Question

I am developing an application which includes 5 plist files. I want to save all those files in documents directory. Because I want to add data to them dynamically. I am Creating a plist path using

Retrieving data from plist

NSMutableArray *pathsArray = NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(NSDocumentDirectory, NSUserDomainMask, YES);
NSString *docpath = [pathsArray objectAtIndex:0];
NSString *scorePlistPath = [docpath stringByAppendingPathComponent:@"highScores.plist"];

if (![[NSFileManager defaultManager] fileExistsAtPath:scorePlistPath]) {
    scorePlistPath = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"highScores" ofType:@"plist"];
}
highScoreArray = [[NSMutableArray alloc]initWithContentsOfFile:scorePlistPath];

Writing data to plist

scorePlistPath = [docpath stringByAppendingPathComponent:@"highScores.plist"];

[highScoreArray writeToFile:scorePlistPath atomically:YES];

Now I want to add one more plists in documents directory.. Not in the Bundle. How can i do that..?

Answer 1

programatically you cannot add files into the application bundle because you don’t have permission and to save or load the files from the Documents folder is not a big deal:

first, you need to define the URL where the file is:

NSString *_filename = @"myOwn.plist";
NSURL *_resourceURL = [[[[NSFileManager defaultManager] URLsForDirectory:NSDocumentDirectory inDomains:NSUserDomainMask] lastObject] URLByAppendingPathComponent:_fileName];

then you can save the file:

NSArray *_array = // your array as you defined
[_array writeToURL:_resourceURL atomically:true];

and anytime the file can be loaded again:

NSData *_plistData = [NSData dataWithContentsOfFile:[_resourceURL path]];
NSArray *_loadedArray = [NSPropertyListSerialization propertyListFromData:_plistData mutabilityOption:NSPropertyListImmutable format:nil errorDescription:nil]; // the option or the format parameter might be set for your special wishes, so check the documentation, please

and violá, it is done.

UPDATE #1

this code is working perfectly on any real device with iOS4.3+, it has never been tested on the simulator.