Question

I have some settings in a plist, but when I kill my app I lose all the data stored there.

This is the code that I’m using:

.h

@property (retain, nonatomic) NSString *plistFilePath;
-(IBAction)setHomepage:(id)sender;

.m

@syntehzise plistFilePath;

-(IBAction)setHomepage:(id)sender{
plistFilePath = [NSString stringWithString:[[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"settings" ofType:@"plist"]];
    NSMutableDictionary *data= [[NSMutableDictionary alloc] initWithContentsOfFile:plistFilePath];
    [data setObject:@"http://www.google.com" forKey:@"Homepage"];
    [data writeToFile:plistFilePath atomically:YES];
    [data release];  

}

Am I doing something wrong? Should I use a different class or differents methods? Please help me because I don’t know why I store well the information but then when I kill the app I lose it.

Answer 1

As already mentioned the bundle is read only.

Try to avoid setting ‘settings’ in an a copied plist, as plists are just one more thing to managed. Instead, why not use NSUserDefaults and import your defaults from a defaults plist. For example, add a new plist to your project, and add this to your delegate:

// Get the shared defaults object
NSUserDefaults *defaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];

// Register the defaults each time the app loads
NSString *defaultsFile = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"Defaults" ofType:@"plist"];
NSDictionary *defaultsDict = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:defaultsFile];
[defaults registerDefaults:defaultsDict];

Now you can save data like this:

// Store the data
NSUserDefaults *defaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];
[defaults setObject:@"http://mattmelton.co.uk" forKey:@"HomePage"];
[defaults synchronize];

And retrieve it like this:

// Retrieve data
NSUserDefaults *defaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];
NSString *homePage = [defaults objectForKey:@"HomePage"];

And you don’t have to worry about external files. Naturally your defaults plist can be platform, user or device specific!

Hope this helps!