Question

I was trying to set a button so it appears on every view that has a navigation bar. Setting the appearance for all views is not a problem using the appearance proxy on the AppDelegate

[[UINavigationBar appearance] setTintColor:[UIColors grayColor]];

I was trying to subclass UINavigationController and then set that navigation controller on the storyboard. On the viewDidLoad method I’ve tried this:

self.navigationItem.rightBarButtonItem = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"right"
                                                                         style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered target:self action:nil];

But the button is not showing up.

If I do this:

self.navigationBar.topItem.rightBarButtonItem = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"right"
                                                                         style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered target:self action:nil];

The button shows up but disappears once you go to the next screen.

I’m trying to do it so I don’t have to set up the right and left buttons on all viewDidLoad methods of each view controller. Is it possible to use a subclass of UINavigationController to set attributes of the navbar?

Answer 1

Apple tells us not to subclass UINavigationController:

This class is not intended for subclassing. Instead, you use instances of it as-is in situations where you want your application’s user interface to reflect the hierarchical nature of your content.

That’s from the XCode version of the docs. The online version loosens up a bit, replacing that advice with:

This class is generally used as-is but may be subclassed in iOS 6 and later.

How about creating a custom subclass of UIViewController with a modified viewDidLoad and base all of your custom VC’s on that?