Access modal view controller parent

Question

I'm presenting a ViewController modally. How can I access the parent view controller ?

My architecture is TabBarController=>VC1=>VC2=>VC3=>MVC1, and I want to reach VC3 from MVC1.

In VC3, I have this code :

- (void) editAd{
    AskPasswordViewController *modalViewController = [[AskPasswordViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"AskPasswordView" bundle:nil];

    NSLog(@"modalparent class=%@", [[modalViewController parentViewController] class]);

    [self presentModalViewController:modalViewController animated:YES];
    [modalViewController release];
}

I tried this in MVC1:

- (void) sendRequest {
    NSLog(@"classe : %@",[[self parentViewController] class] );
}

but it returns my TabBarViewController...

Answer 1

You can access parent by calling:

self.presentingViewController

As per apple documentation:

The view controller that presented this view controller (or its farthest ancestor.)

Answer 2

The way I'd go about something like this is to simply create a delegate. In AskPasswordViewController's header, put

id delegate;

and

@property (nonatomic, assign) id delegate;

Synthesize it in the implementation file. Then after you alloc/init the modal controller, and before you present it, set modalViewController.delegate = self;. Then within the modal controller, you can call self.delegate to get information from the view controller that presented it. I hope this helps

Answer 3

You can always go further back just by calling parentViewController like so:

self.parentViewController.parentViewController .... and so on until you reach the right one.

Answer 4

Addition to Vibhor Goyal - Sometimes, self.presentingViewController registers as NavigationController. Therefore try:

if let vc = self.presentingViewController.childViewControllers.last as? YourViewController {
// do stuff here
}

Answer 5

Here I came up with universal method to navigate from any place to root.

1. You create a new Class file with this class, so that it's accessible from anywhere in your project:

   import UIKit
   
   class SharedControllers
   {
       static func navigateToRoot(viewController: UIViewController)
       {
           var nc = viewController.navigationController
   
           // If this is a normal view with NavigationController, then we just pop to root.
           if nc != nil
           {
               nc?.popToRootViewControllerAnimated(true)
               return
           }
   
           // Most likely we are in Modal view, so we will need to search for a view with NavigationController.
           let vc = viewController.presentingViewController
   
           if nc == nil
           {
               nc = viewController.presentingViewController?.navigationController
           }
   
           if nc == nil
           {
               nc = viewController.parentViewController?.navigationController
           }
   
           if vc is UINavigationController && nc == nil
           {
               nc = vc as? UINavigationController
           }
   
           if nc != nil
           {
               viewController.dismissViewControllerAnimated(false, completion:
                   {
                       nc?.popToRootViewControllerAnimated(true)
               })
           }
       }
   }
   

2. Usage from anywhere in your project:

   {
       ...
       SharedControllers.navigateToRoot(self)
       ...
   }
   

Answer 6

//You have to get the root, iterate through the root's ViewControllers and then ask for the ParentViewController.
    UINavigationController ​*root = (UINavigationController*​)[[(AppDelegate*) [[UIApplication sharedApplication]delegate] window] rootViewController];
           for (UIViewController *VC in root.viewControllers) {
               if([VC isKindOfClass:[YourParentViewController class]]){
                   YourParentViewController*  parent = (YourParentViewController*)VC;
                   [parent callMethod]; // your code here
                   [self dismissViewControllerAnimated:YES completion:nil];
               }
           }

Answer 7

If presentingViewController gives you unexpected results and you don't want to fiddle with it, just do:

class MyViewController: UIViewController {

    private weak var presenter: UIViewController?

    init(presenter: UIViewController) {
        self.presenter = presenter
        super.init(nibName: nil, bundle: nil)
        ...
    }
    
    ...
}