Question

I want to create a class that I want to serialize as XML using the property names and property values of the class. For that I created the following function in my base class (from which I will derive all my other classes):

- (NSString*) serialize
{
    unsigned int outCount, i;
    NSMutableString* s = [NSMutableString string];

    Class currentClass = [self class];
    while(currentClass != nil) {
        objc_property_t *properties = class_copyPropertyList([self class], &outCount);
        if(outCount > 0) {
            for(i = 0; i < outCount; i++) {
                objc_property_t property = properties[i];
                NSString *name = [NSString stringWithCString: property_getName(property) encoding: NSUTF8StringEncoding];
                [s appendFormat: @"<%@>%@</%@>", name, (NSString*)property, name];
            }
        }
        free(properties);
    }
    return (NSString*)s;
}

@end

I am assuming that all the properties are (nonatomic,strong) NSString* (for now – a more sophisticated code would come later). Now for some reason when I hit the line

[s appendFormat: @"<%@>%@</%@>", name, (NSString*)property], name];

I am getting a EXC_BAD_ACCESS exception.
What am I doing wrong?
Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

Found it. Just use

                NSString *value = [self valueForKey:name];

to get the property value…