I'm confused on why the observer is never removed in the following code. In my viewDidAppear I have the following:
-(void)viewDidAppear:(BOOL)animated{
id gpsObserver = [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter]
addObserverForName:FI_NOTES[kNotificationsGPSUpdated]
object:nil
queue:[NSOperationQueue mainQueue]
usingBlock:^(NSNotification *note){
NSLog(@"run once, and only once!");
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:gpsObserver];
}];
}
The observer never gets removed and the statement is output every time the notification is sent out. Can anyone provide any guidance?
When the block is pushed onto the stack by addObserverForName:
the method has not yet returned so gpsObserver is nil (under ARC) or garbage/undefined (not under ARC). Declare the variable using __block
outside and this should work.
__block __weak id gpsObserver;
gpsObserver = [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter]
addObserverForName:FI_NOTES[kNotificationsGPSUpdated]
object:nil
queue:[NSOperationQueue mainQueue]
usingBlock:^(NSNotification *note){
NSLog(@"run once, and only once!");
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter] removeObserver:gpsObserver];
}];
I've added an __weak to ensure there is no memory leak (as per Matt's answer). Code not tested.
I find that in fact there is a memory leak unless the observer is marked both __block
and __weak
. Use Instruments to make sure that self
is not being overretained; I bet it is. This, however, works correctly (from my actual code):
__block __weak id observer = [[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter]
addObserverForName:@"MyMandelbrotOperationFinished"
object:op queue:[NSOperationQueue mainQueue]
usingBlock:^(NSNotification *note) {
// ... do stuff ...
[[NSNotificationCenter defaultCenter]
removeObserver:observer
name:@"MyMandelbrotOperationFinished"
object:op];
}];