NSURL is null in Simulator, but okay on iPad

Question

I'm trying to load an audio file into AVAudioPlayer on the iPad. When I run it on the iPad it finds it in the bundle fine. However, if I try and run it through the simulator, I get a null error for NSURL. Here's the snippet of code (num is an arbitrary int):

NSString *name = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"st-answermachine-%i", num];
NSLog(@"name = %@", name);
NSString *path = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:name ofType:@"m4a"];
NSLog(@"path = %@", path);
NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:path];
NSLog(@"url = %@", url);

In the simluator, the Debugger Console traces this:

name = st-answermachine-1

path = /Users/joe/Library/Application Support/iPhone Simulator/3.2/Applications/B85E9CC8-6E39-47B9-XXXX-1E3A2CE145D1/MyApp.app/st-answermachine-1.m4a

url = (null)

But if I try it on the device, I get this:

name = st-answermachine-1

path = /var/mobile/Applications/116DA1CB-EA13-4B80-XXXX-EBD46C8E2095/MyApp.app/st-answermachine-1.m4a

url = /var/mobile/Applications/116DA1CB-EA13-4B80-XXXX-EBD46C8E2095/MyApp.app/st-answermachine-1.m4a

Any ideas why I might have this problem please?

Thanks!

Answer 1

URLWithString: expects a string containing an actual URL as its parameter (e.g. 'http://blah/' or 'file:///blah'). URLs can't contain spaces (as the simulator's path does), and that's why it's failing.

As Evan suggests, you need to use fileURLWithPath: to convert a path string to a URL object.