How do I create delegates in Objective-C?

Question

I know how delegates work, and I know how I can use them.

But how do I create them?

Answer 1

Let's start with an example , if we buy a product online ,it goes through process like shipping/delivery handled by different teams.So if shipping gets completed ,shipping team should notify delivery team & it should be one to one communication as broadcasting this information would be overhead for other people / vendor might want to pass this information only to required people.

So if we think in terms of our app, an event can be an online order & different teams can be like multiple views.

Here is code consider ShippingView as Shipping team & DeliveryView as delivery team :

//Declare the protocol with functions having info which needs to be communicated
protocol ShippingDelegate : class {
    func productShipped(productID : String)
}
//shippingView which shows shipping status of products
class ShippingView : UIView
{

    weak var delegate:ShippingDelegate?
    var productID : String

    @IBAction func checkShippingStatus(sender: UIButton)
    {
        // if product is shipped
        delegate?.productShipped(productID: productID)
    }
}
//Delivery view which shows delivery status & tracking info
class DeliveryView: UIView,ShippingDelegate
{
    func productShipped(productID : String)
    {
        // update status on view & perform delivery
    }
}

//Main page on app which has both views & shows updated info on product whole status
class ProductViewController : UIViewController
{
    var shippingView : ShippingView
    var deliveryView : DeliveryView

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()
        // as we want to update shipping info on delivery view, so assign delegate to delivery object
        // whenever shipping status gets updated it will call productShipped method in DeliveryView & update UI.
        shippingView.delegate = deliveryView
        //
    }
}