Question

Suppose I have a UITableView with two sections. If the data source for that section is empty I would like to display a placeholder cell with the text “Section Name is empty.”

How can I do that?

Code

- (NSString *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView titleForHeaderInSection:(NSInteger)section
{
    if(section == 1)
    {
        return @"Section One";
    }
    if(section == 0)
    {
        return @"Section Two";
    }
    return @"";
}

- (NSInteger)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView numberOfRowsInSection:(NSInteger)section 
{
    if (section == 1) 
    {
        return self.sectionOne.count;
    }
    else
    {
        return self.sectionTwo.count;
    }
}

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath 
{

    NSArray *theSource =[[NSArray alloc] init];

    if(indexPath.section == 1)
    {
        theSource = self.sectionOne;
    }
    else
    {
        theSource = self.sectionTwo;
    }

    // See if there's an existing cell we can reuse
    UITableViewCell *cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:@"CellIdentifier"];
if (cell == nil) 
    {
        // No cell to reuse => create a new one
        cell = [[UITableViewCell alloc] initWithStyle:UITableViewCellStyleDefault reuseIdentifier:@"CellIdentifier"];
        cell.backgroundView = [[UIImageView alloc] init];
        // Continue creating cell
        }
  }

Answer 1

Implement the following functions in your UITableViewDataSource (pseudo code):

- (NSInteger)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView numberOfRowsInSection:(NSInteger)section
{
    if (datasource == empty)
        return 1;
    else
        return [datasource count];
}

And:

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath
{
    if (datasource == empty)
         return stub cell;
    else
         return regular cell;
}