Question

After searching on how to implement a custom tab bar for my iphone app, I came across the TweetBot Tab Bar located here TweetBotTabBar

I downloaded the zip file and opened the Tweet Bot project in Xcode, however i’m not sure how to go about using it in my own app.

Do I have to import the TweetBot project into my own project or do I have to copy and paste the code separately?

My existing code uses the standard UITabBarController included in the SDK.

Thanks in advance for any help or suggestions.

Answer 1

From the source file copy these files into your project

Then create your rootViewController and add a TBTabBar to the view, assign different viewcontroller to your different tabbars and implement TBTabbarDelegate inside.

#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>
#import "TBTabBar.h"
@interface ViewController : UIViewController<TBTabBarDelegate>{
    TBTabBar *tabBar;
}

@end

Implementation of this view controller will be as follow

#import "ViewController.h"
#import "TweetBotTabBarTestViewController.h"
@interface ViewController ()

@end

@implementation ViewController
- (void)dealloc
{
    [tabBar release];
    [super dealloc];
}

- (void)didReceiveMemoryWarning
{
    // Releases the view if it doesn't have a superview.
    [super didReceiveMemoryWarning];

    // Release any cached data, images, etc that aren't in use.
}

#pragma mark - View lifecycle

- (void)viewDidLoad
{
    [super viewDidLoad];

    TweetBotTabBarTestViewController *vc1 = [[TweetBotTabBarTestViewController alloc] init];
    TweetBotTabBarTestViewController *vc2 = [[TweetBotTabBarTestViewController alloc] init];
    TBViewController *vc3 = [[TBViewController alloc] init];
    vc3.view.backgroundColor = [UIColor darkGrayColor];

    TBTabButton *t1 = [[[TBTabButton alloc] initWithIcon:[UIImage imageNamed:@"timelineIcon"]] autorelease];
    t1.highlightedIcon = [UIImage imageNamed:@"timelineIconHighlighted"];
    t1.viewController = vc1;
    TBTabButton *t2 = [[[TBTabButton alloc] initWithIcon:[UIImage imageNamed:@"mentionsIcon"]] autorelease];
    t2.highlightedIcon = [UIImage imageNamed:@"mentionsIconHighlighted"];
    t2.viewController = vc2;
    TBTabButton *t3 = [[[TBTabButton alloc] initWithIcon:[UIImage imageNamed:@"messagesIcon"]] autorelease];
    t3.highlightedIcon = [UIImage imageNamed:@"messagesIconHighlighted"];
    t3.viewController = vc3;
    TBTabButton *t4 = [[[TBTabButton alloc] initWithIcon:[UIImage imageNamed:@"favoritesIcon"]] autorelease];
    t4.highlightedIcon = [UIImage imageNamed:@"favoritesIconHighlighted"];
    t4.viewController = vc3;
    TBTabButton *t5 = [[[TBTabButton alloc] initWithIcon:[UIImage imageNamed:@"searchIcon"]] autorelease];
    t5.highlightedIcon = [UIImage imageNamed:@"searchIconHighlighted"];
    t5.viewController = vc3;
    NSArray *a = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:t1, t2, t3, t4, t5, nil];
    tabBar = [[TBTabBar alloc] initWithItems:a];
    tabBar.delegate = self;
    [self.view addSubview:tabBar];
    [tabBar showDefaults];
}

#pragma mark - TBTabbar Delegate
-(void)switchViewController:(UIViewController *)viewController {
    UIView *currentView = [self.view viewWithTag:SELECTED_VIEW_CONTROLLER_TAG];
    [currentView removeFromSuperview];

    viewController.view.frame = CGRectMake(0,0,self.view.bounds.size.width, self.view.bounds.size.height-(tabBar.frame.size.height));

    viewController.view.tag = SELECTED_VIEW_CONTROLLER_TAG;

    [self.view insertSubview:viewController.view belowSubview:tabBar];
}


@end