Question

In terms of providing a nice text popup for users in an iPhone application, after they click on a help icon, what approach/style do people recommend?

In my view (re User Experience) I would have thought something that say:

• has a thin border with rounded edges around it
• takes up most of the screen
• has a vertical scroll bar if there is more text than can fit on one screen
• has a way for the user to dismiss

Interested in:

• recommended approach re UI design
• how to implement (which IOS UI objects to use)
• nice to have – example code

Answer 1

The thing about designing iPhone UI elements, including popups, is that you’re very strongly recommended to do it “Apple’s way” – follow their Human Interface Guidelines and use standard UI controls. The two ways I can think to do this offhand:

• Use a UIAlertView for a single chunk of text – it includes buttons for dismissal, properly shaded and colored for consistency with the rest of the OS and other apps. This is a quick, one- or two-line way of putting text on the screen and taking it off again. The downside: there’s no scrolling capability, and the box scales with the text you put in it (i.e. you can’t fix a size for the view).
• Use a new view (in a UIViewController) presented modally. This option gives you more flexibility and the capability to scroll, but at the cost of greater setup.

If you decide to go the second route, follow your existing instincts for how to lay it out – you’ll take over the entire screen on an iPhone, so you have some wiggle room. Your rounded-edges guess and vertical scrolling are right on (consider a UIScrollView for implementation).