Question

This isn’t another debate on brackets vs dot-notation. I noticed in Xcode that when I set outlets, Xcode automatically will set the pointers to nil in ViewDidUnload like so:

- (void)viewDidUnload
{
    [self setScrollView:nil];
    [self setEnergyLabel:nil];
    [self setEnergyBar:nil];
    [super viewDidUnload];
    // Release any retained subviews of the main view.
    // e.g. self.myOutlet = nil;
}

Is there a reason why they use bracket notation instead of using dot-notation, like so?

- (void)viewDidUnload
{
    self.scrollView = nil;
    self.energyLabel = nil;
    self.energyBar = nil;
    [super viewDidUnload];
    // Release any retained subviews of the main view.
    // e.g. self.myOutlet = nil;
}

Answer 1

There is no difference. I assume the latter is just easier for the script to generate from the class metadata.