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I don’t know what’s my thing about logging, it’s just total handy, and look how my console looks since today!

I always printed out which function i am in (easy… just use __FUNCTION__ as macro…) but now it does that WITH ACTUAL PARAMETERS! How awesome is that? You still see some older comments that now “repeat” themselves, all I need to do now on functions is using my DDLogFunction() macro.

How? A blend of cocoalumberjack, my own formatter (see my blog), a modified HOLog, and a modification of LOG_MACRO

Disclaimer: Don’t use this in released code, it’s for debugging only! (You do let the preprocessor compile out your logs, do you?)

Mocking asynchronous http calls is always kinda tricky. And it doesn’t become any easier if you use blocks too. And since my fork of asi-http-request finally is about to merge (check out the blocks-test branch!), we have to work on this.

First, we need some basic block infrastructure. Add this to your project (or better, to your supporting-categories-subproject):

This helps us executing blocks after some delay. Async calls are most likely not to return instantly, so we want to simulate this.

Next, we look at OCMock. While mostly used with SenTestingKit, we use it for mocking the ASIHTTPRequest – helping test our actual software. (This can really replace unit testing, if you use it in combination with UIAutomation)

Note: Some if this (esp. the OCMock part) can also be applied if you work with plain ol’ NSURLConnection – but it’s only half the fun (and elegance)

Integrating OCMock is kinda tricky, be sure to use -all_load OR -force_load . Adding both will obviously fail. Best you use the actual xcode project from the source (not the lib as they propose). Add that to Xcode and include both libOCMock.a and don’t forget to add direct dependencies to OCMockPhoneSim and OCMockPhoneDevice. This really should be simpler with their compiled lib, but they forgot to build the lib universal, leaving simulator out.

And you probably don’t want that code in the AppStore-build, so either create a new target or remove the project prior compiling that.

So, now to the delicate stuff. I use preprocessor defines to enable/disable the mocking. The actual mocking part is between #ifdef MOCK_HANDSHAKE and #endif, but here’s a more complete example to get the idea…

See how we set the 3 seconds delay in RunAfterDelay, creating yet another block that calls our completionBlock, while playing nice with memory. The actual response is loaded from the textfile “mock_handshake.txt” that’s included in our main project.

Please drop me a line if you believe this was helpful.

spoiler: no, it isn’t

But – here’s some new awesome stuff for iOS devs…

• FunctionKit … just see for yourself. FunctionalKit on steroids (and c++)
• ELCImagePickerController
  A clone of the UIImagePickerController using the Assets Library Framework allowing for multiple asset selection. Obviously iOS4 only. (Assets use blocks and were introduced in iOS4)
• ActiveRecord Fetching for Core Data
  More than just helper, a complete framework to work hassle-free with Core Data
• Seriously
  The Objective-C HTTP library that Apple should have created, seriously.
• Slow Motion Enabler “slowmo” – watch your animations 10x as slow.
• speedlimit – slows down network speed, simulate 3G, Edge, GPRS with iPhone Simulator

You should follow me on GitHub to get all those classy gems in your daily stream.

Even after more than a year, CoreData still surprises frustrates enlightens me.

First of, seems I’m doing it all wrong, the whole time. Go get mogenerator + Xmo’d. This should be in the Apple Docs, so useful! mogenerator autocreates core data class files everytime you save the .xcdatamodel file. All you have to do is add a “xmod” comment on that file. (and don’t forget to add the auto-added files as a compile-target, or you end up with NSManagedObjects)

Base is an awesome sqlite browser, much better than that no longer maintained QT stuff i had before.

You can set default data values. Even “last Tuesday at dinner” works here! nah, you can’t, this translates at compile time.

Need more? check out “Core Data Tips & Tricks“