NSTableView - Initial Selection Grey until Clicked (Focussed)

Question

I've got a simple example of an app here which I slapped together, and what I'm getting is pretty much what I'm after.

The issue is that when the view loads up, in the NSViewController's viewDidLoad, I set the tableView's selected index to 0 i.e. the first item (which works).

What I do notice is that when this happens, the selected row comes up as grey in color (i.e. as if it's not an active window/view)… It only seems to high light in the normal blue color when I physically click on the row that's selected.

I can confirm that the row is selected and everything appears fine.

Any ideas?

To confirm, the code I use to select the row is:

override func viewDidAppear() {
    self.tableView.selectRowIndexes(NSIndexSet(index: 0), byExtendingSelection: false)
}

Here is what's happening with the actual view itself:

ABOVE: The darker grey line is the "selection bar". This is what happens as soon as the view becomes active.

ABOVE: Once I click on that row (the one which was once dark grey), I get he desired high lighting.. i.e. Navy Blue.

Answer 1

The reason why the cell is grey is because the table view doesn't have focus / isn't the first responder.

There are 3 states for tableView cell selection color

1. no selection = clear row background

2. selection and focus = blue row background

3. selection and no focus = grey row background

This is probably because another view has focus. Simply selecting a cell doesn't shift focus to a tableView. You need to call NSWindow.makeFirstResponder() to change the focus.

func tableViewSelectionDidChange(notification: NSNotification) {
    let tableView = notification.object as! NSTableView
    if tableView.selectedRow != -1 {
        self.window!.makeFirstResponder(self.tableView)
    }
}

Answer 2

I've managed to find out what's going on. (I think) and it seems to work.

I had to:

1. Subclass NSTableRowView
2. Add a new NSView just below the actual cell view (row) in Interface Builder
3. Set the new Row View's class to 'myNSTableViewSubClass'
4. Set the row view's Identifier to: NSTableViewRowViewKey (this is very specific, and that literally is the key, if this isn't set, it won't work be regarded as the Table Row View.

5. in the subclass I had to override the emphasised: Bool to always return yes e.g.:

   override var emphasized: Bool{
       get{
           return true
       }
       set{
           //You need to have the "set" there as it's a mutable prop
           //It doesn't have to do untying though
       }
   }
   

And voila..

The catch in my case was in 4 above.