Creating No Empty Selections in NSCollectionView - objective-c

Question

I have set up an NSCollectionView in a cocoa application. I have subclassed the collection view's NSCollectionViewItem to send me a custom NSNotification when one of its views it selected / deselected. I register to receive a notification within my controller object when this notification is posted. Within this method I tell the view that has just been selected that it is selected and tell it to redraw, which makes it shade itself grey.
The NSCollectionViewItem Subclass:
-(void)setSelected:(BOOL)flag {
[super setSelected:flag];
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] postNotificationName:#"ASCollectionViewItemSetSelected"
object:nil
userInfo:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys:(ASListView *)self.view, #"view",
[NSNumber numberWithBool:flag], #"flag", nil]];}
The Controller Class (in the -(void)awakeFromNib Method):
//Register for selection changed notification
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] addObserver:self
selector:#selector(selectionChanged:)
name:#"ASCollectionViewItemSetSelected"
object:nil];
And the -(void)selectionChanged:(NSNotification *)notification method:
- (void)selectionChanged:(NSNotification *)notification {
// * * Must get the selected item and set its properties accordingly
//Get the flag
NSNumber *flagNumber = [notification.userInfo objectForKey:#"flag"];
BOOL flag = flagNumber.boolValue;
//Get the view
ASListView *listView = [notification.userInfo objectForKey:#"view"];
//Set the view's selected property
[listView setIsSelected:flag];
[listView setNeedsDisplay:YES];
//Log for testing
NSLog(#"SelectionChanged to: %d on view: %#", flag, listView);}
The application that contains this code requires there to be no empty selection within the collection view at any time. This is where i get my problem. I've tried checking when a view's selection is changed and reselecting it if there is no selection, and manually selecting the views using NSCollectionView's
-(void)setSelectionIndexes:(NSIndexSet *)indexes
But there is always a situation which occurs that causes there to be an empty selection in the collection view.
So I was wondering if there is an easier way to prevent an empty selection occurring in an NSCollectionView? I see no checkbox in interface builder.
Thanks in advance!
Ben
Update
I ended up just subclassing my NSCollectionView, and overriding the - (void)mouseDown:(NSEvent *)theEvent method. I only then sent the method [super mouseDown:theEvent]; if the click was in one of the subviews. Code:
- (void)mouseDown:(NSEvent *)theEvent {
NSPoint clickPoint = [self convertPoint:theEvent.locationInWindow fromView:nil];
int i = 0;
for (NSView *view in self.subviews) {
if (NSPointInRect(clickPoint, view.frame)) {
//Click is in rect
i = 1;
}
}
//The click wasnt in any of the rects
if (i != 0) {
[super mouseDown:theEvent];
}}

Answer 1

I ended up just subclassing my NSCollectionView, and overriding the - (void)mouseDown:(NSEvent *)theEvent method. I only then sent the method [super mouseDown:theEvent]; if the click was in one of the subviews. Code:
- (void)mouseDown:(NSEvent *)theEvent {
NSPoint clickPoint = [self convertPoint:theEvent.locationInWindow fromView:nil];
int i = 0;
for (NSView *view in self.subviews) {
if (NSPointInRect(clickPoint, view.frame)) {
//Click is in rect
i = 1;
}
}
//The click wasnt in any of the rects
if (i != 0) {
[super mouseDown:theEvent];
}}

Answer 2

I also wanted to avoid empty selection in my collection view.
The way I did it is also by subclassing, but I overrode -hitTest: instead of -mouseDown: to return nil in case the click wasn't on an item :
-(NSView *)hitTest:(NSPoint)aPoint {
// convert aPoint in self coordinate system
NSPoint localPoint = [self convertPoint:aPoint fromView:[self superview]];
// get the item count
NSUInteger itemCount = [[self content] count];
for(NSUInteger itemIndex = 0; itemIndex < itemCount; itemIndex += 1) {
// test the point in each item frame
NSRect itemFrame = [self frameForItemAtIndex:itemIndex];
if(NSPointInRect(localPoint, itemFrame)) {
return [[self itemAtIndex:itemIndex] view];
}
}
// not on an item
return nil;
}

Answer 3

Although I'm late to this thread, I thought I'd just chime in because I've had the same problem recently. I got around it using the following line of code:
[_collectionView setValue:#NO forKey:#"avoidsEmptySelection"];
There is one caveat: the avoidsEmptySelection property is not part of the official API although I think that it's pretty safe to assume that its the type of property that will stick around for a while.