I am working on an iPhone app and am getting (null) references to IBOutlet fields in my controller. I have a UIViewController subclass that is set as the File's Owner in my XIB. I have a set of UI elements that are wired into the controller. After loading from NIB and attempting to set properties on those UI elements, I find that they are (null). To clarify, some code:
ExpandSearchPageController.h:
@interface ExpandSearchPageController : UIViewController
{
IBOutlet UITextView * completeMessageView;
}
-(void)checkTextField;
@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet UITextView * completeMessageView;
ExpandSearchPageController.m:
@implementation ExpandSearchPageController
@synthesize completeMessageView;
-(void)checkTextField
{
NSLog(@"text field: %@",completeMessageView);
}
ExpandSearchPageController is set as the File's Owner for ExpandSearchPage.xib. ExpandSearchPage.xib's UITextView is wired to the completeMessageView.
When I call
ExpandSearchPageController * searchExpanderPage = [[ExpandSearchPageController alloc] initWithNibName:@"ExpandSearchPage" bundle:[NSBundle mainBundle]];
[searchExpanderPage checkTextField];
the result is
"text field: (null)"
I guess asking the question after looking at the problem for over an hour led me to figure it out:
I just changed my code to check the text box AFTER displaying the view... now everything is instantiated.
Imagine that: the UI elements aren't instantiated until you display them!