The program I'm working on right now is a bit cumbersome, as it starts with a central menu, and then once the user chooses an option from it it opens their selection in a new window, when I've got a perfectly good window I can (at least apparently) repurpose to that effect. I've been reading the manual regarding views, and I understand what it's talking about regarding view hierarchy and such, but the method of swapping which view is active is confusing me. What do I need to do to have it "sweep away" the initial menu and replace it with another view containing the content the user selected?
Found a simple solution by using NSTabView to hold each of the views I'm looking for.
It sounds like you don't want to change views at all, but change the model you've loaded into the views.
The simplest way is probably to give the controller for the window a property by which the views can access another controller that owns a portion of the model (one such controller for every item in the menu). Then, you simply switch that controller.
In the setter for that property, you may need to send messages such as reloadData to some of the views, depending on what sort of views they are. Views that observe for changes using Bindings or KVO won't need this.
Related
Good evening.
I have two controllers. Call them NSViewController1 and NSViewController2. Controllers placed on one NSWindow and have some network logic. It's not very good to delete them from memory while program is running.
I would like to create button. If user click on button, single window should separate on two windows. First of new window should contain NSViewController1 and second window should contain NSViewController2. Much better if switching is animated.
What is the best way to implement described behavior? May be somebody saw an open source project with this task?
It would be best if you had a controller which controls both your window controllers, as well as both of your view controllers.
If the button is clicked, you can send a message to this controller and remove the second view from the window and add it to the other window.
And of course adjust the frame of those. I guess it's not that big of a deal.
I have a window that contains several rather complex views. Right now, I'm using a single NSWindowController to control the UI for the window and all the views. It's becoming a pretty huge class, since it's dealing with the details of each and every view.
The view behaviors are independent from one another though, so I see an opportunity to put the UI logic for each view into a separate controller.
According to the Mac App Programming Guide, this is exactly what view controllers are for:
Use view controllers to divide up the work for managing more
sophisticated window layouts. Your view controllers work together
(with the window controller) to present the window contents.
However, I can't find any documentation or examples on how this idea works in practice. Can I add multiple view controllers to the nib file in addition to the window controller?
If you add the view controllers to the nib, that's where they're going to be instantiated, and you'd add IBOutlets to the window controller (assuming that's the nib's File's Owner) in order to connect them.
In terms of memory, however, that scheme could become expensive, especially the more view controllers you have. You may want to instead consider lazily instantiating them in the window controller, (i.e., doing so only when needed), assuming this doesn't result in an objectionable lag before the view is presented for the first time.
Don't be afraid to try both approaches. One of them may be best for you.
In any case, I applaud you for your decision to factor out all that code into separate controllers. Very nice. Good luck to you in your endeavors.
I’ve been reading through several books on Mac development, but cannot find the information I’m looking for.
The books all describe how to make floating windows or panes, but never mention how to make them all in one window. A simplified example of what I’m looking to create is shown below:
Basically, there will be three windows; A selector window with radio buttons to choose which NSDocument is currently being used, a window underneath that with buttons that show different windows to the right that allow viewing and manipulation of certain data.
For a example, each NSDocument may have a color value that can be set in the window shown by clicking view A, and some text strings that can be set in the window shown by clicking view B.
So the questions are:
Is it appropriate to use a single NSDocument sub-class for each Doc #1 and Doc #2?
Which classes should I use to set up the application as shown? NSWindowController? NSWindow? NSPanel?
I’m only looking for guidance on what to read up on, so any pointers are appreciated.
EDIT:
To clarify this further, I want to have a table view where the buttons are (View A & B), and by clicking them they will cause the other window/view to change it's contents.
It's like the split view in the iPad settings application, there is a table view on the left, and when it's pressed the right side changes.
The radio buttons are there only to illustrate that I want more than one Document. I'm guessing I need more than one to handle this? Or perhaps I should place them all in a single NSDocument? Somehow that doesn't seem right.
To achieve what you want you need one window (NSWindow), one window controller and various views each with their own view controller. There are several ways you could set this up, all depending on your requirements:
You'd have at least 3 views (instances of NSView): one for the selection of the document class, one for the view selection and one for the content. Each view is controlled by a view controller (instance of NSViewController). Additionally you can opt to wrap the views in split views (NSSplitView) so your user can resize the real estate available to each view.
You have one window with a window controller. If you choose a Document based app template in Xcode, Xcode will generate a subclass of NSDocument which you can use as your window controller (or choose to use Core Data and Xcode will generate a subclass of NSPersistentDocument with all bells and whistles you need to access Core Data for document persistency).
So to come back to your questions:
1: Yes, but depending on your requirements. If Doc #1 is a completely different thing than Doc #2 than you might need to re-evaluate. For example Doc #1 might have completely different persistent requirements than #2.
2: There's no single scenario here, but one that worked for me: Take the project template for a document based app (with or without Core Data). Use the generated subclass of NSDocument (or NSPersistentDocument) as your window controller. Use NSView to implement the views in your window where each view is managed by its own controller, which is an instance of NSViewController.
I know this is an old question, but a way to do it how you want would be to use: ContainerViews and set their embed segue to be the view controllers you want.
I've been learning about when to use WindowController and when to put stuff in the Document object. Looks like Document can work fine as a Controller if you have a simple interface. I have a simple interface in my application, but is it a good practice to put IB outlets into WC anyway? What would be a scenario when you would NOT want to use a WC?
Here are some scenarios:
A document object you intend to use with multiple windows (as commenter noted above) or having different views
A document object you could potentially open and process without displaying a window at all
An application with so much controller code that it's difficult to manage with a single class
During window initialization, the the document will instantiate the window controller.
After that happens, part of the point of separating the model controller and view controller is removing the document's dependency on the window.
As you refine your design, take a look at places where the document needs access to the window, and consider whether you can implement that functionality a different way, for example, by handling it in the window controller instead of the document.
As I wire up my first fairly complicated Cocoa-Touch view I feel like I'm inadvertently slipping back into old procedural patterns and finding it difficult to shake them off...Though fully aware of many of the Cocoa (OO) design patterns I'm afraid I may be subverting them.
As such this view in question is quickly becoming unmanageable and I'm wondering if I might be approaching it the wrong way?!? The view is managed by a subclass of UIViewController. The view itself contains ±10 subviews. Some of these subviews "slide" in and out and contain their own subviews (controls, imageviews, etc) that slide along with them.
Without getting into too much detail I've found that I'm executing most (if not all, including animation) of my management code w/in the touchesBegan/Moved/Ended methods of my root View Controller. And it's become a mess of managing, setting & checking boolean properties. if (editingMode & panelAVisible).... if (editingMode & panelBVisible)... or *if (viewFlipped) { for (MyCustomView view in someArrayOfSubviews)} etc, etc... granted the UI of this app requires most of these views (or their contents) to be touched and moved by the user to different parts of the screen.
The main problems I'm trying to solve seems to be along the lines of: if viewA is present then you 3 views go hide (animated)...or, If viewB is touched then all objects contained in viewC are negative... etc.
Any clever (or rudimentary) OO approach to handling this? Perhaps make the subviews that contain views act as their own mini view controllers? I haven't been able to find too many (any?) examples of that though...
As you suggested at the end of your question, I would recommend having a subcontroller whenever you need logic for a particular subview. The point of a controller object is to keep track of state of the view and to encapsulate all that view logic that you were describing. Interface actions, such as if the user can move to a different screen, can invoke save logic, can create a new document, should be in the controller for that particular view. This will help maintain a separation of concerns between the various controllers and cut your convoluted logic down at the top level.
While it doesn't pertain to iPhone programming specifically, the book Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X contains good examples (especially in the chapter about how to do preference windows) of using subcontrollers and subviews in your application.
I think you should go along your last suggestion, make the subviews that contain views act as their own mini view controllers. Each (sub)view that presents a 'screen full of content' could/should be managed by its own view controller.
Animating between those views can be done with the build in navigation controller (you can actually hide the top bar of a navigation controller) such that you have the default slide animation. Otherwise you could indeed create your own animation while still using that navigation controller.
'The view itself contains ±10 subviews'. Some of these subviews "slide" in and out [..]'. These subviews you're talking about are perfect candidates for extraction from your one monolithic UIView.
The basic OO principle to use is how the navigation controller does it, by pushing and popping views on and off a stack. Each view pushed and popped is handled by its own view controller.
HTH
Edit: I now see you're not specifically talking about iPhone development. Still, have a look how its done there (especially the UINavigationController). You can still get the basic design idea