initWithNibName is not getting called

Question

I need to put it some custom logic into my iPhone app so that depending on what iOS version you are running, choose a different XIB file (i.e. iPhone or iPad will show different XIB files).

I had built the whole iPhone app from day one and its all good, using a tabbarcontroller and the standard navigation controllers in each tab.

So I implemented the :

- (id)initWithNibName:(NSString *)nibName bundle:(NSBundle *)nibBundle

method, only to find that it does not get called. (I have a breakpoint and log statements in it and nothing gets hit).

Does anyone know why this might be? OR how can i achieve this functionality?

I have read somewhere that initWithNibName is only called when you call it, i.e. when you programatically construct your view hierarchy, is this true??

Answer 1

If you're not doing something like this before adding it to your navigation controller:

SomeViewController *someViewController = [[SomeViewController alloc] initWithNibName:...];

Then chances are good you're overriding the wrong method.

If your view controller lives in a nib file, say your navigation controller's nib file, it will be unarchived from the nib file as a new view controller object, instead of being created with its own nib file, so the above method won't be called.

You'll have to override -awakeFromNib instead.

Answer 2

If your view controllers are loaded from a .xib file then initWithCoder: will be called instead. The initWithNibName:bundle: method is only used for programatically creating view controllers.