use table views, but that isn't a very "gamey" UI.