Implementing Toolbar Search item

[BigEagle]

I am developing an app that has a tableview and a search view in the view controller and I have this feature working fine. However, I would like to move this search to use a toolbar search item. So, I was looking in the Coca programming for OS X and did not find any section dealing with implementing a search feature in the toolbar.
So, can anyone direct me to any tutorials/books that would help with this?

Thanks

[ibex10]

Did you try adding a Toolbar to the Window, and a Search Field to the toolbar?

[BigEagle]

Yes, I did add a Search Field to the toolbar, but I don’t see a way to create an @IBOutlet in the view controller as I did with the search field in the window. I think the protocol for implementing the search field in the toolbar will require several steps.

The Coca programming for OS X had a section on NSColor protocol and I was looking for a similar tutorial for implementing a search field in the toolbar.

[ibex10]

Try accessing the window from the view controller, and then access the toolbar. To do this, you will have to create a custom window.

//  MyWindow.swift

import Cocoa

class MyWindow: NSWindow {
    @IBOutlet var toolBar: NSToolbar!
}

//  ViewController.swift

import Cocoa

class ViewController: NSViewController {

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()

        // Do any additional setup after loading the view.
    }

    override var representedObject: Any? {
        didSet {
        // Update the view, if already loaded.
        }
    }

    override func viewWillAppear() {
        if let window = self.view.window as? MyWindow {
            print ("\(window.toolBar.items)")
        }
    }
}

[BigEagle]

Thanks for your answer…

I mostly follow your answer however I don’t see how to connect:

import Cocoa

class MyWindow: NSWindow {
    @IBOutlet var toolBar: NSToolbar!
}

the IBOutlet above to the toolbar in IB. What am I missing.

[ibex10]

Make sure that the window is properly configured in IB:

Its Custom Class attribute is set to the custom class (MyWindow) with the Toolbar outlet.

[BigEagle]

Thanks for the help. That was easy once you supplied the answer… Back to reading Cocoa programming for OS X.

However, I thought I could figure out how to get a hold of the search field it the toolbar. I tried the following code:

  override func viewWillAppear() {
          if let window = self.view.window as? CustWindow {
            print ("\(window.toolBar.identifier)")
            let toolBarItem = NSToolbar(identifier: window.toolBar.identifier)
            custSearchField = toolBarItem.??????
            print(toolBarItem)
          }
      }

but I did not see how to assign the search field in the toolbar to my variable custSearchField or expose the field to my view controller class. Please advise…

[ibex10]

It turns out that there is no need to create a custom window in order to access the toolbar; the standard window already comes with a toolbar property.

The example below assumes that there is only one item in the toolbar: the Search Field.

//  ViewController.swift

import Cocoa

class ViewController: NSViewController {

    override func viewWillAppear() {
        
        guard let toolbar = self.view.window?.toolbar else {
            return
        }
                
        guard let searchFieldToolbarItem = toolbar.items.first else {
            return
        }

        guard let searchField = searchFieldToolbarItem.view as? NSSearchField else {
            return
        }
                
        searchField.target = self
        searchField.action = #selector (procSearchFieldInput (sender:))
    }
    
    @objc func procSearchFieldInput (sender:NSSearchField) {
        print ("\(#function): \(sender.stringValue)")
    }
}

[BigEagle]

Thanks got it all working…I like this solution much better…

[BigEagle]

I tried to use this code in another custom view controller and got different results.

I have the following code in two custom view controllers.

// ToolBar Search override func viewWillAppear() {
guard let toolbar = self.view.window?.toolbar else {
    return
}
guard let searchFieldToolbarItem = toolbar.items.last else {
    return
}
custSearchField = (searchFieldToolbarItem.view as? NSSearchField)!
createMenuForSearchField()
custSearchField.target = self
custSearchField.action = #selector (custSearch (sender:))
}

Below is what I see with the debugger for the instance that works.

One instance shows baseNSSearchToolbarItem and then a baseNSToolbarItem before it gets to the baseNSObject while the other one starts with the baseNSObject. Why is this? Any ideas how to fix?

[BigEagle]

Here is the debugger that does not work

[BigEagle]

I got this working. The problem was resolved by adding a “search item” object in the toolbar instead of a “search Toolbar item” object.