Month: January 2015

IOS 8 Location-Based Notification

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When first time using location based feature on your app, your app must send a request authorization message to user to authorise location usage.

In order to create the location-based notification in iOS8, app must define the string in Info.plist file under the NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription or NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription.

nslocation

The message will be a description to user how the app will be using the location feature.  Remember that if you do not add this string, your app may not be able to use location based feature!

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IOS 8 Local Notification with Actions

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Quick note on how to set up local notification with actions in IOS 8:

1. Set up UIMutableUserNotificationAction.  You need to the following properties:

  • identifier (a string that will be used for respond to the action that user requested)
  • title (string to display on the button)
  • activationMode (enum for UIUserNotificationActivationMode: Foreground or Background.  define if the action running in background or bring the app to the foreground)
  • destructive (boolean, if set true the button will be red color)
  • authenticationRequired (boolean, set to true if you are doing some harmful action so that no other people can respond to the action)

2. Set up UIMutableUserNotificationCategory and set the identifier property.   We will group actions into different categories, and we will just use the category identifier to identify which set of actions will be used.

3. set category actions.  define default and minimal actions for different context.

4. Add category and type of notifications that will be used to UIUserNotificationSettings.

5. Register settings.  UIApplication.sharedApplication().registerUserNotifcationSettings(settings) and we are ready to send notification.

6. When creating a UILocalNotification, we will set the following properties:

  • category (category identifier we defined earlier.  actions belong to that category will be added to the notification)
  • alertBody (string, message to be displayed)
  • soundName (optional. sound for the notification)
  • fireDate (if you would like to schedule the notification to be display later, set this property)

7. Now you can call UIApplication.shareApplication().presentLocalNotificationNow(notification) or UIApplication.shareApplication().scheduleLocalNotification(notification)

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