Question

I’m trying to write an NSArray of NSDictionaries to the documents folder. I’m using

BOOL fileWritten = [favoritesArray writeToFile:fullFileName atomically:NO];
    if (fileWritten == NO) {
        NSLog(@"Writing favoritesFileFailed");
    }

The above keeps returning NO. Any idea why this wouldn’t be writing? What’s really strange is that this same code was working a few days ago. I read something stating that writeToFile can’t handle complex objects. Would NSDictionary be an object writeToFile can’t save?

Answer 1

Writing the NSDictionary itself to a file is not a problem, but the objects it holds may be.

By using the simple property list-related I/O methods, you can write out objects of classes NSArray, NSDictionary, NSData, NSString, NSNumber, NSDate, and any combination thereof (e.g., arrays of dictionaries).

Also, it won’t overwrite an existing file, so have you checked that?