UIToolBar - How to Handle Button-Overflow?

Question

I have a view with a toolbar - each button on the toolbar represents a new message the user is composing. It took me several work days to figure out how to handle the view switching, etc.. but now that I have that all figured out, I have run into a bit of a UI-snafu.

When I have over 11 buttons (I know, a user should really SEND the first 10 before creating an 11th, but I am trying to be thorough) the buttons run off the end of the screen. There is no indicator (aside from the half-button you can see), that there are additional button(s) that can be pressed.

Has anyone run into a situation like this before, and how have you handled it?

My initial thought is when there are more than (lets say) 8 buttons, I programmatically make the first and last buttons "<" and ">" buttons that will slide the buttons down, by removing and adding buttons to my [toolbar items].

Any thoughts?

Answer 1

Instead of creating a new type of UI for the iPhone (which Apple may or may not accept) it would probably be best if you just told the user that he/she has reached the limit and will have to send a message before they can create a new one. Like Safari does when you try to open a 10th webpage.

Answer 2

I think Kane is probably correct, but what you're trying to do sounds a lot like a scrollable tab bar. Three20 offers a class that handles this, or you could implement it yourself. There's no provision for this in the OS (I think the UI guys would probably strongly object if you said you were trying to put 10 buttons down there, let alone MORE than 10.)