Question

I’m looking for a way to dynamically create NSString objects in objective C based on how many of them I need (between 1 and 5). I then want to use those strings as names of objects which also are dynamically created;

Pseudo Code:

for (i=1, i <= number_of_characters, i++)
{
NSMutableString* theString = [NSMutableString character];
[theString appendString:[NSString stringWithFormat:@"%i ",i]];
UILabel *theString;
[theString release];
}

and I am hoping to get several UILabel objects named:

character1

character2

character3

and so on…

Thanks!

Answer 1

You can create UILabel objects on the fly, but you can’t create variables at runtime. If you want to set the text of the label to theString, that’s no problem:

NSMutableArray *labels = [NSMutableArray array];
for (i=1, i <= number_of_characters, i++)
{
    NSMutableString* theString = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"%i ",i];
    UILabel *label = [[UILabel alloc] initWithFrame:someCGRect];
    label.text = theString;
    [labels addObject:label];
    [theString release];
}

Now you’ve got an array full of labels, each of which has a number as its text. The labels haven’t been added to any view yet, so you’ll want to take care of that.