NSUserDefaults not cleared after app uninstall on simulator

Question

this may sound real NOOB! I want to check if it's the second time the user enters my application, so to keep the run count I'm using NSUserDefaults. I have implemented the following code in my rootViewController's viewDidLoad method:

    NSUserDefaults *userDefaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];

    NSLog(@"hello %ld", (long)[userDefaults integerForKey:@"runCount"]);

    if ([userDefaults integerForKey:@"runCount"] != 1) {
        //not the 2nd run
        [userDefaults setInteger:1 forKey:@"runCount"];
        NSLog(@"not 2nd run");
    } else {
        //second run or more
        NSLog(@"2nd run");
    }

    [userDefaults synchronize];

everything works fine, but the problem is that when I uninstall(delete and re-install) the application according to here and here the data should be cleared, but it is not and after re-installing the app previous data is still showing up. I'm running my app on iOS simulator using xCode6-beta and targeting the application on iOS 8

Answer 1

I think this is due to a bug in the iOS8 Beta Simulator.

The expected behavior is that when the app is deleted, the NSUserDefaults for that app are deleted as well.

• However, NSUserDefaults are NOT deleted when you remove an app from the simulator.
• They are correctly deleted when you delete them from a physical device running iOS8.

A quick and annoying solution for now is to click, iOS Simulator -> Reset Content and Settings.

Xcode 9.2 with Simulator 10 still presents this issue. Menu option is now Hardware .. Erase All Content and Settings

I submitted a bug report btw

Answer 2

Since Reset Content and Settings is a nuclear option, you could consider two other options until the bug on the iOS 8/Xcode 6 GM simulator is addressed:

1. You could manually delete the plist file where the NSUserDefaults are stored. This is currently located at ~/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/*some_device_id*/Library/Preferences/com.yourcompany.yourapp.plist It's a little tedious to find the right simulator to work with among the UUID directory names. EDIT: 2014-10-28 20-34-52 Correct path: ~/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/*some_device_id*/data/Library/Preferences/com.yourcompany.yourapp.plist

2. You could perform "surgery" on that plist (using a run script build phase perhaps) using plistbuddy e.g.

/usr/libexec/plistbuddy -c "Set :BSDidMoveSqliteDb 0" path_to_plist