swift: only show section headers if more than 1 section

Question

i have a table with a variable number of sections. If there are more than one section i want to show show custom Headers, but if there is only one, i don't want a header at all. My Approach is to use func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, viewForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> UIView? and return nil if i have only one section. But instead of showing no header, i get an empty header. Any ideas?

here is my code

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()

    self.title = "Orders"

    tableView.dataSource = self
    tableView.delegate = self


    let headerNib = UINib.init(nibName: "SectionHeader", bundle: Bundle.main)
    tableView.register(headerNib, forHeaderFooterViewReuseIdentifier: "SectionHeader")

}

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, viewForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> UIView? {
    if(ordersList.count < 2) {return nil}
    let headerView = tableView.dequeueReusableHeaderFooterView(withIdentifier: "SectionHeader") as! SectionHeader
    headerView.label.text = "\(sectionHeaders[section]) (\(ordersList[section].count))"
    headerView.button.setTitle(self.collapsed[section] ? "▶" : "▼", for: .normal)
    headerView.onTap = {
        self.collapsed[section] = !self.collapsed[section]
        headerView.button.rotate(self.collapsed[section] ? CGFloat(-.pi/2.0) : CGFloat(.pi/2.0), duration: 0.1, completion: {
            self.tableView.beginUpdates()
            self.tableView.reloadSections([section], with: .fade)

            self.tableView.endUpdates()
        })
    }

    return headerView
}

Answer 1

use heightForHeaderInSection delegate method also. Make height 0 if condition not satisfy. For Reference -

public func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, heightForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> CGFloat {
    if(ordersList.count < 2) {return 0.1}
    else { return HEIGHT} //custom value of view height
}

Answer 2

You have to use the following methods to achieve the desired result:

func numberOfSections(in tableView: UITableView) -> Int {
        if(ordersList.count < 2) {return nil}
        return ordersList.count
    }

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, viewForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> UIView? {
    if(ordersList.count < 2) {return nil} 
      //else return some view }


func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, heightForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> CGFloat {
        if(ordersList.count < 2) {return 0}
         return some_height

    }

Answer 3

Use tableView.numberOfSections to get the section count . And use this value in tableView(_:viewForHeaderInSection:) to check whether you want return SectionHeader or nil . You need to return nil in case you don't want to show header in a particular section .

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, viewForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> UIView? {
    guard tableView.numberOfSections > 1 else {
        return nil
    }
    let headerView = tableView.dequeueReusableHeaderFooterView(withIdentifier: "SectionHeader") as! SectionHeader
    //add rest of the code...
    return headerView
}

Implement tableView(_:heightForHeaderInSection:) to return the header height based on the section . Return 0 if you don't want to show header in a section otherwise it will take the default header height .

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, heightForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> CGFloat {
    return (tableView.numberOfSections > 1) ? 100.0 : 0.0
}

Answer 4

you should override numberOfSections method of tableview. And you should not use dequeueReusableHeaderFooterView for section header view. Section header views should be a custom view.

-- numberOfSections

func numberOfSections(in tableView: UITableView) -> Int {
    return sectionCount
}

-- sectionHeaderView

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, viewForHeaderInSection section: Int) -> UIView? {
    // you can store data on a view model
    let cellViewModel = viewModel.returnViewModel(index: section)

    switch cellViewModel.type {
    case .sampleViewModel1:
        return UIView() // sampleView1
    case .sampleViewModel2:
        return UIView() // sampleView2
    }
}