Part 2: SwiftUI 2.0 & UIKit

The article is broken in three different parts:

The second part is about using UIKit elements in a SwiftUI 2.0 application.

Use UIKit elements in SwiftUI

To be able to use UIKit views and view controllers in SwiftUI, They have to be wrapped in types conforming to the UIViewRepresentable and UIViewControllerRepresentable protocols.

The XCode Project

Create a new SwiftUI app project

Name the project

Create a new Swift file

Name it

Now we have to create a type conforming to the UIViewControllerRepresentable protocol to wrap a UIKit component ...

ImagePicker: The `UIViewControllerRepresentable` conforming type

First, let's create the ImagePicker type to wrap the UIImagePickerController.

The UIViewControllerRepresentable protocol has 2 requirements:

a makeUIViewController(context:) method that creates and configure a UIViewController
an updateUIViewController(_:context:) method that updates the state of the specified view controller with new information from SwiftUI. We will leave it blank as we won't use it for our example.

ImagePicker.swift

import Foundation
import SwiftUI
import AVKit

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    func makeUIViewController(context: UIViewControllerRepresentableContext<ImagePicker>) -> UIImagePickerController {
        // ...
    }
    func updateUIViewController(_ uiViewController: UIImagePickerController, context: UIViewControllerRepresentableContext<ImagePicker>) {
    }
}

Next, let's create the UIImagePickerController in the makeUIViewController(context:) method:

Swift

    let imagePicker = UIImagePickerController()

Then let's configure it:

Set the user interface for choosing among saved pictures and movies (To set the user interface for taking a new picture or movie use .camera instead):

Swift

    imagePicker.sourceType = .photoLibrary

Specify the media types to be accessed by the media picker controller, images and movies:

Swift

    imagePicker.mediaTypes = UIImagePickerController.availableMediaTypes(for: .photoLibrary) ?? ["public.image", "public.movie"]

Disable editing of the selected still images and movies:

Swift

    imagePicker.allowsEditing = false

Set the video recording and transcoding quality:

Swift

    imagePicker.videoQuality = .typeHigh

Set the image picker’s delegate object that will handle the image picker's event notifications:

Swift

    imagePicker.delegate = context.coordinator

※　We will discuss the delegate object in the next section ...

And last, return the UIImagePickerController:

Swift

    return imagePicker

Finally, to be able to change the source type when creating an ImagePicker, define a variable to hold the default .photoLibrary source type to be used during configuration in the makeUIViewController(context:) method:

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    var sourceType: UIImagePickerController.SourceType = .photoLibrary
    // ...
    func makeUIViewController(context: UIViewControllerRepresentableContext<ImagePicker>) -> UIImagePickerController {
        // ...
        imagePicker.sourceType = sourceType
        imagePicker.mediaTypes = UIImagePickerController.availableMediaTypes(for: sourceType) ?? ["public.image", "public.movie"]

        // ...
    }
    // ...
}

The source type of the UIImagePickerController can then be changed at creation time like below:

SwiftUI

ImagePicker(sourceType: .camera, /* ... */)

Coordinator: The `UIImagePickerController`'s delegate

To communicate changes occurring within the view controller to other parts of the SwiftUI interface, a custom coordinator object must be provided to the SwiftUI view.

To listen to changes in UIKit components, delegates are used. Delegates handle event notifications before or after the event itself has been handled by the system.

And, to listen to UIImagePickerController changes our Coordinator will have to conform to the UIImagePickerControllerDelegate and UINavigationControllerDelegate protocols, as well as inherit from NSObject to conform to the NSObjectProtocol protocol which cannot be declared in Swift.

Let's declare our Coordinator type with a constructor setting a reference to the ImagePicker instance whose changes it observes:

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    // ...
    final class Coordinator: NSObject, UIImagePickerControllerDelegate, UINavigationControllerDelegate {
        var parent: ImagePicker
        init(_ parent: ImagePicker) {
            self.parent = parent
        }
        // ...
    }
    // ...
}

`imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:)`

To catch the "user picked an image or a movie" event notification, we need to implement the imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:) method telling the delegate that the user picked a still image or a movie.

In it, we check whether the user picked an image or a movie:

If the user picked an image, the info parameter UIImagePickerController.InfoKey.originalImage contains an UIImage object.
If the user picked a movie, the info parameter .mediaURL contains an URL object.

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    // ...
    final class Coordinator: NSObject, UIImagePickerControllerDelegate, UINavigationControllerDelegate {
        // ...
        func imagePickerController(_ picker: UIImagePickerController, didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo info: [UIImagePickerController.InfoKey : Any]) {
            if let image = info[UIImagePickerController.InfoKey.originalImage] as? UIImage {
                // ...
            }
            if let videoURL = info[.mediaURL] as? URL {
                // ...
            }
            // ...
        }
    }
    // ...
}

To communicate to the SwiftUI interface what files the user picked, we chose to use a binding to an external Array of URLs passed as argument to the ImagePicker at creation time.

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    // ...
    @Binding var selectedFiles: Array<URL>
    final class Coordinator: NSObject, UIImagePickerControllerDelegate, UINavigationControllerDelegate {
        // ...
        func imagePickerController(_ picker: UIImagePickerController, didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo info: [UIImagePickerController.InfoKey : Any]) {
            if let image = info[UIImagePickerController.InfoKey.originalImage] as? UIImage {
                // ...
                parent.selectedFiles.append(imagePath.absoluteURL)
            }
            if let videoURL = info[.mediaURL] as? URL {
                parent.selectedFiles.append(videoURL)
            }
            // ...
        }
    }
    // ...
}

When a user picks a movie, we get an URL, which can directly be added to the url array.
But, when the user picks an image, we have to first write a temporary file to disk, before adding the URL representation of its path to the url array:

Swift

    // ...
    if let image = info[UIImagePickerController.InfoKey.originalImage] as? UIImage {
        let imageName = UUID().uuidString
        let paths = FileManager.default.urls(for: .documentDirectory, in: .userDomainMask)
        let imagePath = paths[0].appendingPathComponent(imageName)

        if let jpegData = image.jpegData(compressionQuality: 0.8) {
            try? jpegData.write(to: imagePath)
        }

        parent.selectedFiles.append(imagePath.absoluteURL)
    }
    // ...
}

The last step in our imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:) method is to dismiss the picker using the environment property presentationMode:

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    // ...
    @Environment(\.presentationMode) private var presentationMode
    final class Coordinator: NSObject, UIImagePickerControllerDelegate, UINavigationControllerDelegate {
        // ...
        func imagePickerController(_ picker: UIImagePickerController, didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo info: [UIImagePickerController.InfoKey : Any]) {
            // ...
            parent.presentationMode.wrappedValue.dismiss()
        }
    }
    // ...
}

Custom Coordinator Object

To provide our own coordinator object instead of the default implementation provided, we need to implement the makeCoordinator() method in ImagePicker:

Swift

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    // ...
    func makeCoordinator() -> Coordinator {
        Coordinator(self)
    }
    // ...
}

The ImagePicker Source Code

ImagePicker.swift

import Foundation
import SwiftUI
import AVKit

struct ImagePicker: UIViewControllerRepresentable {
    var sourceType: UIImagePickerController.SourceType = .photoLibrary
    @Binding var selectedFiles: Array<URL>
    @Environment(\.presentationMode) private var presentationMode
    final class Coordinator: NSObject, UIImagePickerControllerDelegate, UINavigationControllerDelegate {
        var parent: ImagePicker
        init(_ parent: ImagePicker) {
            self.parent = parent
        }
        func imagePickerController(_ picker: UIImagePickerController, didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo info: [UIImagePickerController.InfoKey : Any]) {
            if let image = info[UIImagePickerController.InfoKey.originalImage] as? UIImage {
                let imageName = UUID().uuidString
                let paths = FileManager.default.urls(for: .documentDirectory, in: .userDomainMask)
                let imagePath = paths[0].appendingPathComponent(imageName)
                if let jpegData = image.jpegData(compressionQuality: 0.8) {
                    try? jpegData.write(to: imagePath)
                }
                parent.selectedFiles.append(imagePath.absoluteURL)
            }
            if let videoURL = info[.mediaURL] as? URL {
                parent.selectedFiles.append(videoURL)
            }
            parent.presentationMode.wrappedValue.dismiss()
        }
    }
    func makeCoordinator() -> Coordinator {
        Coordinator(self)
    }
    func makeUIViewController(context: UIViewControllerRepresentableContext<ImagePicker>) -> UIImagePickerController {
        let imagePicker = UIImagePickerController()
        imagePicker.sourceType = sourceType
        imagePicker.mediaTypes = UIImagePickerController.availableMediaTypes(for: sourceType) ?? ["public.image", "public.movie"]
        imagePicker.allowsEditing = false
        imagePicker.videoQuality = .typeHigh
        imagePicker.delegate = context.coordinator
        return imagePicker
    }
    func updateUIViewController(_ uiViewController: UIImagePickerController, context: UIViewControllerRepresentableContext<ImagePicker>) {
    }
}

The ContentView Source Code

Now, let's add our ImagePicker to the App ContentView.

We use a Button to present our ImagePicker in a sheet using the sheet(isPresented:onDismiss:content:) method:

ContentView.swift

import SwiftUI

struct ContentView: View {
    @State var imageFiles = Array<URL>()
    @State private var isShowingPhotoLibrary = false

    var body: some View {
        VStack {
            Text("Pick an Image!")
                .padding()
            Button(action: {
                self.isShowingPhotoLibrary = true
            }) {
                Image(systemName: "photo.fill")
                    .font(.system(size: 40))
            }.sheet(isPresented: self.$isShowingPhotoLibrary) {
                ImagePicker(sourceType: .photoLibrary, selectedFiles: $imageFiles)
            }
        }
    }
}

struct ContentView_Previews: PreviewProvider {
    static var previews: some View {
        ContentView()
    }
}

The App

Launch the App, and in the content view, click on the button to open the image picker:

In the picker, select an image:

I added a print statement at the end of the imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:) to display the contents of the url array.

After picking the first image:

selectedFiles= [
    file:///Users/loic/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX/data/Containers/Data/Application/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX/Documents/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX
]

After picking a second image:

selectedFiles= [
    file:///Users/loic/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX/data/Containers/Data/Application/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX/Documents/XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX,
    file:///Users/loic/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/YYYYYYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYYYYYYYYYY/data/Containers/Data/Application/YYYYYYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYYYYYYYYYY/Documents/YYYYYYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYY-YYYYYYYYYYYY
]

It works!

That wraps up this article about using UIKit elements in SwiftUI.

SwiftUI 2.0 & UIKit & Storyboard (Part 2)

Part 2: SwiftUI 2.0 & UIKit

Use UIKit elements in SwiftUI

The XCode Project

ImagePicker: The `UIViewControllerRepresentable` conforming type

Coordinator: The `UIImagePickerController`'s delegate

`imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:)`

Custom Coordinator Object

The ImagePicker Source Code

The ContentView Source Code

The App

See also

SwiftUI 2.0 & UIKit & Storyboard (Part 2)

Part 2: SwiftUI 2.0 & UIKit

Use UIKit elements in SwiftUI

The XCode Project

ImagePicker: The UIViewControllerRepresentable conforming type

Coordinator: The UIImagePickerController's delegate

imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:)

Custom Coordinator Object

The ImagePicker Source Code

The ContentView Source Code

The App

See also

ImagePicker: The `UIViewControllerRepresentable` conforming type

Coordinator: The `UIImagePickerController`'s delegate

`imagePickerController(_:didFinishPickingMediaWithInfo:)`