iPhone Toolbar button spacing

Question

Is there a way to have the UIBarButtonItems in a toolbar space themselves out evenly?

Answer 1

Drop a Flexible Space bar button item in between your UIBarButtonItems. This is pretty easy to do in IB, look down the bottom of the controls.

If you want to do this programtically, this code should help:

UIBarButtonItem* button1 = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Button1" style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered target:self action:@selector(button1Action)];
UIBarButtonItem* button2 = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Button2" style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered target:self action:@selector(button2Action)];
UIBarButtonItem *flexibleSpace = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithBarButtonSystemItem:UIBarButtonSystemItemFlexibleSpace target:nil action:nil];
[myToolbar setItems:[NSArray arrayWithObjects:button1, flexibleSpace, button2, nil]];

Answer 2

Yup. Create a UIBarButtonItem with the -initWithBarButtonSystemItem: method using UIBarButtonSystemItemFlexibleSpace, and insert that between each of your actual toolbar items. E.g.:

UIBarButtonItem *flexSpace = [[UIBarButton alloc] initWithBarButtonSystemItem:UIBarButtonSystemItemFlexibleSpace];
myToolbar.items = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:buttonOne,flexSpace,buttonTwo,flexSpace,buttonThree,nil];
[flexSpace release];

Answer 3

Ignore the width on UIBarButtonItem suggestion; this is not the correct approach as recommended by Apple and will not work if you want to add further icons.

The correct approach is to add a "Flexible space" (technically another button!) in between each button. You see it in Interface Builder, or it can be added directly in code if needed.