iOS - Position UIView in center of superview using Auto Layout programmatically

Question

How do you programmatically set a UIView to be in the center of its superview using Auto Layout?

UIButton* viewObj = [UIButton buttonWithType:UIButtonTypeRoundedRect];
[viewObj setTranslatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints:NO];
[viewObj setBackgroundColor:[UIColor greenColor]];
[self.view addSubview:viewObj];

NSLayoutConstraint* cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj
                                                      attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterX
                                                      relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual
                                                         toItem:self.view
                                                      attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterX 
                                                     multiplier:1.0
                                                       constant:0];
[self.view addConstraint:cn];
cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj 
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterY
                                  relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual 
                                     toItem:self.view
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterY
                                 multiplier:1.0
                                   constant:0];
[self.view addConstraint:cn];

The above code works for me for UIButton, but I'm having trouble replacing the first line with something that works for a UIView.

I've tried

UIView* viewObj = [UIView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectZero];

but the view does not show up in simulator.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Answer 1

UIButton, UIImageView, UIlabel and UITextField can automatically set their size according to their content properties. The width and height of a UIImageView are set by the UIImage it may contain. The size of a UILabel will depend on its text. The width and height of a UIButton are defined by the title and the image it has (you can learn more about it with Intrinsic Content Size).

Therefore, when you want to center a UIButton, a UILabel, a UITextField or a UIImageView inside a UIView with auto layout, in almost all cases you don't have to create constraints for their width and height. You simply need to set horizontal and vertical constraints for them.

However, with auto layout, a UIView that has no subviews can't rely on anything to set its size unless you provide it some arbitrary width and height constraints. And according to your needs, you can solve this in 3 different ways.

---

The pure auto layout style

Here, we set the width and height of our UIView directly as auto layout constraints:

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()

    let newView = UIView()
    newView.backgroundColor = .redColor()
    newView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    view.addSubview(newView)

    // Auto layout code using anchors (iOS9+)
    let horizontalConstraint = newView.centerXAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(view.centerXAnchor)
    let verticalConstraint = newView.centerYAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(view.centerYAnchor)
    let widthConstraint = newView.widthAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(nil, constant: 100)
    let heightConstraint = newView.heightAnchor.constraintEqualToAnchor(nil, constant: 100)
    NSLayoutConstraint.activateConstraints([horizontalConstraint, verticalConstraint, widthConstraint, heightConstraint])
}

---

The autoresizing mask style

Here, we initialize our UIView with its width and height, make its center and its superview's center equal and create some autoresizing masks. Then, we ask UIKit to translate those autoresizing masks into auto layout constraints:

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()
    
    let newView = UIView(frame: CGRect(x: 0.0, y: 0.0, width: 100.0, height: 100.0))
    newView.backgroundColor = .redColor()
    
    newView.center = CGPointMake(view.bounds.midX, view.bounds.midY)
    newView.autoresizingMask = [.FlexibleLeftMargin, .FlexibleRightMargin, .FlexibleTopMargin, .FlexibleBottomMargin]

    newView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = true // default is true
    view.addSubview(newView)
}

---

The subclass style

Here, we create a subclass of UIView and override its intrinsicContentSize() method (declaration) so that it returns the desired size:

import UIKit

class CustomView: UIView {
    override func intrinsicContentSize() -> CGSize {
        return CGSize(width: 100, height: 100)
    }
}

class ViewController: UIViewController {
    
    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()
        
        let newView = CustomView()
        newView.backgroundColor = .redColor()
        newView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
        view.addSubview(newView)
        
        let horizontalConstraint = NSLayoutConstraint(item: newView,
            attribute: .CenterX,
            relatedBy: .Equal,
            toItem: view,
            attribute: .CenterX,
            multiplier: 1,
            constant: 0)
        view.addConstraint(horizontalConstraint)
        let verticalConstraint = NSLayoutConstraint(item: newView,
            attribute: .CenterY,
            relatedBy: .Equal,
            toItem: view,
            attribute: .CenterY,
            multiplier: 1,
            constant: 0)
        view.addConstraint(verticalConstraint)
    }
    
}

Answer 2

Since you asked this question in the context of using Auto Layout, the issue here is that a UIButton has an intrinsic size (communicated through the intrinsicContentSize method) that provides Auto Layout with information about width and height, but a UIView normally does not. So you need to add more constraints related to width and height.

If you want your UIView to be a set size (say, 200x200), you could add these lines:

cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj 
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeHeight
                                  relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual 
                                     toItem:nil
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeNotAnAttribute 
                                 multiplier:1
                                   constant:200];
[viewObj addConstraint:cn];

cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeWidth
                                  relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual
                                     toItem:nil
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeNotAnAttribute 
                                 multiplier:1 
                                   constant:200];
[viewObj addConstraint: cn];

Note that the toItem: argument is nil and the second attribute is NSLayoutAttributeNotAnAttribute, because you aren't specifying the width and height relative to anything else. If you want the subview's height and width to be relative to the superview (say, 0.5), you could do this:

cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeHeight
                                  relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual
                                     toItem:self.view
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeHeight 
                                 multiplier:0.5 
                                   constant:0];
[self.view addConstraint:cn];
cn = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:viewObj
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeWidth
                                  relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual
                                     toItem:self.view
                                  attribute:NSLayoutAttributeWidth
                                 multiplier:0.5
                                   constant:0];
[self.view addConstraint: cn];