Question

How would I create a number of NSDictionary variables using an array’s count?

This is basically what I came up with, but I’m not sure how to make this work with Objective-C syntax. doesntContainAnother is an NSArray. I want the names of the dictionaries to use the current value of loopInt.

int *loopInt = 0;
while (doesntContainAnother.count <= loopInt) {

    NSMutableDictionary *[NSString stringWithFormat:@"loopDictionary%i", loopInt] = [[[NSMutableDictionary alloc] init] autorelease];
    [NSString stringWithFormat:@"loopDictionary%i", loopInt] = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObject:[array1 objectAtIndex:loopInt] 
                                                 forKey:[array2 objectAtIndex:loopInt]];
    loopInt = loopInt + 1;
}

Answer 1

Create a mutable array and loop until you reach the original array’s count, creating a dictionary and adding it to the mutable array on each iteration.

Your code should look like this.

NSMutableArray *dictionaries = [[NSMutableArray alloc] init];
for (int i = 0; i < doesntContainAnother.count; i++) {
    [dictionaries addObject:[NSMutableDictionary dictionaryWithObject:[array1 objectAtIndex:i] forKey:[array2 objectAtIndex:i]]];
}

The approach of creating variables with numbers at the end of their names is an antipattern and not even possible in Objective-C. It’s equivalent to an array, but clunkier.