UICollectionViewFlowLayout implementation

Question

I am trying to accomplish the following, I've done this easily with UIScrollview but I've been experimenting with UICollectionView lately (I know I'm pretty late to the game) and would love to know if in order to do what I want I have to implement a custom layout or if FlowLayout already does this for me.

Basically, if you look at the attachment, you will notice that scrolling can happen both vertically and horizontally, the rows go all the way to beyond the UICollectionView height. The same happens with columns going beyond the width of the collection view.

Is this possible to do with Flowlayout?

Answer 1

I've done it like this.

#define space 5
#import "MultpleLineLayout.h"

@implementation MultpleLineLayout { // a subclass of UICollectionViewFlowLayout
    NSInteger itemWidth;
    NSInteger itemHeight;
}

-(id)init {
    if (self = [super init]) {
        itemWidth = 60;
        itemHeight = 60;
    }
    return self;
}

-(CGSize)collectionViewContentSize {
    NSInteger xSize = [self.collectionView numberOfItemsInSection:0] * (itemWidth + space); // "space" is for spacing between cells.
    NSInteger ySize = [self.collectionView numberOfSections] * (itemHeight + space);
    return CGSizeMake(xSize, ySize);
}

- (UICollectionViewLayoutAttributes *)layoutAttributesForItemAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)path {
    UICollectionViewLayoutAttributes* attributes = [UICollectionViewLayoutAttributes layoutAttributesForCellWithIndexPath:path];
    attributes.size = CGSizeMake(itemWidth,itemHeight);
    int xValue = itemWidth/2 + path.row * (itemWidth + space);
    int yValue = itemHeight + path.section * (itemHeight + space);
    attributes.center = CGPointMake(xValue, yValue);
    return attributes;
}


-(NSArray*)layoutAttributesForElementsInRect:(CGRect)rect {
    NSInteger minRow =  (rect.origin.x > 0)?  rect.origin.x/(itemWidth + space) : 0; // need to check because bounce gives negative values  for x.
    NSInteger maxRow = rect.size.width/(itemWidth + space) + minRow;
    NSMutableArray* attributes = [NSMutableArray array];
    for(NSInteger i=0 ; i < self.collectionView.numberOfSections; i++) {
        for (NSInteger j=minRow ; j < maxRow; j++) {
            NSIndexPath* indexPath = [NSIndexPath indexPathForItem:j inSection:i];
            [attributes addObject:[self layoutAttributesForItemAtIndexPath:indexPath]];
        }
    }
    return attributes;
}

My data source was an array of arrays with each inner array providing the data for an individual row.

After Edit:

My collection view scrolled in both directions. This is what I had in my viewDidload to set things up:

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    self.theData = @[@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"], @[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"0",@"1",@"2",@"3",@"4",@"5",@"6",@"7",@"8",@"9",@"10",@"11",@"12",@"13",@"14",@"15",@"16",@"17",@"18",@"19",@"20"],@[@"Z0",@"Z1",@"Z2",@"Z3",@"Z4",@"Z5",@"Z6",@"Z7",@"Z8",@"Z9",@"Z10",@"Z11",@"Z12",@"Z13",@"Z14",@"Z15",@"Z16",@"Z17",@"Z18",@"Z19",@"Z20"]];
    MultpleLineLayout *layout = [[MultpleLineLayout alloc] init];
    self.collectionView = [[RDCollectionView alloc] initWithFrame:self.view.bounds collectionViewLayout:layout];
    self.collectionView.dataSource = self;
    self.collectionView.delegate = self;
    self.view.backgroundColor = [UIColor blackColor];
    [self.view addSubview:self.collectionView];
    [self.collectionView registerClass:[DataCell class] forCellWithReuseIdentifier:@"DataCell"];
    [self.collectionView reloadData];
}