uiviewcontroller - iOS: What is the difference between -init and -viewLoad of a ViewController?

Question

I don't know exactly what's the right place to set things like the tintColor of the NavigationBar or the title of my ViewController. It works in the -init method and the -viewLoad method too. What is the "best-practice" or "right way" to do this? Has one of those any advantages?

Answer 1

The init methods (yes there is more then one) are where the UIViewController is initialized. Thus this is the place where you do stuff for the UIViewController and not its views.

If you use a nib to load you view then the best place to set any properties is the viewDidLoad method. This method gets called after the nib is loaded. If you set up the view programatically use the loadView method then this is the place to set UIControl properties.

Since the system can unload views to save memory, it will leave the UIViewController alone. Any properties set in the init methode will not be applied again, since the UIViewController is already initialized.