How to force view controller orientation in iOS 8?

Question

Before iOS 8, we used below code in conjunction with supportedInterfaceOrientations and shouldAutoRotate delegate methods to force app orie

Answer 1

For me, the top level VC needed to implement the orientation overrides. Using VC's down the stack will have no effect if the top VC is not implementing.

VC-main
    |
    -> VC 2
        |
        -> VC 3

Only VC-Main is listened to, essentially in my testing.

Answer 2

First of all - this is a bad idea, in general, something wrong going with your app architecture, but, sh..t happens, if so, you can try to make something like below:

final class OrientationController {

    static private (set) var allowedOrientation:UIInterfaceOrientationMask = [.all]

    // MARK: - Public

    class func lockOrientation(_ orientationIdiom: UIInterfaceOrientationMask) {
        OrientationController.allowedOrientation = [orientationIdiom]
    }

    class func forceLockOrientation(_ orientation: UIInterfaceOrientation) {
        var mask:UIInterfaceOrientationMask = []
        switch orientation {
            case .unknown:
                mask = [.all]
            case .portrait:
                mask = [.portrait]
            case .portraitUpsideDown:
                mask = [.portraitUpsideDown]
            case .landscapeLeft:
                mask = [.landscapeLeft]
            case .landscapeRight:
                mask = [.landscapeRight]
        }

        OrientationController.lockOrientation(mask)

        UIDevice.current.setValue(orientation.rawValue, forKey: "orientation")
    }
}

Than, in AppDelegate

func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplicationLaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {
    // do stuff
    OrientationController.lockOrientation(.portrait)
    return true
}

// MARK: - Orientation

func application(_ application: UIApplication, supportedInterfaceOrientationsFor window: UIWindow?) -> UIInterfaceOrientationMask {
    return OrientationController.allowedOrientation
}

And whenever you want to change orientation do as:

OrientationController.forceLockOrientation(.landscapeRight)

Note: Sometimes, device may not update from such call, so you may need to do as follow

OrientationController.forceLockOrientation(.portrait)
OrientationController.forceLockOrientation(.landscapeRight)

That's all

Answer 3

This is a feedback to comments in Sid Shah's answer, regarding how to disable animations using:

[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:enabled];

Code:

- (void)viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated {
    [super viewWillAppear:NO];
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];

    // Stackoverflow #26357162 to force orientation
    NSNumber *value = [NSNumber numberWithInt:UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeRight];
    [[UIDevice currentDevice] setValue:value forKey:@"orientation"];
}

- (void)viewDidAppear:(BOOL)animated {
    [super viewDidAppear:NO];
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];
}

Answer 4

This way work for me in Swift 2 iOS 8.x:

PS (this method dont require to override orientation functions like shouldautorotate on every viewController, just one method on AppDelegate)

Check the "requires full screen" in you project general info.

So, on AppDelegate.swift make a variable:

var enableAllOrientation = false

So, put also this func:

func application(application: UIApplication, supportedInterfaceOrientationsForWindow window: UIWindow?) -> UIInterfaceOrientationMask {
        if (enableAllOrientation == true){
            return UIInterfaceOrientationMask.All
        }
        return UIInterfaceOrientationMask.Portrait
}

So, in every class in your project you can set this var in viewWillAppear:

override func viewWillAppear(animated: Bool)
{
        super.viewWillAppear(animated)
        let appDelegate = UIApplication.sharedApplication().delegate as! AppDelegate
        appDelegate.enableAllOrientation = true
}

If you need to make a choices based on the device type you can do this:

override func viewWillAppear(animated: Bool)
    {
        super.viewWillAppear(animated)
        let appDelegate = UIApplication.sharedApplication().delegate as! AppDelegate
        switch UIDevice.currentDevice().userInterfaceIdiom {
        case .Phone:
        // It's an iPhone
           print(" - Only portrait mode to iPhone")
           appDelegate.enableAllOrientation = false
        case .Pad:
        // It's an iPad
           print(" - All orientation mode enabled on iPad")
           appDelegate.enableAllOrientation = true
        case .Unspecified:
        // Uh, oh! What could it be?
           appDelegate.enableAllOrientation = false
        }
    }

Answer 5

If you are using navigationViewController you should create your own superclass for this and override:

- (BOOL)shouldAutorotate {
  id currentViewController = self.topViewController;

  if ([currentViewController isKindOfClass:[SecondViewController class]])
    return NO;

  return YES;
}

this will disable rotation in SecondViewController but if you push your SecondViewController when your device is on portrait orientation then your SecondViewController will appear in portrait mode.

Assume that you are using storyboard. You have to create manual segue (How to) and in your "onClick" method:

- (IBAction)onPlayButtonClicked:(UIBarButtonItem *)sender {
  NSNumber *value = [NSNumber numberWithInt:UIInterfaceOrientationLandscapeLeft];
  [[UIDevice currentDevice] setValue:value forKey:@"orientation"];
  [self performSegueWithIdentifier:@"PushPlayerViewController" sender:self];
}

This will force landscape orientation before your superclass disable autorotate feature.

Answer 6

My solution

In AppDelegate:

func application(application: UIApplication, supportedInterfaceOrientationsForWindow window: UIWindow?) -> UIInterfaceOrientationMask {
    if let topController = UIViewController.topMostViewController() {
        if topController is XXViewController {
            return [.Portrait, .LandscapeLeft]
        }
    }
    return [.Portrait]
}

XXViewController is the ViewController you want to support Landscape mode.

Then Sunny Shah's solution would work in your XXViewController on any iOS version:

let value = UIInterfaceOrientation.LandscapeLeft.rawValue
UIDevice.currentDevice().setValue(value, forKey: "orientation")

This is the utility function to find the top most ViewController.

extension UIViewController {

    /// Returns the current application's top most view controller.
    public class func topMostViewController() -> UIViewController? {
        let rootViewController = UIApplication.sharedApplication().windows.first?.rootViewController
        return self.topMostViewControllerOfViewController(rootViewController)
    }



    /// Returns the top most view controller from given view controller's stack.
    class func topMostViewControllerOfViewController(viewController: UIViewController?) -> UIViewController? {
        // UITabBarController
        if let tabBarController = viewController as? UITabBarController,
           let selectedViewController = tabBarController.selectedViewController {
            return self.topMostViewControllerOfViewController(selectedViewController)
        }

        // UINavigationController
        if let navigationController = viewController as? UINavigationController,
           let visibleViewController = navigationController.visibleViewController {
            return self.topMostViewControllerOfViewController(visibleViewController)
        }

        // presented view controller
        if let presentedViewController = viewController?.presentedViewController {
            return self.topMostViewControllerOfViewController(presentedViewController)
        }

        // child view controller
        for subview in viewController?.view?.subviews ?? [] {
            if let childViewController = subview.nextResponder() as? UIViewController {
                return self.topMostViewControllerOfViewController(childViewController)
            }
        }

        return viewController
    }

}