Question

I have the Header of this class in my project:

    @interface VideoItem : NSObject <NSCoding> {
        NSString *idStr;
        NSString *name;
        NSString *link;
    }

    -(id)initWithVideoItem:(VideoItem*)video;

    @property (nonatomic, retain) NSString *name;
    @property (nonatomic, retain) NSString *link;
    @property (nonatomic, retain) NSString *idStr;

    @end

this is the implement:

@implementation VideoItem
@synthesize name,link,idStr;

-(id)initWithVideoItem:(VideoItem*)video{
    if (self = [super init]) {
        self.name = video.name;
        self.link = video.link;
        self.idStr = video.idStr;
    }
    return self;
}

#pragma mark 
#pragma mark NSCoder

- (void)encodeWithCoder:(NSCoder *)encoder{
    [encoder encodeObject:self.name forKey:@"video_name"];
    [encoder encodeObject:self.link forKey:@"video_link"];  
    [encoder encodeObject:self.idStr forKey:@"video_id"];   
    [encoder encodeObject:self.imgUrl forKey:@"video_img"];
    [encoder encodeObject:self.viewCount forKey:@"video_views"];
    [encoder encodeObject:self.artist forKey:@"video_artist"];
    [encoder encodeObject:self.timeStr forKey:@"video_timestr"];    
    [encoder encodeInt:self.seconds forKey:@"video_secondes"];
    [encoder encodeInt:self.rating forKey:@"video_rating"];
    [encoder encodeObject:self.pubDate forKey:@"pubDate"];

}

- (id)initWithCoder:(NSCoder *)decoder {
    if(self = [super init]){
        self.name = [decoder decodeObjectForKey:@"video_name"];
        self.link = [decoder decodeObjectForKey:@"video_link"]; 
        self.idStr = [decoder decodeObjectForKey:@"video_id"];
    }
    return self;
}

@end

And i want to know if in case like this i need to add dealloc method and release the strings or not?

Answer 1

Yes you should release the strings because when using the properties that retain objects.

- (void)dealloc {
   [idStr release];
   [name release];
   [link release];
   [super dealloc];
}

Normally you would copy the object in the init, this is a better way then since the orginal object can then savely be edited or released.

-(id)initWithVideoItem:(VideoItem*)video{
    if ((self = [super init])) {
        name = [video.name copy];
        link = [video.link copy];
        idStr = [video.idStr copy];
    }
    return self;
}

Since the copy method return a retained object you want to skip the property, since that would increase the retain count.

On a other note: the objective-c convention the private ivar should start with an _ to make it more obvious that they are not properties.