Connecting NSOutlineView to Core Data in 10.6 Part 1: Ordered Trees

NOTE: This tutorial is now outdated. I’m leaving it here for posterity, but please know that it may not work.

There are aspects to Cocoa that I find extremely obtuse and difficult to implement. I’m relatively new both to programming and Cocoa, and I suspect that others in the same boat also are frustrated by these steps. The single most frustrating simple thing that I have come across is implementing an NSOutlineView that connects to a Core Data model. There are several ways to approach this problem; primarily with or without Cocoa Bindings and with or without sorting.

There is a good, but outdated tutorial on how to make this work at this link: http://allusions.sourceforge.net/articles/treeDragPart1.php

The primary problem with the tutorials is that it requires the use of private Apple methods, which means that anything you build with it will not be accepted into the Mac App Store. This tutorial draws very heavily on that tutorial, with updated screenshots and code that does not use private APIs. The code also is difficult to read on that page, so it’s updated here in an easier-to-read format. Oh, and one more thing: the example on that page uses a feature of Interface Builder that no longer exists – subclassing within IB.

This tutorial is done with Xcode 3.2.5 on OS X 10.6.6.

The tutorial continues after the break…