DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties

Parse framework provides PFObject as the base class for their BaaS solution. Unfortunately they don’t provide ready to use solution for subclassing their object, declaring some @dynamic properties and using the setters and getters instead of their pseudo-NSDictionary interface, as Core Data does under the hood. This leads to code that’s not easily read and in many cases to ugly SOP (String Oriented Programming).

This project aims to provide several facilities to make your live easier:

• Subclasses of PFObject can use initWithAutoClassName to use the class name as the PFObject className.
• Every property declared as @dynamic in your subclass implementation will be provided a standard getter and setter that uses the PFObject interface for you.
• Your subclasses will automatically get type checking by the compiler, auto-completion by the editor and a more readable syntax.

How to use

Installing

Using CocoaPods

1. Include the following line in your Podfile:

   pod 'DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties', :git => 'https://github.com/drodriguez/DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties'
   

2. Run pod install

Manually

1. Clone, add as a submodule or download DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties.
2. Add all the files under Classes/common to your project.
3. Look at the Requirements section if you are not using ARC.

Using

Create your subclass of PFObject and declare its properties as you will normally do. Custom setters and getters are respected. Also readonly properties. Integer and floating point native types are automatically boxed and unboxed for you.

#import <Parse/Parse.h>

@interface MYDocument : PFObject

@property (nonatomic, copy) NSString *title;
@property (nonatomic, strong, readonly) NSNumber *countOfPages;
@property (nonatomic, strong, getter = isLandscape) NSNumber *landscape;
@property (nonatomic, assign) CGFloat width;
@property (nonatomic, assign) CGFloat height;

@end

In your implementation simply declare those properties as @dynamic and import DRTPFObject+DynamicProperties.h. If you want to use your own class name as the PFObject className, invoke initWithAutoClassName in your initializers.

#import "MYDocument.h"
#import "DRTPFObject+DynamicProperties.h"

@implementation MYDocument

@dynamic title;
@dynamic countOfPages;
@dynamic landscape;
@dynamic width;
@dynamic height;

- (id)init
{
    return [self initWithAutoClassName];
}

@end

And finally use your object as you will normally do. You can mix PFObject and properties as you will (properties of native types will return the corresponding NSNumber representation).

MYDocument *document = [MYDocument init];
document.title = @"My awesome document";
[document setObject:@42 forKey:@"countOfPages"];
document.landscape = @YES;
document.width = 123.45f;
document.height = 678.90f;
[document save];

NSLog("The document is titled %@, has %@ pages, landscape is %@, and measures %f x %f",
      document.title,
      document.countOfPages,
      document.isLandscape,
      document.width,
      document.height);

You can also assign nil freely to those dynamic properties. It will get converted into NSNull and back for you without doing something else.

MYDocument *document = [MYDocument init];
document.title = nil; // Stores NSNull into "title" key.
[document save];

NSLog("The document is titled %@", document.title);
// -> The document is titled (null)

NSLog("The document is really titled %@", [document objectForKey:@"title"]);
// -> The document is really titled <null>

Requirements

DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties should work in any iOS version where Parse framework works, but have only been tested in iOS 5.0 and higher.

DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties uses ARC, so if you use it in a non-ARC project, and you are not using CocoaPods, you will need to use -fobjc-arc compiler flag on every DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties source file.

To set a compiler flag in Xcode, go to your desidered target and select the “Build Phases” tab. Select all DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties source files, press Enter, add -fobjc-arc and then “Done” to enable ARC for DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties.

TODO

• Nothing in my mind, do you have any idea?

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md file for more info.

Credits & Contact

DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties was created by Daniel Rodríguez Troitiño. You can follow me on Twitter @yonosoytu.

License

DRTPFObjectDynamicProperties is available under the MIT license. See LICENSE file for more info.