How to access a property in a public method. “Use of undeclared identifier error”

Question

This probably sounds bare bones basic, but I need help. I'm a bit new to objective-c. So I have a void method that that sets a property. How would I use that same property inside of a public method? Here's the code:

.h

 @property (strong, nonatomic) NSString *globalShowKey;

.m

  +(NSString *)fileStructure{

        NSString *mainDBPath = [PATH stringByAppendingPathComponent:CLIENT_KEY];

        NSString *subDirectory = [mainDBPath stringByAppendingPathComponent:globalShowKey];



        return subDirectory;
    }

Could someone please give me an explanation what the best approach to achieve this? I am so close to achieving this! If I am unclear, please let me know.

Answer 1

You are using self in class method as + in method definition indicates its class method and in class method self represent class not instance of that class.This line is causing trouble

   //self represent here class not instance but you need to access instance variable through property
    NSString *subDirectory = [mainDBPath stringByAppendingPathComponent:self.globalShowKey];

use - instead of + in method as + indicates class method and - indicates instance method

 -(NSString *)fileStructure{

        NSString *mainDBPath = [PATH stringByAppendingPathComponent:CLIENT_KEY];

        NSString *subDirectory = [mainDBPath stringByAppendingPathComponent:self.globalShowKey];
        return subDirectory;
    }

Now call this method on class instance for eg: if this method is defined in class Abc than instead of using [Abc fileStructure]; make object of class Abc

Abc *abc = [[Abc alloc] init];
NSString *fileStructure = [abc fileStructure];

EDIT : You can also make self.globalShowKey as constant string if it is not changing througout application like NSString *const GlobalShowKey = @"abc"; //write this after #import statements

and than you can append this global key using your previous class method

 +(NSString *)fileStructure{

        NSString *mainDBPath = [PATH stringByAppendingPathComponent:CLIENT_KEY];

        NSString *subDirectory = [mainDBPath stringByAppendingPathComponent:GlobalShowKey];
        return subDirectory;
    }

and call it by

[Abc fileStructure];