How do I create a basic UIButton programmatically?

Question

How can I create basic UIButton programmatically? For example in my view controller, when executing the viewDidLoad method, a three UIButton will create dynamically and set its layout or properties.

Answer 1

To add a button programatically to your controller's view, use the following:

-(void)viewDidLoad
{
   UIButton * btn = [UIButton buttonWithType:UIButtonTypeRoundedRect];
   btn.frame = CGRectMake(0, 0, 100, 50);
   [btn setTitle:@"Hello, world!" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
   [self.view addSubview:btn];
}

To add three of these, rinse and repeat.

Answer 2

Here's one:

button = [UIButton buttonWithType:UIButtonTypeRoundedRect];
[button addTarget:self 
           action:@selector(aMethod:)
 forControlEvents:UIControlEventTouchDown];
[button setTitle:@"Show View" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
button.frame = CGRectMake(80.0, 210.0, 160.0, 40.0);
[view addSubview:button];

Answer 3

are you trying to create three dynamic instances of a button? if not, then the answer is mahboudz above.

otherwise, you can just put the creator instance within a loop and dynamically add names from an array if you so wish.

Answer 4

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];
    [self addMyButton];   // Call add button method on view load
}

- (void)addMyButton{    // Method for creating button, with background image and other properties

    UIButton *playButton = [[UIButton buttonWithType:UIButtonTypeRoundedRect] retain];
    playButton.frame = CGRectMake(110.0, 360.0, 100.0, 30.0);
    [playButton setTitle:@"Play" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
    playButton.backgroundColor = [UIColor clearColor];
    [playButton setTitleColor:[UIColor whiteColor] forState:UIControlStateNormal ];
    UIImage *buttonImageNormal = [UIImage imageNamed:@"blueButton.png"];
    UIImage *strechableButtonImageNormal = [buttonImageNormal stretchableImageWithLeftCapWidth:12 topCapHeight:0];
    [playButton setBackgroundImage:strechableButtonImageNormal forState:UIControlStateNormal];
    UIImage *buttonImagePressed = [UIImage imageNamed:@"whiteButton.png"];
    UIImage *strechableButtonImagePressed = [buttonImagePressed stretchableImageWithLeftCapWidth:12 topCapHeight:0];
    [playButton setBackgroundImage:strechableButtonImagePressed forState:UIControlStateHighlighted];
    [playButton addTarget:self action:@selector(playAction:) forControlEvents:UIControlEventTouchUpInside];
    [self.view addSubview:playButton];  
}

Answer 5

All well and good my friends, except none of the answers address 1 key issue - what if you want to set a background color on the button? Not so straight forward!

Changing this line:

playButton.backgroundColor = [UIColor clearColor];

...to this:

playButton.backgroundColor = [UIColor redColor];

Well, some interesting results. Apparently this only sets the background for the frame that the button is contained within. So you'll see that for a rounded rectangle button would display the colors ONLY in the corners! Why i do not know.

I've checked the docs, nothing. If anybody could shed some light on what should be a trivial issue it would be much appreciated. Thanks