Trailing and Leading constraints in Swift programmatically (NSLayoutConstraints)

Question

I'm adding from a xib a view into my ViewController. Then I'm putting its constraints to actually fit it

override func viewDidAppear(animated: Bool) {
    super.viewDidAppear(animated)
    ...
    ...
    view!.addSubview(gamePreview)
    gamePreview.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    if #available(iOS 9.0, *) {
        // Pin the leading edge of myView to the margin's leading edge
        gamePreview.leadingAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(view.leadingAnchor).active = true
        //Pin the trailing edge of myView to the margin's trailing edge
        gamePreview.trailingAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(view.trailingAnchor).active = true

    } else {
        // Fallback on earlier versions
        view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .TrailingMargin, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .TrailingMargin, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))

        view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .LeadingMargin, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .LeadingMargin, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
    }
    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Top, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: self.topLayoutGuide, attribute: .Bottom, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Height, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: nil, attribute: .NotAnAttribute,multiplier: 1, constant: 131))
}

What i'm trying to do: To actually fit my view constraining it to top, leading, trailing to ViewController's view, and with a prefixed height. The view I'm adding to main view has its own transparent-background view, so no need of margin (the view is meant to be device's width size, so).

I've placed 2 couples of lines that would be supposed to be equal (in my attempts), with the if, because the first 2 lines in if are actually available in iOS9> only, while I'm attempting to do the same thing in the else statement, for every device (starting from iOS 8).

This is what I get:

iOS9+ at left, iOS8+ at right. Transparent background was colored red to show what happens (don't mind at different height in the images, they're equal height in app, instead look at added margins at left and right)

I also tried AutoLayoutDSL-Swift, but doesn't help, I'm not expert with it but every attempt made only things worse.

How can I write those constraints using classic NSLayoutConstraints methods, and how could I write all in a better way with a framework like AutoLayoutDSL or a fork of it? (or an alternative, though now mostly I'm concerned on official libs)

Answer 1

You need to use the leading and trailing attributes, not the leadingMargin and trailingMargin attributes:

override func viewDidAppear(animated: Bool) {
    super.viewDidAppear(animated)
    ...
    ...
    view!.addSubview(gamePreview)
    gamePreview.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false

    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Trailing, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .Trailing, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))            
    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Leading, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .Leading, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))

    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Top, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: self.topLayoutGuide, attribute: .Bottom, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
    view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Height, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: nil, attribute: .NotAnAttribute,multiplier: 1, constant: 131))
}

Answer 2

Guessed it thanks to @Paulw11... this is the solution

view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Trailing, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .Trailing, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))     
view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Leading, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: view, attribute: .Leading, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))        
view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Top, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: self.topLayoutGuide, attribute: .Bottom, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
view.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: gamePreview, attribute: .Height, relatedBy: .Equal, toItem: nil, attribute: .NotAnAttribute,multiplier: 1, constant: 131))

Also I managed to rewrite it as it follows using AutoLayoutDSL-Swift for anyone interested

view => gamePreview.trailing == view.trailing
     => gamePreview.leading == view.leading
     => gamePreview.height == 131
     => gamePreview.top == view.top + self.navigationController!.navigationBar.bounds.height + UIApplication.sharedApplication().statusBarFrame.size.height

The last line is a little long because view.top refers to the really view top and doesn't consider padding added by both statusBar and navigationBar heights. They could be replaced as constants, waiting if someone comes up with a more elegant solution.

Answer 3

SWIFT 4 Update

stackView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false

stackView.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: stackView, attribute: .trailing, relatedBy: .equal, toItem: stackView, attribute: .trailing, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
stackView.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: stackView, attribute: .leading, relatedBy: .equal, toItem: stackView, attribute: .leading, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))

stackView.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: stackView, attribute: .top, relatedBy: .equal, toItem: self.addLayoutGuide, attribute: .bottom, multiplier: 1, constant: 0))
stackView.addConstraint(NSLayoutConstraint(item: stackView, attribute: .height, relatedBy: .equal, toItem: nil, attribute: .notAnAttribute,multiplier: 1, 
constant: 131))

Answer 4

Why don't you use constraint activation? You could do this:

    var anchors = [NSLayoutConstraint]()
    anchors.append(view.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: gamePreview.topAnchor, constant: 0))
    anchors.append(view.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: gamePreview.leadingAnchor, constant: 0))
    anchors.append(view.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: gamePreview.trailingAnchor, constant: 0))
    anchors.append(view.heightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: gamePreview.heightAnchor, multiplier: 1, constant: 131))
    NSLayoutConstraint.activate(anchors)

This is another. Hope it helps. You could swap view and gamePreview depending on the parent / child, or you could create a general helper extension for your constraints. I found one in a tutorial provided by a YouTuber Here and slightly modified it to accept leading/trailing, left/right constraints. You could also add safeLayoutGuide to the below as well, which makes it future-friendly. Something like this:

    func anchor(_ top: UIView? = nil, left: UIView? = nil, bottom: UIView? = nil, right: UIView? = nil, width: UIView? = nil, height: UIView? = nil, topConstant: CGFloat = 0, leftConstant: CGFloat = 0, bottomConstant: CGFloat = 0, rightConstant: CGFloat = 0, widthConstant: CGFloat = 0, heightConstant: CGFloat = 0, isForLeading: Bool = false) -> [NSLayoutConstraint] {
    translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false

    var anchors = [NSLayoutConstraint]()
    if #available(iOS 11.0, *) {
        if let top = top {
            anchors.append(topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: top.safeAreaLayoutGuide.topAnchor, constant: topConstant))
        }

        if let left = left {
            if isForLeading  {
                anchors.append(leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: left.safeAreaLayoutGuide.leadingAnchor, constant: leftConstant))
            } else {
                anchors.append(leftAnchor.constraint(equalTo: left.safeAreaLayoutGuide.leftAnchor, constant: leftConstant))
            }
        }

        if let bottom = bottom {
            anchors.append(bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: bottom.safeAreaLayoutGuide.bottomAnchor, constant: -bottomConstant))
        }

        if let right = right {
            if isForLeading  {
                anchors.append(trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: right.safeAreaLayoutGuide.leadingAnchor, constant: rightConstant))
            } else {
                anchors.append(rightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: right.safeAreaLayoutGuide.rightAnchor, constant: -rightConstant))
            }
        }
        if let width = width {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalTo: width.safeAreaLayoutGuide.widthAnchor, multiplier: 1, constant: widthConstant))
        } else if widthConstant > 0 {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: widthConstant))
        }

        if let height = height {
            anchors.append(heightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: height.safeAreaLayoutGuide.heightAnchor, multiplier: 1, constant: widthConstant))
        } else if heightConstant > 0 {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: heightConstant))
        }
        anchors.forEach({$0.isActive = true})
    } else {
        if let top = top {
            anchors.append(topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: top.topAnchor, constant: topConstant))
        }

        if let left = left {
            if isForLeading  {
                anchors.append(leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: left.leadingAnchor, constant: leftConstant))
            } else {
                anchors.append(leftAnchor.constraint(equalTo: left.leftAnchor, constant: leftConstant))
            }
        }

        if let bottom = bottom {
            anchors.append(bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: bottom.bottomAnchor, constant: -bottomConstant))
        }

        if let right = right {
            if isForLeading  {
                anchors.append(trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: right.leadingAnchor, constant: rightConstant))
            } else {
                anchors.append(rightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: right.rightAnchor, constant: -rightConstant))
            }
        }

        if let width = width {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalTo: width.widthAnchor, multiplier: 1, constant: widthConstant))
        } else if widthConstant > 0 {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: widthConstant))
        }

        if let height = height {
            anchors.append(heightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: height.heightAnchor, multiplier: 1, constant: widthConstant))
        } else if heightConstant > 0 {
            anchors.append(widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: heightConstant))
        }
        anchors.forEach({$0.isActive = true})
    }

    return anchors
}

And then call it like this:

        _ = view.anchor(gamePreview, left: gamePreview, right: gamePreview, height: gamePreview, heightConstant: 131, isForLeading: true)