Question

I’m trying to access an array from a custom UITableViewCell subclass. The array is created in my tableViewController. This is driving me crazy. I access other view controller’s objects all the time with ViewController *vcInstance. I actually need to edit the array from my cell subclass, but I can’t even NSLog it from my cell view controller. The array logs perfectly in my tableViewController. All I get is null from the cell subclass.

CustomCell.h

@property (retain, nonatomic) SongsViewController *vc;

CustomCell.m

@synthesize vc;

-(IBAction)setStateOfObjects
{
    NSMutableArray *array = [[NSMutableArray alloc] initWithArray:vc.parseTrackArray];
    NSLog(@"%@", array);
}

I’ve also simply tried: CustomCell.m

-(IBAction)setStateOfObjects
{
    SongsViewController *vc;
    NSLog(@"%@", vc.parseTrackArray);
}

Answer 1

EDIT: You’re not quite understanding how object referencing works. When you request an object from an array, or some other object that is “retaining” it, you are not creating a new object. So, you don’t end up with your “previous object” and an “updated object”. Consider this:

NSMutableDictionary *dict = [array objectAtIndex:index];
[dict setObject:@"Hello" forKey:@"Status"];
//You don't need to add *dict back to the array in place of the "old" one
//because you have been only modifying one object in the first place
[array replaceObjectAtIndex:index withObject:dict]; //this doesn't do anything

Considering that…

The way you’re going about this is backwards. Make a property in your UITableVieCell subclass for your array

interface CustomCell : UITableViewCell
@property (nonatomic,retain) NSMutableArray *vcArray;
@end

#import CustomCell.h
@implementation CustomCell
@synthesize vcArray;

-(IBAction)setStateOfObjects { 
    NSMutableDictionary *dictionary = [parseTrackArrayToBeModified objectAtIndex:currentIndex]; 
    [dictionary setObject:[NSNumber numberWithBool:YES] forKey:@"sliderEnabled"]; 

    //THIS LINE IS REDUNDANT
    //[parseTrackArrayToBeModified replaceObjectAtIndex:currentIndex withObject:dictionary]; 
    //END REDUNDANT LINE

 }

//in your ViewController's delegate method to create the cell
-(UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
    //assume previous code has CustomCell created and stored in variable
    CustomCell *cell;
    cell.vcArray = self.parseTrackArray;
    return cell;
}