UISplitViewController in a TabBar ( UITabBarController )?

Question

I am in kind of situation that I need to start with a tab based application and in that I need a split view for one or more tabs. But it seems that split view controller obj

Answer 1

I created a UITabBarController subclass which properly propagates the rotation messages to all UISplitViewControllers it contains. This maintains the correct internal state of the UISplitViewControllers. However, one of the SplitViewController delegate methods is not called if the SplitViewController is not visible, so I account for this in the detail view controller viewWillAppear method. I've confirmed this works in iOS5.0 - iOS6.1

OSTabBarController.m

#import "OSTabBarController.h"

@implementation OSTabBarController

-(void)willRotateToInterfaceOrientation:(UIInterfaceOrientation)toInterfaceOrientation duration:(NSTimeInterval)duration{
    [super willRotateToInterfaceOrientation:toInterfaceOrientation duration:duration];
    for(UIViewController *targetController in self.viewControllers){
        if(targetController != self.selectedViewController && [targetController isKindOfClass:[UISplitViewController class]]){
            [targetController willRotateToInterfaceOrientation:toInterfaceOrientation duration:duration];
        }
    }
}

-(void)didRotateFromInterfaceOrientation:(UIInterfaceOrientation)fromInterfaceOrientation{
    [super didRotateFromInterfaceOrientation:fromInterfaceOrientation];
    for(UIViewController *targetController in self.viewControllers){
        if(targetController != self.selectedViewController && [targetController isKindOfClass:[UISplitViewController class]]){
            [targetController didRotateFromInterfaceOrientation:fromInterfaceOrientation];
        }
    }
}

@end

DetailViewController

@implementation OSDetailViewController

-(void)viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated{
    //the splitViewController:willHideViewController:withBarButtonItem:forPopoverController: may not have been called
    if(!UIInterfaceOrientationIsPortrait(self.interfaceOrientation)){
        self.navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem = nil;
    }
}

#pragma mark - UISplitViewControllerDelegate Methods

- (void)splitViewController:(UISplitViewController *)splitController willHideViewController:(UIViewController *)viewController withBarButtonItem:(UIBarButtonItem *)barButtonItem forPopoverController:(UIPopoverController *)popoverController
{
    [self.navigationItem setLeftBarButtonItem:barButtonItem animated:YES];

}

- (void)splitViewController:(UISplitViewController *)splitController willShowViewController:(UIViewController *)viewController invalidatingBarButtonItem:(UIBarButtonItem *)barButtonItem
{
    [self.navigationItem setLeftBarButtonItem:nil animated:YES];
}

@end

Answer 2

I've written up a subclass for the UISplitViewController that will listen for changes to device orientation and orient itself accordingly. With this class, I can now place split views within a UITabBarController and each split view will behave correctly upon rotation, even if it's not the frontmost tab. I've successfully deployed this in TexLege and it was approved for use in the App Store, but your mileage may vary. Please see the repository at Github.

Feel free to fork and modify it, and I'm always interested in hearing comments (or complaints) about it. https://github.com/grgcombs/IntelligentSplitViewController

Answer 3

Using the interface builder, create a split view controller and a tab bar controller and link them to your outlets:

@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet UITabBarController *tabBarController;
@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet UISplitViewController *splitViewController;

In your app delegate didFinishLaunchingWithOption, assign your split view controller to the tab bar controller:

splitViewController.tabBarItem = [[[UITabBarItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Title" image:nil tag:0] autorelease];
NSArray *controllers = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:splitViewController,  /* other controllers go here */ nil];
tabBarController.viewControllers = controllers;
[window addSubview:tabBarController.view];
[window makeKeyAndVisible];

This will create a tab bar controller (with only 1 tab in this case), which is displayed correctly in all orientations.

Answer 4

To let a tabbarcontroller appear as a master view for splitviewcontroller you should rewrite tabbarcontroller so that it will support or orientations(so say, using a category for the class UITabBarController)

Answer 5

Keep in mind that OS 3.2 does not provide proper support for a splitview as a tabbar view.

You can make it "work" but it will have bugs - the biggest is that an orientation change made on another tab's view will often not propagate to the splitview tab view properly, making the view go wacky when you go back to it (left side view takes over the screen, or the barbutton item is missing, etc.).

I've reached the conclusion that I have to create my own splitview for use in a tabBarController because of this issue.

I had heard rumors that Apple was working on a fix but it's been months now and no iPad OS updates have occurred - maybe OS 4 for the iPad will address it.

Answer 6

You can use IB to build tabtab and modify tabs to splitviewcontroller.

-(void) makeSplitViewController {
NSMutableArray *controllers = [NSMutableArray arrayWithArray:tabBarController.viewControllers];
int index = 0;

for (UIViewController *controller in tabBarController.viewControllers) {
    if ([controller.tabBarItem.title isEqualToString:@"Stock"]) {
        stockDetailController = [[StockDetailController alloc] initWithNibName:@"StockDetailController" bundle:nil];

        stockMasterController = [[StockMasterController alloc] initWithStyle:UITableViewStylePlain]; 
        stockMasterController.navigationItem.title = date;
        stockMasterController.stockDetailController = stockDetailController;

        UINavigationController *nav = [[[UINavigationController alloc] initWithRootViewController:stockMasterController] autorelease];

        splitViewController = [[UISplitViewController alloc] init];
        splitViewController.tabBarItem = controller.tabBarItem;
        splitViewController.viewControllers = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:nav, stockDetailController, nil];
        splitViewController.delegate = stockDetailController;

        [controllers replaceObjectAtIndex:index withObject:splitViewController];
    }

    index++;
}

tabBarController.viewControllers = controllers;

}