WKWebView causes my view controller to leak

Question

My view controller displays a WKWebView. I installed a message handler, a cool Web Kit feature that allows my code to be notified from inside the web page:

override func viewDidAppear(animated: Bool) {
    super.viewDidAppear(animated)
    let url = // ...
    self.wv.loadRequest(NSURLRequest(URL:url))
    self.wv.configuration.userContentController.addScriptMessageHandler(
        self, name: "dummy")
}

func userContentController(userContentController: WKUserContentController,
    didReceiveScriptMessage message: WKScriptMessage) {
        // ...
}

So far so good, but now I've discovered that my view controller is leaking - when it is supposed to be deallocated, it isn't:

deinit {
    println("dealloc") // never called
}

It appears that merely installing myself as a message handler causes a retain cycle and hence a leak!

Answer 1

The leak is caused by userContentController.addScriptMessageHandler(self, name: "handlerName") which will keep a reference to the message handler self.

To prevent leaks, simply remove the message handler via userContentController.removeScriptMessageHandlerForName("handlerName") when you no longer need it. If you add the addScriptMessageHandler at viewDidAppear, its a good idea to remove it in viewDidDisappear.

Answer 2

Basic problem: The WKUserContentController holds a strong reference to all WKScriptMessageHandlers that were added to it. You have to remove them manually.

Since this is still a problem with Swift 4.2 and iOS 11 I want to suggest a solution which is using a handler which is separate from the view controller that holds the UIWebView. This way the view controller can deinit normally and tell the handler to clean up as well.

Here is my solution:

UIViewController:

import UIKit
import WebKit

class MyViewController: JavascriptMessageHandlerDelegate {

    private let javascriptMessageHandler = JavascriptMessageHandler()

    private lazy var webView: WKWebView = WKWebView(frame: .zero, configuration: self.javascriptEventHandler.webViewConfiguration)

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()

        self.javascriptMessageHandler.delegate = self

        // TODO: Add web view to the own view properly

        self.webView.load(URLRequest(url: myUrl))
    }

    deinit {
        self.javascriptEventHandler.cleanUp()
    }
}

// MARK: - JavascriptMessageHandlerDelegate
extension MinigameViewController {
    func handleHelloWorldEvent() {

    }
}

Handler:

import Foundation
import WebKit

protocol JavascriptMessageHandlerDelegate: class {
    func handleHelloWorld()
}

enum JavascriptEvent: String, CaseIterable {
    case helloWorld
}

class JavascriptMessageHandler: NSObject, WKScriptMessageHandler {

    weak var delegate: JavascriptMessageHandlerDelegate?

    private let contentController = WKUserContentController()

    var webViewConfiguration: WKWebViewConfiguration {
        for eventName in JavascriptEvent.allCases {
            self.contentController.add(self, name: eventName.rawValue)
        }

        let config = WKWebViewConfiguration()
        config.userContentController = self.contentController

        return config
    }

    /// Remove all message handlers manually because the WKUserContentController keeps a strong reference on them
    func cleanUp() {
        for eventName in JavascriptEvent.allCases {
            self.contentController.removeScriptMessageHandler(forName: eventName.rawValue)
        }
    }

    deinit {
        print("Deinitialized")
    }
}

// MARK: - WKScriptMessageHandler
extension JavascriptMessageHandler {
    func userContentController(_ userContentController: WKUserContentController, didReceive message: WKScriptMessage) {
        // TODO: Handle messages here and call delegate properly
        self.delegate?.handleHelloWorld()
    }
}

Answer 3

The solution posted by matt is just what's needed. Thought I'd translate it to objective-c code

@interface WeakScriptMessageDelegate : NSObject<WKScriptMessageHandler>

@property (nonatomic, weak) id<WKScriptMessageHandler> scriptDelegate;

- (instancetype)initWithDelegate:(id<WKScriptMessageHandler>)scriptDelegate;

@end

@implementation WeakScriptMessageDelegate

- (instancetype)initWithDelegate:(id<WKScriptMessageHandler>)scriptDelegate
{
    self = [super init];
    if (self) {
        _scriptDelegate = scriptDelegate;
    }
    return self;
}

- (void)userContentController:(WKUserContentController *)userContentController didReceiveScriptMessage:(WKScriptMessage *)message
{
    [self.scriptDelegate userContentController:userContentController didReceiveScriptMessage:message];
}

@end

Then make use of it like this:

WKUserContentController *userContentController = [[WKUserContentController alloc] init];    
[userContentController addScriptMessageHandler:[[WeakScriptMessageDelegate alloc] initWithDelegate:self] name:@"name"];

Answer 4

Correct as usual, King Friday. It turns out that the WKUserContentController retains its message handler. This makes a certain amount of sense, since it could hardly send a message to its message handler if its message handler had ceased to exist. It's parallel to the way a CAAnimation retains its delegate, for example.

However, it also causes a retain cycle, because the WKUserContentController itself is leaking. That doesn't matter much on its own (it's only 16K), but the retain cycle and leak of the view controller are bad.

My workaround is to interpose a trampoline object between the WKUserContentController and the message handler. The trampoline object has only a weak reference to the real message handler, so there's no retain cycle. Here's the trampoline object:

class LeakAvoider : NSObject, WKScriptMessageHandler {
    weak var delegate : WKScriptMessageHandler?
    init(delegate:WKScriptMessageHandler) {
        self.delegate = delegate
        super.init()
    }
    func userContentController(userContentController: WKUserContentController,
        didReceiveScriptMessage message: WKScriptMessage) {
            self.delegate?.userContentController(
                userContentController, didReceiveScriptMessage: message)
    }
}

Now when we install the message handler, we install the trampoline object instead of self:

self.wv.configuration.userContentController.addScriptMessageHandler(
    LeakAvoider(delegate:self), name: "dummy")

It works! Now deinit is called, proving that there is no leak. It looks like this shouldn't work, because we created our LeakAvoider object and never held a reference to it; but remember, the WKUserContentController itself is retaining it, so there's no problem.

For completeness, now that deinit is called, you can uninstall the message handler there, though I don't think this is actually necessary:

deinit {
    println("dealloc")
    self.wv.stopLoading()
    self.wv.configuration.userContentController.removeScriptMessageHandlerForName("dummy")
}