Constants in Objective-C

Question

I\'m developing a Cocoa application, and I\'m using constant NSStrings as ways to store key names for my preferences.

I understand this is a good idea b

Answer 1

I am generally using the way posted by Barry Wark and Rahul Gupta.

Although, I do not like repeating the same words in both .h and .m file. Note, that in the following example the line is almost identical in both files:

// file.h
extern NSString* const MyConst;

//file.m
NSString* const MyConst = @"Lorem ipsum";

Therefore, what I like to do is to use some C preprocessor machinery. Let me explain through the example.

I have a header file which defines the macro STR_CONST(name, value):

// StringConsts.h
#ifdef SYNTHESIZE_CONSTS
# define STR_CONST(name, value) NSString* const name = @ value
#else
# define STR_CONST(name, value) extern NSString* const name
#endif

The in my .h/.m pair where I want to define the constant I do the following:

// myfile.h
#import <StringConsts.h>

STR_CONST(MyConst, "Lorem Ipsum");
STR_CONST(MyOtherConst, "Hello world");

// myfile.m
#define SYNTHESIZE_CONSTS
#import "myfile.h"

et voila, I have all the information about the constants in .h file only.

Answer 2

You should create a header file like

// Constants.h
FOUNDATION_EXPORT NSString *const MyFirstConstant;
FOUNDATION_EXPORT NSString *const MySecondConstant;
//etc.

(you can use extern instead of FOUNDATION_EXPORT if your code will not be used in mixed C/C++ environments or on other platforms)

You can include this file in each file that uses the constants or in the pre-compiled header for the project.

You define these constants in a .m file like

// Constants.m
NSString *const MyFirstConstant = @"FirstConstant";
NSString *const MySecondConstant = @"SecondConstant";

Constants.m should be added to your application/framework's target so that it is linked in to the final product.

The advantage of using string constants instead of #define'd constants is that you can test for equality using pointer comparison (stringInstance == MyFirstConstant) which is much faster than string comparison ([stringInstance isEqualToString:MyFirstConstant]) (and easier to read, IMO).

Answer 3

Easiest way:

// Prefs.h
#define PREFS_MY_CONSTANT @"prefs_my_constant"

Better way:

// Prefs.h
extern NSString * const PREFS_MY_CONSTANT;

// Prefs.m
NSString * const PREFS_MY_CONSTANT = @"prefs_my_constant";

One benefit of the second is that changing the value of a constant does not cause a rebuild of your entire program.

Answer 4

If you like namespace constant, you can leverage struct, Friday Q&A 2011-08-19: Namespaced Constants and Functions

// in the header
extern const struct MANotifyingArrayNotificationsStruct
{
    NSString *didAddObject;
    NSString *didChangeObject;
    NSString *didRemoveObject;
} MANotifyingArrayNotifications;

// in the implementation
const struct MANotifyingArrayNotificationsStruct MANotifyingArrayNotifications = {
    .didAddObject = @"didAddObject",
    .didChangeObject = @"didChangeObject",
    .didRemoveObject = @"didRemoveObject"
};

Answer 5

Try using a class method:

+(NSString*)theMainTitle
{
    return @"Hello World";
}

I use it sometimes.

Answer 6

There is also one thing to mention. If you need a non global constant, you should use static keyword.

Example

// In your *.m file
static NSString * const kNSStringConst = @"const value";

Because of the static keyword, this const is not visible outside of the file.

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Minor correction by @QuinnTaylor: static variables are visible within a compilation unit. Usually, this is a single .m file (as in this example), but it can bite you if you declare it in a header which is included elsewhere, since you'll get linker errors after compilation