How do I detect when someone shakes an iPhone?

Question

I want to react when somebody shakes the iPhone. I don\'t particularly care how they shake it, just that it was waved vigorously about for a split second. Does anyone know h

Answer 1

This is the basic delegate code you need:

#define kAccelerationThreshold      2.2

#pragma mark -
#pragma mark UIAccelerometerDelegate Methods
    - (void)accelerometer:(UIAccelerometer *)accelerometer didAccelerate:(UIAcceleration *)acceleration 
    {   
        if (fabsf(acceleration.x) > kAccelerationThreshold || fabsf(acceleration.y) > kAccelerationThreshold || fabsf(acceleration.z) > kAccelerationThreshold) 
            [self myShakeMethodGoesHere];   
    }

Also set the in the appropriate code in the Interface. i.e:

@interface MyViewController : UIViewController <UIPickerViewDelegate, UIPickerViewDataSource, UIAccelerometerDelegate>

Answer 2

You need to check the accelerometer via accelerometer:didAccelerate: method which is part of the UIAccelerometerDelegate protocol and check whether the values go over a threshold for the amount of movement needed for a shake.

There is decent sample code in the accelerometer:didAccelerate: method right at the bottom of AppController.m in the GLPaint example which is available on the iPhone developer site.

Answer 3

In 3.0, there's now an easier way - hook into the new motion events.

The main trick is that you need to have some UIView (not UIViewController) that you want as firstResponder to receive the shake event messages. Here's the code that you can use in any UIView to get shake events:

@implementation ShakingView

- (void)motionEnded:(UIEventSubtype)motion withEvent:(UIEvent *)event
{
    if ( event.subtype == UIEventSubtypeMotionShake )
    {
        // Put in code here to handle shake
    }

    if ( [super respondsToSelector:@selector(motionEnded:withEvent:)] )
        [super motionEnded:motion withEvent:event];
}

- (BOOL)canBecomeFirstResponder
{ return YES; }

@end

You can easily transform any UIView (even system views) into a view that can get the shake event simply by subclassing the view with only these methods (and then selecting this new type instead of the base type in IB, or using it when allocating a view).

In the view controller, you want to set this view to become first responder:

- (void) viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated
{
    [shakeView becomeFirstResponder];
    [super viewWillAppear:animated];
}
- (void) viewWillDisappear:(BOOL)animated
{
    [shakeView resignFirstResponder];
    [super viewWillDisappear:animated];
}

Don't forget that if you have other views that become first responder from user actions (like a search bar or text entry field) you'll also need to restore the shaking view first responder status when the other view resigns!

This method works even if you set applicationSupportsShakeToEdit to NO.

Answer 4

From my Diceshaker application:

// Ensures the shake is strong enough on at least two axes before declaring it a shake.
// "Strong enough" means "greater than a client-supplied threshold" in G's.
static BOOL L0AccelerationIsShaking(UIAcceleration* last, UIAcceleration* current, double threshold) {
    double
        deltaX = fabs(last.x - current.x),
        deltaY = fabs(last.y - current.y),
        deltaZ = fabs(last.z - current.z);

    return
        (deltaX > threshold && deltaY > threshold) ||
        (deltaX > threshold && deltaZ > threshold) ||
        (deltaY > threshold && deltaZ > threshold);
}

@interface L0AppDelegate : NSObject <UIApplicationDelegate> {
    BOOL histeresisExcited;
    UIAcceleration* lastAcceleration;
}

@property(retain) UIAcceleration* lastAcceleration;

@end

@implementation L0AppDelegate

- (void)applicationDidFinishLaunching:(UIApplication *)application {
    [UIAccelerometer sharedAccelerometer].delegate = self;
}

- (void) accelerometer:(UIAccelerometer *)accelerometer didAccelerate:(UIAcceleration *)acceleration {

    if (self.lastAcceleration) {
        if (!histeresisExcited && L0AccelerationIsShaking(self.lastAcceleration, acceleration, 0.7)) {
            histeresisExcited = YES;

            /* SHAKE DETECTED. DO HERE WHAT YOU WANT. */

        } else if (histeresisExcited && !L0AccelerationIsShaking(self.lastAcceleration, acceleration, 0.2)) {
            histeresisExcited = NO;
        }
    }

    self.lastAcceleration = acceleration;
}

// and proper @synthesize and -dealloc boilerplate code

@end

The histeresis prevents the shake event from triggering multiple times until the user stops the shake.

Answer 5

Easiest solution is to derive a new root window for your application:

@implementation OMGWindow : UIWindow

- (void)motionEnded:(UIEventSubtype)motion withEvent:(UIEvent *)event {
    if (event.type == UIEventTypeMotion && motion == UIEventSubtypeMotionShake) {
        // via notification or something   
    }
}
@end

Then in your application delegate:

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions {
    self.window = [[OMGWindow alloc] initWithFrame:[UIScreen mainScreen].bounds];
    //…
}

If you are using a Storyboard, this may be trickier, I don’t know the code you will need in the application delegate precisely.

Answer 6

I came across this post looking for a "shaking" implementation. millenomi's answer worked well for me, although i was looking for something that required a bit more "shaking action" to trigger. I've replaced to Boolean value with an int shakeCount. I also reimplemented the L0AccelerationIsShaking() method in Objective-C. You can tweak the ammount of shaking required by tweaking the ammount added to shakeCount. I'm not sure i've found the optimal values yet, but it seems to be working well so far. Hope this helps someone:

- (void)accelerometer:(UIAccelerometer *)accelerometer didAccelerate:(UIAcceleration *)acceleration {
    if (self.lastAcceleration) {
        if ([self AccelerationIsShakingLast:self.lastAcceleration current:acceleration threshold:0.7] && shakeCount >= 9) {
            //Shaking here, DO stuff.
            shakeCount = 0;
        } else if ([self AccelerationIsShakingLast:self.lastAcceleration current:acceleration threshold:0.7]) {
            shakeCount = shakeCount + 5;
        }else if (![self AccelerationIsShakingLast:self.lastAcceleration current:acceleration threshold:0.2]) {
            if (shakeCount > 0) {
                shakeCount--;
            }
        }
    }
    self.lastAcceleration = acceleration;
}

- (BOOL) AccelerationIsShakingLast:(UIAcceleration *)last current:(UIAcceleration *)current threshold:(double)threshold {
    double
    deltaX = fabs(last.x - current.x),
    deltaY = fabs(last.y - current.y),
    deltaZ = fabs(last.z - current.z);

    return
    (deltaX > threshold && deltaY > threshold) ||
    (deltaX > threshold && deltaZ > threshold) ||
    (deltaY > threshold && deltaZ > threshold);
}

PS: I've set the update interval to 1/15th of a second.

[[UIAccelerometer sharedAccelerometer] setUpdateInterval:(1.0 / 15)];