Hi all,
I'm trying to use lazy loading of nib files when a user click at the menu item in a Cocoa application. After looking at several examples (I'm new to Objective-C although with solid C/C++ background), I decided that some panels like the Preferences only require shared instances. I split all my windows (about 9 created from clicking menu items) in different nib files and tried to share instances. I seem to be able to load the files (all the methods are called) including awakeFromNib....and showWindow, however no window displays. Only the main window loads. I have tried different ways of loading nibs, and nothing worked. What is the standard practice for loading other nibs besides MainMenu? I have looked at endless tutorials including "Learning Cocoa" (no help) and Cocoa Dev Central, etc. All help is appreciated.
Here is how I setup my code just in case it helps someone. Let me know if you see something wrong:
I have my AppDelegate where all the actions from the menu's are connected to, then I have the auxiliary nib (say Preferences.nib), and a frozen object in the nib with all the connections and a controller in my application that owns the nib.
I derive all my controllers from a common object subclass of NSWindowController that has this code in init (and I keep the naming of the controller object the same as the nib file
- (id) init {
// Continue the designated initializer chain:
[super init];
// here's a fuller invocation of "loadNibNamed:" which shows the loading of the // dictionary with the key-value pair NSOwner, which has a value of "self".
[NSBundle loadNibFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:NSStringFromClass([self class]) ofType
"nib"] externalNameTable:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys:self, @"NSOwner", nil] withZone:[self zone]];
// place other initialization code here
return self;
}
Then the Preferences.m, the controller for Preferences.nib, inherits the init above and has the shareInstance method below:
+ (id) sharedInstance {
static Preferences *_shared = nil;
if (!_shared) {
NSLog(@"This means the instance was not created yet");
_shared = [[Preferences allocWithZone:[self zone]] init];
}
return _shared;
}
Then the frozen object (PreferencesCO.m) has the usuals: IBOutlets/actions and some reference code just to know they are being called:
- (id) init {
[super init];
NSLog(@"In init of PreferencesCO");
return self;
}
- (void) awakeFromNib {
NSLog(@"in awakeFromNib in PreferencesCO");
}
Finally when a user clicks Preferences... in the menu the corresponding IBAction is called in the application delegate and this code runs:
- (IBAction)showPreferences
id)sender {
NSLog(@"I'm in Preferences...");
[[Preferences sharedInstance] showWindow:sender];
NSLog(@"Just loaded the Preferences in AppdDelegate");
}
All input and ideas are more than welcome, I have ran out of ideas and I can't move forward on this. Please help and feel free to use the ideas here for your own...
Adrian
- Take a little, give a little - Hi all,
I'm trying to use lazy loading of nib files when a user click at the menu item in a Cocoa application. After looking at several examples (I'm new to Objective-C although with solid C/C++ background), I decided that some panels like the Preferences only require shared instances. I split all my windows (about 9 created from clicking menu items) in different nib files and tried to share instances. I seem to be able to load the files (all the methods are called) including awakeFromNib....and showWindow, however no window displays. Only the main window loads. I have tried different ways of loading nibs, and nothing worked. What is the standard practice for loading other nibs besides MainMenu? I have looked at endless tutorials including "Learning Cocoa" (no help) and Cocoa Dev Central, etc. All help is appreciated.
Here is how I setup my code just in case it helps someone. Let me know if you see something wrong:
I have my AppDelegate where all the actions from the menu's are connected to, then I have the auxiliary nib (say Preferences.nib), and a frozen object in the nib with all the connections and a controller in my application that owns the nib.
I derive all my controllers from a common object subclass of NSWindowController that has this code in init (and I keep the naming of the controller object the same as the nib file
- (id) init {
// Continue the designated initializer chain:
[super init];
// here's a fuller invocation of "loadNibNamed:" which shows the loading of the // dictionary with the key-value pair NSOwner, which has a value of "self".
[NSBundle loadNibFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:NSStringFromClass([self class]) ofType
"nib"] externalNameTable:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys:self, @"NSOwner", nil] withZone:[self zone]]; // place other initialization code here
return self;
}
Then the Preferences.m, the controller for Preferences.nib, inherits the init above and has the shareInstance method below:
+ (id) sharedInstance {
static Preferences *_shared = nil;
if (!_shared) {
NSLog(@"This means the instance was not created yet");
_shared = [[Preferences allocWithZone:[self zone]] init];
}
return _shared;
}
Then the frozen object (PreferencesCO.m) has the usuals: IBOutlets/actions and some reference code just to know they are being called:
- (id) init {
[super init];
NSLog(@"In init of PreferencesCO");
return self;
}
- (void) awakeFromNib {
NSLog(@"in awakeFromNib in PreferencesCO");
}
Finally when a user clicks Preferences... in the menu the corresponding IBAction is called in the application delegate and this code runs:
- (IBAction)showPreferences
id)sender { NSLog(@"I'm in Preferences...");
[[Preferences sharedInstance] showWindow:sender];
NSLog(@"Just loaded the Preferences in AppdDelegate");
}
All input and ideas are more than welcome, I have ran out of ideas and I can't move forward on this. Please help and feel free to use the ideas here for your own...
Adrian
- Take a little, give a little - Hi all,
