Building a complex view with Three20 - resources?

Question

I'm using three20 for most of my iPhone app. One of the views I need to create is relatively complex. It needs a top bar (under the nav bar) with some controls and label, an image view below this bar (which occupies most of the body) and another bottom bar with more controls and labels (above the tab bar control).

I don't have much UI experience - my only experience with anything UI is laying stuff out using CSS, etc on websites. Apple's online doc seems to assume that the reader knows a bunch about rectangles, layouts, frames, etc or is using InterfaceBuilder. And three20 isn't too well documented either.

So my question is:

• Is it possible to design something like what I describe in IB and then still have a three20-based app use it? If so, any tips/pointers on how would be much appreciated.

• Can you point me to some documentation that explain how views/controls etc are rendered. I'm pretty sure I can figure it out if I find some decent explanation/tutorial for it. (Book recommendations/online references work too)

Answer 1

You can use IB with Three20. It's not recommended, but you can call the -initWithNib method instead of the default -init method in your URL mapping.

ie:

[map from:@"tt://dashboard/(initWithNib:)" toViewController:[TableViewController class]];