Reading plist file

Question

I created plist with big base of different animals in it (keys) and added this plist in my project. Type of every animal is NSDictionary. In every dictionary there are 5 more keys - characteristics of these animals (). I would like to go through every animal and if I match a certain characteristics of this animal, I put this animal in another array.

So, I tried to make a code:

NSArray *newArray = [[NSArray alloc]initWithContentsOfFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"animals" ofType:@"plist"]];    

for (int i = 0;[newArray objectAtIndex:i];i++)    
{      
      if ([[newArray objectAtIndex:i]objectForKey:@"minAge"] == [NSNumber numberWithInt:3]) 
      {            
              [array addObject:[[newArray objectAtIndex:i]objectForKey:@"name"]];                  
      }
}

So objectAtIndex:i is an animal and minAge is one of it's characteristics. But my code does not work. I do it for the first time, so what I have done wrong ? Thanks!

UPDATE: Thank you, your plist works normally ! But I still cant understand why doesn't work mine plist:

Anyway, thank you so much ! I didn't eat and sleep while I was solving this problem :) You helped me a lot !

Answer 1

NSArray The Return value will be nil if the file can’t be opened or if the contents of the file can’t be parsed into an array.

I suspect the issue is you need to put the contents in a NSDictionary rather than a NSArray

 NSDictionary *theDict = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:plistFile];

Edit.Further to my answer

NSMutableArray *mutableArray =[[NSMutableArray alloc] initWithObjects:nil];
NSDictionary *mainDictionary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"animals" ofType:@"plist"]];

   //--get parent dictionary/Array named animals which holds the animals dictionary items
    NSDictionary *parentDictionary = [mainDictionary objectForKey:@"animals"];


    //---enumerate through the dictionary objects inside the parentDictionary
    NSEnumerator *enumerator = [parentDictionary objectEnumerator];
    id value;

    while ((value = [enumerator nextObject])) {
        if ([[value valueForKey:@"minAge"] isEqualToNumber:[NSNumber numberWithInt:3]]) 
        {            

            [mutableArray addObject:[value valueForKey:@"name"]];                  
        }


    }

If the animal dictionaries are not inside of a parent dictionary or Array, use something like this

NSMutableArray *mutableArray =[[NSMutableArray alloc] initWithObjects:nil];

    NSDictionary *mainDictionary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"animals" ofType:@"plist"]];




    //---enumerate through the dictionary objects 
    NSEnumerator *enumerator = [mainDictionary objectEnumerator];
    id value;

    while ((value = [enumerator nextObject])) {
        if ([[value valueForKey:@"minAge"] isEqualToNumber:[NSNumber numberWithInt:3]]) 
        {            

            [mutableArray addObject:[value valueForKey:@"name"]];                  
        }


    }

Edit. 1.

Try it with this plist. Make sure you use a plain text editor to paste it into and save as a plist file

Edit.2 . I have now updated my plist to match yours. Although the other one worked. I felt it would make more sense that we are using the same.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>Whale</key>
    <dict>
        <key>name</key>
        <string>Whale</string>
        <key>isMale</key>
        <true/>
        <key>color</key>
        <string>blue</string>
        <key>maxAge</key>
        <integer>8</integer>
        <key>minAge</key>
        <integer>3</integer>
    </dict>
    <key>Dolphin</key>
    <dict>
        <key>maxAge</key>
        <integer>20</integer>
        <key>name</key>
        <string>Dolphin</string>
        <key>isMale</key>
        <false/>
        <key>color</key>
        <string>blue</string>
        <key>minAge</key>
        <integer>15</integer>
    </dict>
</dict>
</plist>

Also, here is another example showing how to compare the boolean and number together

NSMutableArray *theAnimalMatched =[[NSMutableArray alloc] initWithObjects:nil];


    NSDictionary *mainDictionary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"data1" ofType:@"plist"]];



    //---enumerate through the dictionary objects inside the rootDictionary
    NSEnumerator *enumerator = [mainDictionary objectEnumerator];
    id returnValue;

 while ((returnValue = [enumerator nextObject])) {

         if ( [[returnValue valueForKey:@"isMale" ] boolValue] && [[returnValue valueForKey:@"minAge"] isEqualToNumber:[NSNumber numberWithInt:3]] && [[returnValue valueForKey:@"color"] isEqualToString:@"blue"]  )  
         {  

        [theAnimalMatched addObject:[returnValue valueForKey:@"name"]];                  
    }


}