Merge causes XML issue in Main Storyboard iOS

Question

After a merge gone wrong I am getting an error:

Interface Builder Storyboard Line 3166: StartTag: Invalid element name

Here is line 3166 in the XML:

                            <include reference="mg7-MW-AgG"/>
                                <include reference="W21-pW-ZnG"/>
                                <include reference="e3g-wW-DtJ"/>
                                <include reference="u5V-a3-6xi"/>
                            </mask>
                        </variation>
                    </view>
<<<<<<< HEAD
                    <tabBarItem key="tabBarItem" title="Rooms" image="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" selectedImage="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" id="xhN-9a-8cf"/>
=======
                    <tabBarItem key="tabBarItem" title="Rooms" image="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" selectedImage="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" id="xhN-9a-8cf"/>
>>>>>>> origin/Develop
                    <connections>
                        <outlet property="roomSearchBar" destination="BM4-2v-IaL" id="kH8-j7-2Qh"/>
                        <outlet property="tViewRooms" destination="wPf-94-ZeE" id="lDI-zg-WK5"/>

The line that says <<<<<<< HEAD is line 3166

As you can see there are 2 identical tabBarItems. I tried removing one along with the a few other lines, but I am afraid I'll mess something up.

Any ideas what to do here?

Thanks a lot.

EDIT

I also notice a similar thing happening 600 lines down

<<<<<<< HEAD
        <image name="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" width="24" height="24">
=======
        <image name="0F637DAF-B54F-4BF7-81AC-038AB16B6A9A" width="24" height="24">
>>>>>>> origin/Develop

except this time the image names aren't identical. Is this causing the merge conflict?

Answer 1

If it's just those two locations, you'll need to pick which of the pairs are the lines you wish to keep. Then you'll need to delete the merge annotations ("<<<<<< HEAD", ">>>>>>> origin...", etc.) to get yourself back to valid XML in your storyboard.

So

                    </view>
<<<<<<< HEAD
                    <tabBarItem key="tabBarItem" title="Rooms" image="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" selectedImage="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" id="xhN-9a-8cf"/>
=======
                    <tabBarItem key="tabBarItem" title="Rooms" image="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" selectedImage="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" id="xhN-9a-8cf"/>
>>>>>>> origin/Develop

would simply become

                    <tabBarItem key="tabBarItem" title="Rooms" image="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" selectedImage="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" id="xhN-9a-8cf"/>

And then

<<<<<<< HEAD
        <image name="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" width="24" height="24">
=======
        <image name="0F637DAF-B54F-4BF7-81AC-038AB16B6A9A" width="24" height="24">
>>>>>>> origin/Develop

would become either:

        <image name="55FD63F5-732A-439B-877F-1706F6988CF7" width="24" height="24">

OR

         <image name="0F637DAF-B54F-4BF7-81AC-038AB16B6A9A" width="24" height="24">

depending on which image was the one that should be there.

Honestly, our team almost never tries to merge changes in storyboards / XIBs. It frequently corrupts the file. If you're making minor changes and you get a merge conflict, simply discard the local changes, update to the latest, and then re-implement your storyboard changes.

This can be especially challenging when there are larger changes, which is why storyboards (which are essentially collections of XIBs) can be difficult to maintain in a multi-team member environment. With Xcode 7 you can mitigate this a bit by using multiple storyboards along with storyboard references.