How to show a message when collection view is empty

Question

I`m trying to show a message only when my collection view is empty. Well, I try set return 1 when my if is true but when I have this, it only show one item in my collection view

Answer 1

I would say have two sections in your collectionView, where one is for the actual data to be displayed, then the other one when you don't have any data.

Assuming we are populating data in section 0.

in numberOfRowsInSection you'd have something like:

     if section == 0 { return movies.count}
     else if section == 1 {
          if movies.count < 1 { return 1 }
          else { return 0  }
     }
        return 0

in your cellForItemAt you'd do something like that:

 if indexPath.section == 0 {
      // let cell = ...
      // show your data into your cell 
        return cell  
     }else {
          // here you handle the case where there is no data, but the big thing is we are not dequeuing  
          let rect = CGRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: self.favCollectionView.frame.width, height: self.favCollectionView.frame.height)
        let noDataLabel: UILabel = UILabel(frame: rect)
        noDataLabel.text = "No favorite movies yet."
        noDataLabel.textAlignment = .center
        noDataLabel.textColor = UIColor.gray
        noDataLabel.sizeToFit()

        let cell = UICollectionViewCell()
        cell.contentView.addSubview(noDataLabel)

       return cell
      }