Question

With the following setup

....
MyUIMenuItem *someAction  = [[MyUIMenuItem alloc]initWithTitle : @"Something"  action : @selector(menuItemSelected:)];
MyUIMenuItem *someAction2 = [[MyUIMenuItem alloc]initWithTitle : @"Something2" action : @selector(menuItemSelected:)];
....

- (IBAction) menuItemSelected : (id) sender
{
    UIMenuController *mmi = (UIMenuController*) sender;
}

How to figure out which menu item was selected.

And don’t say that you need to have two methods… Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Okay, I’ve solved this one. The solution isn’t pretty, and the better option is “Apple fixes the problem”, but this at least works.

First of all, prefix your UIMenuItem action selectors with “magic_“. And don’t make corresponding methods. (If you can do that, then you don’t need this solution anyway).

I’m building my UIMenuItems thus:

NSArray *buttons = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:@"some", @"random", @"stuff", nil];
NSMutableArray *menuItems = [NSMutableArray array];
for (NSString *buttonText in buttons) {
    NSString *sel = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"magic_%@", buttonText];
    [menuItems addObject:[[UIMenuItem alloc] 
                         initWithTitle:buttonText
                         action:NSSelectorFromString(sel)]];
}
[UIMenuController sharedMenuController].menuItems = menuItems;

Now your class that catches the button tap messages needs a few additions. (In my case the class is a subclass of UITextField. Yours might be something else.)

First up, the method that we’ve all been wanting to have but that didn’t exist:

- (void)tappedMenuItem:(NSString *)buttonText {
    NSLog(@"They tapped '%@'", buttonText);
}

Then the methods that make it possible:

- (BOOL)canPerformAction:(SEL)action withSender:(id)sender {
    NSString *sel = NSStringFromSelector(action);
    NSRange match = [sel rangeOfString:@"magic_"];
    if (match.location == 0) {
        return YES;
    }
    return NO;
}

- (NSMethodSignature *)methodSignatureForSelector:(SEL)sel {
    if ([super methodSignatureForSelector:sel]) {
        return [super methodSignatureForSelector:sel];
    }
    return [super methodSignatureForSelector:@selector(tappedMenuItem:)];
}

- (void)forwardInvocation:(NSInvocation *)invocation {
    NSString *sel = NSStringFromSelector([invocation selector]);
    NSRange match = [sel rangeOfString:@"magic_"];
    if (match.location == 0) {
        [self tappedMenuItem:[sel substringFromIndex:6]];
    } else {
        [super forwardInvocation:invocation];
    }
}