Can presentModalViewController work at startup?

Question

I'd like to use a modal UITableView at startup to ask users for password, etc. if they are not already configured. However, the command to call the uitableview doesn't seem to work inside viewDidLoad.

startup code:

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  rootViewController = [[SettingsController alloc] 
    initWithStyle:UITableViewStyleGrouped];
  navigationController = [[UINavigationController alloc]     
    initWithRootViewController:rootViewController];

  // place where code doesn't work
  //[self presentModalViewController:navigationController animated:YES];
}

However, the same code works fine when called later by a button:

- (IBAction)settingsPressed:(id)sender{
    [self presentModalViewController:navigationController animated:YES];
}

Related question: how do I sense (at the upper level) when the UITableView has used the command to quit?

[self.parentViewController dismissModalViewControllerAnimated:YES];

Answer 1

If you are going to do it like that then you are going to have to declare your own protocol to be able to tell when the UITableView dismissed the parentViewController, so you declare a protocol that has a method like

-(void)MyTableViewDidDismiss

then in your parent class you can implement this protocol and after you dismissModalView in tableView you can call MyTableViewDidDismiss on the delegate (whihc is the parent view controller).

Answer 2

You can place the presentModalViewController:animated: call elsewhere in code - it should work in the viewWillAppear method of the view controller, or in the applicationDidFinishLaunching method in the app delegate (this is where I place my on-launch modal controllers).

As for knowing when the view controller disappears, you can define a method on the parent view controller and override the implementation of dismissModalViewControllerAnimated on the child controller to call the method. Something like this:

// Parent view controller, of class ParentController
- (void)modalViewControllerWasDismissed {
    NSLog(@"dismissed!");
}

// Modal (child) view controller
- (void)dismissModalViewControllerAnimated:(BOOL)animated {
    ParentController *parent = (ParentController *)(self.parentViewController);
    [parent modalViewControllerWasDismissed];

    [super dismissModalViewControllerAnimated:animated];
}

Answer 3

I had quite the same problem. I know the topic is old but maybe my solution could help someone else... You just have to move your modal definition in a method:

// ModalViewController initialization
- (void) presentStartUpModal 
{
    ModalStartupViewController *startUpModal = [[ModalStartupViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"StartUpModalView" bundle:nil];
    startUpModal.delegate = self;

    [self presentModalViewController:startUpModal animated:YES];
    [startUpModal release]; 
}

Next, in viewDidLoad, call your modal definition method in a performSelector:withObject:afterDelay: with 0 as delay value. Like this:

- (void)viewDidLoad
{
    [super viewDidLoad];
    //[self presentStartUpModal];  // <== This line don't seems to work but the next one is fine.
    [self performSelector:@selector(presentStartUpModal) withObject:nil afterDelay:0.0];
}

I still don't understand why the 'standard' way doesn't work.

Answer 4

optionally it should work in viewDidAppear without the workaround.