How to move the buttons in a UIAlertView to make r

Question

[EDIT] Hmm. Perhaps this question should be titled "what is the default user-input dialog view called in CocoaTouch?" I realize that I can create an entire view that is exactly what I want, and wrap it in a view controller and presentModalView -- but I was sort of hoping that there was a standard, normal user-input "dialog" view that came-with Cocoa-touch. "Enter your name", "enter text to search", etc., are VERY common things!

Anyway... here's the question as I originally asked it:

This code:

UIAlertView* find = [[UIAlertView alloc] init];
[find setDelegate:self];
[find setTitle:@"Find"];

[find addButtonWithTitle:@"Cancel"];
[find addButtonWithTitle:@"Find & Bring"];
[find addButtonWithTitle:@"Find & Go"];
[find addButtonWithTitle:@"Go To Next"];

[find addSubview:_findText];

CGRect frm = find.frame;
int height = frm.size.height + _findText.frame.size.height + 100; // note how even 100 has no effect.
[find setFrame:CGRectMake(frm.origin.x, frm.origin.y, frm.size.width, height)];

[find setNeedsLayout];
[find show];
[find release];

Produces this Alert view:

Find Alert http://www.publicplayground.com/IMGs/Misc/FindAlert.png

(I started with the code from this question by emi1Faber, and it works as advertised; however, as I state in my comment, the cancel button overlays the text field.)

How do I reshuffle everything to make the text field fit properly? [findAlert setNeedsLayout] doesn't seem to do anything, even after I [findAlert setFrame:tallerFrame]. Hints?

Thanks!

Answer 1

Even if you can get this working it's not going to be very iPhone-y. The UIAlertView really is not designed for user input like this. If you look in all the Apple apps you'll see that they use a new view that displayed using the presentModalViewController: method of UIViewController.

Edit: This advice is no longer as true as it was when I wrote it. Apple have increasingly used alert views as text entry boxes and iOS5 even includes native support without having to mess around with views (check out the alertViewStyle property).

I think maybe if you need to have four buttons then using a custom UIViewController is probably still the right way to go. But if you just want to enter a password with OK/Cancel buttons then it's fine.

Answer 2

Most probably You would want to look into the addTextFieldWithValue method of the UIAlertView? Add the following code somewhere at the top of Your class:

@interface UIAlertView ()
- (void) addTextFieldWithValue: (NSString*) val label: (NSString*) label;
- (UITextField*) textField;
@end

It’s not official, but IMHO it’s not getting You rejected from the App store and it’s much better solution than hacking the textfield into the dialog Yourself.