Question

Is it possible on iOS that a view always floats above all other views. I ask this because what I would like to achieve is a view that floats above a ViewController, and then a Modal View Controller slides in, whilst that particular view is still floating over that Modal View Controller (hope you get what I am trying to say).

Answer 1

There is. You can add your view to the main window and bring it to front when you have to.

In following code is presumed that _viewConroller and _anotherView are strong properties of appDelegate – configuration could of course be different.

This code would add small blue square on top left corner of the screen.

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions {

    self.window = [[UIWindow alloc] initWithFrame:[[UIScreen mainScreen] bounds]];

    _viewController = [[ViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"ViewController" bundle:nil];
    _anotherView = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame: CGRectMake (0.0,0.0,20.0,20.0)];
    [anotherView setBackgroundColor: [UIColor blueColor]];    

    self.window.rootViewController = self.viewController;
    [self.window makeKeyAndVisible];

    [self.window addSubView: _anotherView];
    [self.window bringSubViewToFront: _anotherView]; //not really needed here but it doesn't do any harm

    return YES;
}