Ios – Add a navigation bar to a view without a navigation controller

cocoa-touchiosstoryboarduinavigationbaruinavigationcontroller

I have a side menu that slides out to display a table view and from there I have segues that use the reveal view controller. The segue has to connect directly to the view controller; I can't use a navigation controller.

How do I add a navigation bar with a bar button item without a navigation controller?

the story board has the navigation item

the app does not

Best Answer

While there are several smart ways to answer your question. I just solved it programmatically and wrote the following code in my viewWillAppear (note - viewDidLoad is also okay, but not suggested) -

-(void) viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated {

    UINavigationBar *myNav = [[UINavigationBar alloc]initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 320, 50)];
    [UINavigationBar appearance].barTintColor = [UIColor lightGrayColor];
    [self.view addSubview:myNav];


    UIBarButtonItem *cancelItem = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Cancel"
                                                                   style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered
                                                                  target:self
                                                                  action:nil];

    UIBarButtonItem *doneItem = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Done"
                                                                 style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered
                                                                target:self action:nil];


    UINavigationItem *navigItem = [[UINavigationItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Navigation Title"];
    navigItem.rightBarButtonItem = doneItem;
    navigItem.leftBarButtonItem = cancelItem;
    myNav.items = [NSArray arrayWithObjects: navigItem,nil];

    [UIBarButtonItem appearance].tintColor = [UIColor blueColor];
}

So, you have a white navigation bar with blue bar button items without a Navigation controller. Again, there are other ways to implement it in your case. Hope, this was helpful.

Output -

enter image description here

Update -

To add images -

UIImageView *myImage = [[UIImageView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0,10,32,32)];
[myImage setImage:[UIImage imageNamed:@"image.png"]];
self.navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithCustomView:myImage];
[self.view addSubview:myImage];