一、
二、Layers Use Two Types of Coordinate Systems
Among the most common uses for point-based coordinates is to specify the size and position of the layer, which you do using the layer’s bounds and position properties. The bounds defines the coordinate system of the layer itself and encompasses the layer’s size on the screen. The position property defines the location of the layer relative to its parent’s coordinate system. Although layers have a frame property, that property is actually derived from the values in the bounds and position properties and is used less frequently.
The orientation of a layer’s bounds and frame rectangles always matches the default orientation of the underlying platform. Figure 1-3 shows the default orientations of the bounds rectangle on both iOS and OS X. In iOS, the origin of the bounds rectangle is in the top-left corner of the layer by default, and in OS X it is in the bottom-left corner. If you share Core Animation code between iOS and OS X versions of your app, you must take such differences into consideration.
三、Anchor Points Affect Geometric Manipulations
四、Layers Can Be Manipulated in Three Dimensions
Transforms work by multiplying coordinate values through a matrix of numbers to get new coordinates that represent the transformed versions of the original points. Because Core Animation values can be specified in three dimensions, each coordinate point has four values that must be multiplied through a four-by-four matrix, as shown in Figure 1-7. In Core Animation, the transform in the figure is represented by the a target="_self" CATransform3D/a type. Fortunately, you do not have to modify the fields of this structure directly to perform standard transformations. Core Animation provides a comprehensive set of functions for creating scale, translation, and rotation matrices and for doing matrix comparisons. In addition to manipulating transforms using functions, Core Animation extends key-value coding support to allow you to modify a transform using key paths. For a list of key paths you can modify, see CATransform3D Key Paths.
Figure 1-8 shows the matrix configurations for some of the more common transformations you can make. Multiplying any coordinate by the identity transform returns the exact same coordinate. For other transformations, how the coordinate is modified depends entirely on which matrix components you change. For example, to translate along the x-axis only, you would supply a nonzero value for the tx component of the translation matrix and leave the ty and tz values to 0. For rotations, you would provide the appropriate sine and cosine values of the target rotation angle.
五、The Relationship Between Layers and Views
Layers are not a replacement for your app’s views—that is, you cannot create a visual interface based solely on layer objects. Layers provide infrastructure for your views. Specifically, layers make it easier and more efficient to draw and animate the contents of views and maintain high frame rates while doing so. However, there are many things that layers do not do. Layers do not handle events, draw content, participate in the responder chain, or do many other things. For this reason, every app must still have one or more views to handle those kinds of interactions.
In addition to the layers associated with your views, you can also create layer objects that do not have a corresponding view. You can embed these standalone layer objects inside of any other layer object in your app, including those that are associated with a view. You typically use standalone layer objects as part of a specific optimization path. For example, if you wanted to use the same image in multiple places, you could load the image once and associate it with multiple standalone layer objects and add those objects to the layer tree. Each layer then refers to the source image rather than trying to create its own copy of that image in memory.
For information about how to enable layer support for your app’s views, see Enabling Core Animation Support in Your App. For information on how to create a layer object hierarchy,and for tips on when you might do so,see Building a Layer Hierarchy
六、Changing the Layer Class Used by UIView
you might find that a different layer class is more appropriate in certain situations. For example, you might want to change the layer class in the following situations:
- Your view draws content using Metal or OpenGL ES, in which case you would use a CAMetalLayer or CAEAGLLayer object.
- There is a specialized layer class that offers better performance.
- You want to take advantage of some specialized Core Animation layer classes, such as particle emitters or replicators.
Changing the layer class of a view is very straightforward; an example is shown in Listing 2-1. All you have to do is override the layerClass method and return the class object you want to use instead. Prior to display, the view calls the layerClass method and uses the returned class to create a new layer object for itself. Once created, a view’s layer object cannot be changed.
七、Providing a Layer’s Contents
Layers are data objects that manage content provided by your app. A layer’s content consists of a bitmap containing the visual data you want to display. You can provide the content for that bitmap in one of three ways:
Assign an image object directly to the layer object’s contents property. (This technique is best for layer content that never, or rarely, changes.)
Assign a delegate object to the layer and let the delegate draw the layer’s content. (This technique is best for layer content that might change periodically and can be provided by an external object, such as a view.)
Define a layer subclass and override one of its drawing methods to provide the layer contents yourself. (This technique is appropriate if you have to create a custom layer subclass anyway or if you want to change the fundamental drawing behavior of the layer.)
八、Tweaking the Content You Provide
When you assign an image to the contents property of a layer, the layer’s contentsGravity property determines how that image is manipulated to fit the current bounds. By default, if an image is bigger or smaller than the current bounds, the layer object scales the image to fit within the available space. If the aspect ratio of the layer’s bounds is different than the aspect ratio of the image, this can cause the image to be distorted. You can use the contentsGravity property to ensure that your content is presented in the best way possible.
The values you can assign to the contentsGravity property are divided into two categories:
- The position-based gravity constants allow you to pin your image to a particular edge or corner of the layer’s bounds rectangle without scaling the image.
- The scaling-based gravity constants allow you to stretch the image using one of several options, some of which preserve the aspect ratio and some of which do not.
Figure 2-1 shows the how the position-based gravity settings affect your images. With the exception of the kCAGravityCenter constant, each constant pins the image to a particular edge or corner of the layer’s bounds rectangle. The kCAGravityCenter constant centers the image in the layer. None of these constants cause the image to be scaled in any way, so the image is always rendered at its original size. If the image is bigger than the layer’s bounds, this may result in portions of the image being clipped, and if the image is smaller, the portions of the layer that are not covered by the image reveal the layer’s background color, if set.
Figure 2-2 shows how the scaling-based gravity constants affect your images. All of these constants scale the image if it does not fit exactly within the bounds rectangle of the layer. The difference between the modes is how they deal with the image’s original aspect ratio. Some modes preserve it and others do not. By default, a layer’s contentsGravity property is set to the kCAGravityResize constant, which is the only mode that does not preserve the image aspect ratio.
九、Adding Custom Properties to a Layer
The CAAnimation and CALayer classes extend the key-value coding conventions to support custom properties. You can use this behavior to add data to a layer and retrieve it using a custom key you define. You can even associate actions with your custom properties so that when you change the property, a corresponding animation is performed.
For information about how to set and get custom properties, see Key-Value Coding Compliant Container Classes. For information about adding actions to your layer objects, see Changing a Layer’s Default Behavior.
十、Animating Simple Changes to a Layer’s Properties
To trigger implicit animations, all you have to do is update the properties of your layer object. When modifying layer objects in the layer tree, your changes are reflected immediately by those objects. However, the visual appearance of the layer objects does not change immediately. What happens instead is that Core Animation uses your changes as a trigger to create and schedule one or more implicit animations for execution. Thus, making a change like the one in Listing 3-1 causes Core Animation to create an animation object for you and schedule that animation to run starting in the next update cycle.
To make the same change explicitly using an animation object, create a CABasicAnimation object and use that object to configure the animation parameters. You can set the start and end values for the animation, change the duration, or change any other animation parameters before adding the animation to a layer. Listing 3-2 shows how to fade out a layer using an animation object. When creating the object, you specify the key path for the property you want to animate and then set your animation parameters. To execute the animation, you use the addAnimation:forKey: method to add it to the layers you want to animate.
