How to retrieve photo from UITextView after adding it using NSAttributedString?

Question

I am using the next code to add an image to a UITextView:

    UITextView *textView = [[UITextView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(200,200,140,140)];
    textView.font = [UIFont systemFontOfSize:20.0f];
    NSMutableAttributedString *attributedString = [[NSMutableAttributedString alloc] initWithString:@"Test  with emoji"];
    NSTextAttachment *textAttachment = [[NSTextAttachment alloc] init];
    textAttachment.image = [UIImage imageNamed:@"Angel.png"];

    //for the padding inside the textView
    textAttachment.image = [UIImage imageWithCGImage:textAttachment.image.CGImage scale:3.0 orientation:UIImageOrientationUp];
    NSAttributedString *attrStringWithImage = [NSAttributedString attributedStringWithAttachment:textAttachment];
    [attributedString replaceCharactersInRange:NSMakeRange(5, 1) withAttributedString:attrStringWithImage];
    [attributedString addAttribute:NSFontAttributeName value:[UIFont systemFontOfSize:17] range:NSMakeRange(0, attributedString.length)];
    textView.attributedText = attributedString;
    NSLog(@"Text view: %@", textView.attributedText);

    [self.view addSubview:textView];

and the result looks like this:

enter image description here

what I am interested in, is how can I know what picture was inserted in the text field and at witch position? I was thinking about using attributedText, as you can observe in the code, since it logs:

Text view: Test {
    NSFont = "<UICTFont: 0x7ff0324f2110> font-family: \".HelveticaNeueInterface-Regular\"; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 17.00pt";
}{
    NSAttachment = "<NSTextAttachment: 0x7ff032682bc0>";
    NSFont = "<UICTFont: 0x7ff0324f2110> font-family: \".HelveticaNeueInterface-Regular\"; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 17.00pt";
}with emoji{
    NSFont = "<UICTFont: 0x7ff0324f2110> font-family: \".HelveticaNeueInterface-Regular\"; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 17.00pt";
}

Update

Retrieved the image using the code:

NSMutableArray *imagesArray = [[NSMutableArray alloc] init];
    [attributedString enumerateAttribute:NSAttachmentAttributeName
                                 inRange:NSMakeRange(0, [attributedString length])
                                 options:0
                              usingBlock:^(id value, NSRange range, BOOL *stop)
    {
        if ([value isKindOfClass:[NSTextAttachment class]])
        {
            NSTextAttachment *attachment = (NSTextAttachment *)value;
            UIImage *image = nil;
            if ([attachment image])
                image = [attachment image];
            else
                image = [attachment imageForBounds:[attachment bounds]
                                     textContainer:nil
                                    characterIndex:range.location];

            if (image)
                [imagesArray addObject:image];
        }
    }];

But what if attributedString contains more than 1 consecutive photo? example:

if the the string contains two consecutive photos then only one is added to the array how it looks

enter image description here

code

NSMutableAttributedString *attributedString = [[NSMutableAttributedString alloc] initWithString:@"Test   with emoji "];
    [attributedString replaceCharactersInRange:NSMakeRange(4, 1) withAttributedString:attrStringWithImage];
    [attributedString replaceCharactersInRange:NSMakeRange(5, 1) withAttributedString:attrStringWithImage];

log:

Image array: (
    "<UIImage: 0x7fd4e3e56760>"
)

if the photos are not consecutive the both of them are added correctly to the array how it looks

enter image description here

code

NSMutableAttributedString *attributedString = [[NSMutableAttributedString alloc] initWithString:@"Test  with emoji "];
[attributedString replaceCharactersInRange:NSMakeRange(4, 1) withAttributedString:attrStringWithImage];
    [attributedString replaceCharactersInRange:NSMakeRange(16, 1) withAttributedString:attrStringWithImage];

log

Image array: (
    "<UIImage: 0x7f9ce35a4a70>",
    "<UIImage: 0x7f9ce35a4a70>"
)

So, is there a bug in what I am doing or one with the enumerateAttribute method?

Update 2 Managed to fix the issue if I create a new textAttachment and attrStringWithImage instance for each photo I add.

Enumerate your `NSAttributedString`. Here, I'd just kept the image, but you can also save the `range` that's given in the block: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/29152660/extract-uiimage-from-nsattributed-string/29153172#29153172 — Larme, May 11 '15 at 13:57
@Larme can you formulate an answer and also include the the answer to my second question on how to get all images if there are more than one? Thank you in advance! — Laur Stefan, May 11 '15 at 14:42

score 3 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 11:54

Retrieving images are explained here.

Your new issue is that if two image are consecutive and the same.

So instead of:

if (image)
    [imagesArray addObject:image];

You need to to other checks, this will do for two images, but you can't know if they are consecutive or not.

if (image)
{
    if ([imagesArray lastObject] != image)
        [imagesArray addObject:image];
}

So you need to keep references of the NSRange too.

if (image)
{
    if ([imagesArray count] > 0)
    {
        NSDictionary *lastFound = [imagesArray lastObject];
        NSRange lastRange = [lastFound[@"range"] rangeValue];
        UIImage *lastImage = lastFound[@"image"];
        if (lastImage == image && lastRange.location+lastRange.length == range.location)
        { //Two images same & consecutive}
        else
        {
            [imagesArray addObject:@{@"image":image, @"range":[NSValue valueWithRange:range]}];
        }
    }
    else
    {
        [imagesArray addObject:@{@"image":image, @"range":[NSValue valueWithRange:range]}];
    }
}

Retrieving only images:

NSArray *onlyImages = [imagesArray valueForKey:@"image"];

Note: I didn't check if this code compile, but you should get the whole idea. My range calculation may be wrong (some +1/-1 missing, but nothing difficult to verify with test), and what if there is space between two same consecutive images? You may want to get the String between (NSString *stringBetween = [[attributedString string] substringWithRange:NSMakeRange(lastRange.location+lastRange.length, range.location-lastRange.location+lastRange.length)], and check for spaces, ponctuation characters (there are a lot of way to do it).

Additional note: In your case, just comparing image != newImage may be enough, but if you use web images, or even two images with different name in your bundle but that are identical, that's another issue to know if they are the same. There are a few questions on SO about comparing two images, but that should take some time/ressources.

I have another question :D How can I tell the position of an image in a NSMutableAttributedString? I am asking because a user ca make a few changes to the text and so on, so is there a way, method to easy retrieve the position of an image in an NSMutableAttributedString? — Laur Stefan, May 13 '15 at 08:23
What do you mean by position? This could be another question/topic maybe. — Larme, May 13 '15 at 08:34
for instance in my initial example I insert my image at index 5, so my question is: how can I retrieve the position/ index where the image is? of course if the user makes a few changes to the string the index will no longer be at index 5 — Laur Stefan, May 13 '15 at 09:05
Instead of `if (image) [imagesArray addObject:image];`, do `if (image == imageWanted){NSLog(@"NewRange: %@", NSStringFromRange(range));}`. — Larme, May 13 '15 at 09:16
The image you're looking for. Else, you can keep a duplicate of `imageArray` at start in my answer and compare ranges/images with the one you found whenever you enumerate again the attributed string. — Larme, May 13 '15 at 09:23

How to retrieve photo from UITextView after adding it using NSAttributedString?

1 Answers1