Delegate method not called after dismissing modal view controller

Question

I am using NSURLSessionDataTask to retrieve JSON from a url in my JsonClient class, this class has a delegate protocol to notify when the json task is complete.

JsonClient.h

#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>

@protocol JsonDelegate <NSObject>
- (void)jsonFetchComplete;
@end

@interface JsonClient : NSObject

@property (weak,nonatomic) id <JsonDelegate> delegate;

- (void)fetchJsonData;

@end

JsonClient.m

#import "JsonClient.h"

@implementation JsonClient

- (void)fetchJsonData {

    [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setNetworkActivityIndicatorVisible:YES];

    NSString *urlString = @"http://api.kivaws.org/v1/loans/search.json?status=fundraising";
    urlString = [urlString stringByAddingPercentEscapesUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
    //urlString = [urlString stringByAppendingString:@".json"];

    NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:urlString];
    NSURLRequest *request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL:url cachePolicy:1 timeoutInterval:10];

    NSURLSession *session = [NSURLSession sharedSession];

    NSURLSessionDataTask *task = [session dataTaskWithRequest:request
                                            completionHandler:^(NSData *data, NSURLResponse *response, NSError *error) {
                                                if (error) {

                                                    NSLog(@"error: %@",error.localizedDescription);

                                                    dispatch_sync(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^{
                                                        [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setNetworkActivityIndicatorVisible:NO];

                                                        UIAlertView *alert = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:@"ERROR"
                                                                                                        message:error.localizedDescription
                                                                                                       delegate:self
                                                                                              cancelButtonTitle:@"Cancel"
                                                                                              otherButtonTitles:nil];
                                                        [alert show];
                                                    });

                                                } else {
                                                    NSLog(@"got data");

                                                    [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setNetworkActivityIndicatorVisible:NO];

                                                    NSError *jsonerror = nil;

                                                    NSDictionary *dict = [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:data options:kNilOptions error:&jsonerror];

                                                    dispatch_sync(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^{
                                                        NSLog(@"json is \n %@",dict);
                                                        [self.delegate jsonFetchComplete];
                                                        NSLog(@"done");
                                                    });
                                                }
                                            }];
    [task resume];
}

@end

Fetching the json works fine. But for some reason the delegate method is not getting called in my first view controller. ViewController presents ViewController2 with a modal segue. A button in ViewController2 fetches the json when tapped and dismisses back to the first ViewController .

ViewController.m

#import "ViewController.h"
#import "JsonClient.h"

@interface ViewController () <JsonDelegate>
@property (weak,nonatomic) IBOutlet UILabel *label;
@end

@implementation ViewController

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];

    self.label.text = @"Loaded VC";
}

- (void)viewWillAppear:(BOOL)animated {
    NSLog(@"view will appear");

    JsonClient *jc = [[JsonClient alloc] init];
    jc.delegate = self;
}

// delegate method from JsonClient
- (void)jsonFetchComplete {
    NSLog(@"fetch complete");
    self.label.text = @"Completed!";
}

- (IBAction)toHome:(UIStoryboardSegue *)segue {
    // unwind segue
}

@end

ViewController2.m

#import "ViewController2.h"
#import "JsonClient.h"
#import "ViewController.h"

@interface ViewController2 ()

@end

@implementation ViewController2

- (IBAction)getJsonData:(id)sender {

    JsonClient *jsonClient = [[JsonClient alloc] init];
    [jsonClient fetchJsonData];

    [self dismissViewControllerAnimated:YES completion:nil];
}

@end

Why is the delegate method in the first view controller ViewController not called?

Answer 1

Unless JsonClient is a Singleton, and you're not telling us, you're creating two instances of JsonClient , one in the viewWillAppear method of ViewController and another in the getJsonData method of ViewController2 .

These two instances track their delegates separately, and you're only setting one of them. The second one, the one that gets called when you click the button in ViewController2 , never has its delegate set, so it defaults to nil , and messages sent to nil do nothing.

You need something like:

@implementation ViewController2

- (IBAction)getJsonData:(id)sender {

    JsonClient *jsonClient = [[JsonClient alloc] init];
    jsonClient.delegate = otherViewController;
    [jsonClient fetchJsonData];

    [self dismissViewControllerAnimated:YES completion:nil];
}

@end