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📚 Comprehensive list of questions and problems to pass an interview for the iOS Developer position

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Data Structures

Variations on arrays

  • Array2D. A two-dimensional array with fixed dimensions. Useful for board games.
  • Bit Set. A fixed-size sequence of n bits.
  • Fixed Size Array. When you know beforehand how large your data will be, it might be more efficient to use an old-fashioned array with a fixed size.
  • Ordered Array. An array that is always sorted.
  • Rootish Array Stack. A space and time efficient variation on Swift arrays.

Queues

  • Stack. Last-in, first-out!
  • Queue. First-in, first-out!
  • Deque. A double-ended queue.
  • Priority Queue. A queue where the most important element is always at the front.
  • Ring Buffer. Also known as a circular buffer. An array of a certain size that conceptually wraps around back to the beginning.

Lists

  • Linked List. A sequence of data items connected through links. Covers both singly and doubly linked lists.
  • Skip-List. Skip List is a probabilistic data-structure with same logarithmic time bound and efficiency as AVL/ or Red-Black tree and provides a clever compromise to efficiently support search and update operations.

Trees

  • Tree. A general-purpose tree structure.
  • Binary Tree. A tree where each node has at most two children.
  • Binary Search Tree (BST). A binary tree that orders its nodes in a way that allows for fast queries.
  • Red-Black Tree. A self balancing binary search tree.
  • Splay Tree. A self balancing binary search tree that enables fast retrieval of recently updated elements.
  • Threaded Binary Tree. A binary tree that maintains a few extra variables for cheap and fast in-order traversals.
  • Segment Tree. Can quickly compute a function over a portion of an array.
  • Lazy Propagation
  • kd-Tree
  • Sparse Table. Another take on quickly computing a function over a portion of an array, but this time we'll make it even quicker!.
  • Heap. A binary tree stored in an array, so it doesn't use pointers. Makes a great priority queue.
  • Fibonacci Heap
  • Trie. A special type of tree used to store associative data structures.
  • B-Tree. A self-balancing search tree, in which nodes can have more than two children.
  • QuadTree. A tree with 4 children.
  • Octree. A tree with 8 children.

Hashing

  • Hash Table. Allows you to store and retrieve objects by a key. This is how the dictionary type is usually implemented.
  • Hash Functions

Sets

  • Bloom Filter. A constant-memory data structure that probabilistically tests whether an element is in a set.
  • Hash Set. A set implemented using a hash table.
  • Multiset. A set where the number of times an element is added matters. (Also known as a bag.)
  • Ordered Set. A set where the order of items matters.

Graphs

  • Graph
  • Breadth-First Search (BFS)
  • Depth-First Search (DFS)
  • Shortest Path on an unweighted tree
  • Single-Source Shortest Paths
  • Minimum Spanning Tree on an unweighted tree
  • Minimum Spanning Tree
  • All-Pairs Shortest Paths
  • Dijkstra's shortest path algorithm

What Are B-Trees?

B-trees are search trees that provide an ordered key-value store with excellent performance characteristics. In principle, each node maintains a sorted array of its own elements, and another array for its children.

iOS Frameworks

What is CoreData ?

Core data is an object graph manager which also has the ability to persist object graphs to the persistent store on a disk. An object graph is like a map of all the different model objects in a typical model view controller iOS application. CoreData has also integration with Core Spotlight.

But Core Data is not thread safe, meaning that, if you load a managed object on one thread, you can’t pass it to another thread and use it safely. This becomes an issue when we want to start introducing threading for performance, so we have two choices.

The first is to keep everything on the main thread, which just means it’s single threaded. Or the second, means making changes on background threads and passing managed object IDs and then loading those objects again on the main thread, but that would mean that you’re on the main thread, which puts us right back where we started. Both of these kind of ruin the point of using threading within Core Data and they can add a lot of complexity to the data layer.

There’s also another option for that and it’s to convert the managed object to a plain old Swift object, or a POSO.

What is iOS 11 SDK Features for Developers ?

New MapKit Markers Configurable File Headers Block Based UITableView Updates MapKit Clustering Closure Based KVO Vector UIImage Support New MapKit Display Type Named colors in Asset Catalog Password Autofill Face landmarks, Barcode and Text Detection Multitasking using the new floating Dock, slide-over apps, pinned apps, and the new App Switcher Location Permission: A flashing blue status bar anytime an app is collecting your location data in the background. Updated locations permissions that always give the user the ability to choose only to share location while using the app.

When bounds origin will be different from 0,0?

Let's take an example of UIScrollView: UIScrollView's bounds.origin will not be (0, 0) when its contentOffset is not (0, 0).

Unit Tests

Tests the smallest unit of functionality, typically a method/function (e.g. given a class with a particular state, calling x method on the class should cause y to happen). Unit tests should be focussed on one particular feature (e.g., calling the pop method when the stack is empty should throw an InvalidOperationException). Everything it touches should be done in memory; this means that the test code and the code under test shouldn't:

Call out into (non-trivial) collaborators Access the network

Hit a database

Use the file system

Spin up a thread

Any kind of dependency that is slow / hard to understand / initialise / manipulate should be stubbed / mocked / whatevered using the appropriate techniques so you can focus on what the unit of code is doing, not what its dependencies do. In short, unit tests are as simple as possible, easy to debug, reliable (due to reduced external factors), fast to execute and help to prove that the smallest building blocks of your program function as intended before they're put together. The caveat is that, although you can prove they work perfectly in isolation, the units of code may blow up when combined which brings us to ...

  • Integration Tests

Integration tests build on unit tests by combining the units of code and testing that the resulting combination functions correctly. This can be either the innards of one system, or combining multiple systems together to do something useful. Also, another thing that differentiates integration tests from unit tests is the environment. Integration tests can and will use threads, access the database or do whatever is required to ensure that all of the code and the different environment changes will work correctly. If you've built some serialization code and unit tested its innards without touching the disk, how do you know that it'll work when you are loading and saving to disk? Maybe you forgot to flush and dispose filestreams. Maybe your file permissions are incorrect and you've tested the innards using in memory streams. The only way to find out for sure is to test it 'for real' using an environment that is closest to production. The main advantage is that they will find bugs that unit tests can't such as wiring bugs (e.g. an instance of class A unexpectedly receives a null instance of B) and environment bugs (it runs fine on my single-CPU machine, but my colleague's 4 core machine can't pass the tests). The main disadvantage is that integration tests touch more code, are less reliable, failures are harder to diagnose and the tests are harder to maintain. Also, integration tests don't necessarily prove that a complete feature works. The user may not care about the internal details of my programs, but I do!

  • Functional Tests

Functional tests check a particular feature for correctness by comparing the results for a given input against the specification. Functional tests don't concern themselves with intermediate results or side-effects, just the result (they don't care that after doing x, object y has state z). They are written to test part of the specification such as, "calling function Square(x) with the argument of 2 returns 4".

  • Acceptance Tests

Acceptance testing seems to be split into two types: Standard acceptance testing involves performing tests on the full system (e.g. using your web page via a web browser) to see whether the application's functionality satisfies the specification. E.g. "clicking a zoom icon should enlarge the document view by 25%." There is no real continuum of results, just a pass or fail outcome. The advantage is that the tests are described in plain English and ensures the software, as a whole, is feature complete. The disadvantage is that you've moved another level up the testing pyramid. Acceptance tests touch mountains of code, so tracking down a failure can be tricky. Also, in agile software development, user acceptance testing involves creating tests to mirror the user stories created by/for the software's customer during development. If the tests pass, it means the software should meet the customer's requirements and the stories can be considered complete. An acceptance test suite is basically an executable specification written in a domain specific language that describes the tests in the language used by the users of the system.

File owner

Two points to be remembered:

The File owner is the object that loads the nib, i.e. that object which receives the message loadNibNamed: or initWithNibName:. If you want to access any objects in the nib after loading it, you can set an outlet in the file owner. So you created a fancy view with lots of buttons, subviews etc . If you want to modify any of these views / objects any time after loading the nib FROM the loading object (usually a view or window controller) you set outlets for these objects to the file owner. It's that simple.

This is the reason why by default all View Controllers or Window Controllers act as file owners, and also have an outlet to the main window or view object in the nib file: because duh, if you're controlling something you'll definitely need to have an outlet to it so that you can send messages to it.

The reason it's called file owner and given a special place, is because unlike the other objects in the nib, the file owner is external to the nib and is not part of it. In fact, it only becomes available when the nib is loaded. So the file owner is a stand-in or proxy for the actual object which will later load the nib.

You’ve just been alerted that your new app is prone to crashing. What do you do?

This classic interview question is designed to see how well your prospective programmer can solve problems. What you’re looking for is a general methodology for isolating a bug, and their ability to troubleshoot issues like sudden crashes or freezing. In general, when something goes wrong within an app, a standard approach might look something like this:

Determine the iOS version and make or model of the device.

Gather enough information to reproduce the issue.

Acquire device logs, if possible.

Once you have an idea as to the nature of the issue, acquire tooling or create a unit test and begin debugging. A great answer would include all of the above, with specific examples of debugging tools like Buglife or ViewMonitor, and a firm grasp of software debugging theory—knowledge on what to do with compile time errors, run-time errors, and logical errors. The one answer you don’t want to hear is the haphazard approach—visually scanning through hundreds of lines of code until the error is found. When it comes to debugging software, a methodical approach is must.

What are layer objects and what do they represent?

Layer objects are data objects which represent visual content. Layer objects are used by views to render their content. Custom layer objects can also be added to the interface to implement complex animations and other types of sophisticated visual effects.

What makes React Native special for iOS?

(Unlike PhoneGap) with React Native your application logic is written and runs in JavaScript, whereas your application UI is fully native; therefore you have none of the compromises typically associated with HTML5 UI. Additionally (unlike Titanium), React introduces a novel, radical and highly functional approach to constructing user interfaces. In brief, the application UI is simply expressed as a function of the current application state.

What is NSFetchRequest ?

NSFetchRequest is the class responsible for fetching from Core Data. Fetch requests are both powerful and flexible. You can use fetch requests to fetch a set of objects meeting the provided criteria, individual values and more.

Explain NSPersistentContainer ?

The persistent container creates and returns a container, having loaded the store for the application to it. This property is optional since there are legitimate error conditions that could cause the creation of the store to fail.

NSFetchedResultsController ?

NSFetchedResultsController is a controller, but it’s not a view controller. It has no user interface. Its purpose is to make developers’ lives easier by abstracting away much of the code needed to synchronize a table view with a data source backed by Core Data.

Set up an NSFetchedResultsController correctly, and your table will mimic its data source without you have to write more than a few lines of code.

What is the three major debugging improvements in Xcode 8 ?

The View Debugger lets us visualize our layouts and see constraint definitions at runtime. Although this has been around since Xcode 6, Xcode 8 introduces some handy new warnings for constraint conflicts and other great convenience features. The Thread Sanitizer is an all new runtime tool in Xcode 8 that alerts you to threading issues — most notably, potential race conditions. The Memory Graph Debugger is also brand new to Xcode 8. It provides visualization of your app’s memory graph at a point in time and flags leaks in the Issue navigator.

How could you setup Live Rendering ?

With @IBInspectable and @IBDesignable, it’s possible to build a custom interface for configuring your custom controls and have them rendered in real-time while designing your project.

@IBInspectable properties provide new access to an old feature: user-defined runtime attributes. Currently accessible from the identity inspector, these attributes have been available since before Interface Builder was integrated into Xcode. They provide a powerful mechanism for configuring any key-value coded property of an instance in a NIB, XIB, or storyboard.

Built-in Cocoa types can also be extended to have inspectable properties beyond the ones already in Interface Builder’s attribute inspector. If you like rounded corners, you’ll love this UIView extension:

extension UIView {
    @IBInspectable var cornerRadius: CGFloat {
        get {
            return layer.cornerRadius
        }
        set {
            layer.cornerRadius = newValue
            layer.masksToBounds = newValue > 0
        }
    }
}

The attribute @IBDesignable lets Interface Builder perform live updates on a particular view. This allows seeing how your custom views will appear without building and running your app after each change.

To mark a custom view as IBDesignable, prefix the class name with @IBDesignable (or the IB_DESIGNABLE macro in Objective-C). Your initializers, layout, and drawing methods will be used to render your custom view right on the canvas:

@IBDesignable
class MyCustomView: UIView {
    ...
}

What is TVMLKit ?

TVMLKit is the glue between TVML, JavaScript, and your native tvOS application.

What is Platform limitations of tvOS ?

First, tvOS provides no browser support of any kind, nor is there any WebKit or other web-based rendering engine you can program against. This means your app can’t link out to a web browser for anything, including web links, OAuth, or social media sites. Second, tvOS apps cannot explicitly use local storage. At product launch, the devices ship with either 32 GB or 64 GB of hard drive space, but apps are not permitted to write directly to the on-board storage. tvOS app bundle cannot exceed 4 GB.

What are Realm benefits ?

An open-source database framework. Easy to set up. All changes are made to objects in store directly. Supports observing changes. Supports encryption. Fast.

What is JSON/PLIST limits ?

We create your objects and then serialized them to disk.. It’s great and very limited use cases. We can’t obviously use complex queries to filter your results. It’s very slow. Each time we need something, we need to either serialize or deserialize it. it’s not thread-safe.

What are SQLite limits ?

We need to define the relations between the tables. Define the schema of all the tables. We have to manually write queries to fetch data. We need to query results and then map those to models. Queries are very fast.

How many are there APIs for battery-efficient location tracking ?

There are 3 apis. Significant location changes — the location is delivered approximately every 500 meters (usually up to 1 km) Region monitoring — track enter/exit events from circular regions with a radius equal to 100m or more. Region monitoring is the most precise API after GPS. Visit events — monitor place Visit events which are enters/exits from a place (home/office).

iOS Core

Common

What is Remote Notifications attacment’s limits ?

We can be sent with video or image with push notification. But maximum payload is 4kb.

What is three triggers for a local notification ?

Location, Calendar, and Time Interval. A Location notification fires when the GPS on your phone is at a location or geographic region. Calendar trigger is based on calendar data broken into date components. Time Interval is a count of seconds until the timer goes off.

How could we get device token ?

There are two steps to get device token. First, we must show the user’s permission screen, after we can register for remote notifications. If these steps go well, the system will provide device token. If we uninstall or reinstall the app, the device token would change.

What is Encapsulation ?

Encapsulation is an object-oriented design principles and hides the internal states and functionality of objects. That means objects keep their state information private.

What is big-o notation ?

An algorithm is an impression method used to determine the working time for an input N size. The big-o notation grade is expressed by the highest value. And the big-o notation is finding the answer with the question of O(n). Here is a cheat sheet and swift algorithm club. For example;

For Loops big-o notation is O(N). Because For Loops work n times. Variables (var number:Int = 4) big-o notation is O(1).

What Is Dependency Management?

If we want to integrate open source project, add a framework from a third party project, or even reuse code across our own projects, dependency management helps us to manage these relationships. Check this out

What is UML Class Diagrams?

UML Class Diagram is a set of rules and notations for the specification of a software system, managed and created by the Object Management Group.

Explain throw

We are telling the compiler that it can throw errors by using the throws keyword. Before we can throw an error, we need to make a list of all the possible errors you want to throw.

What is GraphQL ?

GraphQL is trying to solve creating a query interface for the clients at the application level. Apollo iOS is a strongly-typed, caching GraphQL client for iOS, written in Swift.

Explain Common features of Protocols & superclasses

implementation reuse provide points for customization interface reuse supporting modular design via dynamic dispatch on reused interfaces

What is Continuous Integration ?

Continuous Integration allows us to get early feedback when something is going wrong during application development. There are a lot of continuous integration tools available.

Self hosted server

  • Xcode Server
  • Jenkins
  • TeamCity
  • Cloud solutions
  • TravisCI
  • Bitrise
  • Buddybuild

What is the difference Delegates and Callbacks ?

The difference between delegates and callbacks is that with delegates, the NetworkService is telling the delegate “There is something changed.” With callbacks, the delegate is observing the NetworkService.

Explain Linked List

Linked List basically consist of the structures we named the Node. These nodes basically have two things. The first one is the one we want to keep. (we do not have to hold single data, we can keep as much information as we want), and the other is the address information of the other node.

Disadvantages of Linked Lists, at the beginning, there is extra space usage. Because the Linked List have an address information in addition to the existing information. This means more space usage.

Do you know Back End development ?

Depends. I have experienced PARSE and I am awarded FBStart. I decided to learn pure back end. You have two choices. Either you can learn node.js + express.js and mongodb. OR, you can learn Vapor or Kitura.

Don’t you like or use Firebase?

Firebase doesn't have a path for macOS X developers. If you want to learn Firebase, please just follow one month of Firebase Google Group.

Explain AutoLayout

AutoLayout provides a flexible and powerful layout system that describes how views and the UI controls calculates the size and position in the hierarchy.

What is the disadvantage to hard-coding log statements ?

First, when you start to log. This starts to accumulate. It may not seem like a lot, but every minute adds up. By the end of a project, those stray minutes will equal to hours.

Second, Each time we add one to the code base, we take a risk of injecting new bugs into our code.

What is Pointer ?

A pointer is a direct reference to a memory address. Whereas a variable acts as a transparent container for a value, pointers remove a layer of abstraction and let you see how that value is stored.

Explain Core ML Pros and Cons

Pros of Core ML: Really easy to add into your app. Not just for deep learning: also does logistic regression, decision trees, and other “classic” machine learning models. Comes with a handy converter tool that supports several different training packages (Keras, Caffe, scikit-learn, and others).

Cons: Core ML only supports a limited number of model types. If you trained a model that does something Core ML does not support, then you cannot use Core ML. The conversion tools currently support only a few training packages. A notable omission is TensorFlow, arguably the most popular machine learning tool out there. You can write your own converters, but this isn’t a job for a novice. (The reason TensorFlow is not supported is that it is a low-level package for making general computational graphs, while Core ML works at a much higher level of abstraction.) No flexibility, little control. The Core ML API is very basic, it only lets you load a model and run it. There is no way to add custom code to your models. iOS 11 and later only.

What is pair programming?

Pair programming is a tool to share information with junior developers. Junior and senior developer sitting side-by-side this is the best way for the junior to learn from senior developers.

Check out Martin Fowler on “Pair Programming Misconceptions”, WikiHow on Pair Programming

Explain blocks

Blocks are a way of defining a single task or unit of behavior without having to write an entire Objective-C class. they are anonymous functions.

What is Keychain ?

Keychain is an API for persisting data securly in iOS App. There is a good library - Locksmith

What is the biggest changes in UserNotifications ?

We can add audio, video and images. We can create custom interfaces for notifications. We can manage notifications with interfaces in the notification center. New Notification extensions allow us to manage remote notification payloads before they’re delivered.

Explain to using Class and Inheritance benefits

With Overriding provides a mechanism for customization Reuse implementation Subclassing provides reuse interface Modularity Subclasses provide dynamic dispatch

Explain Priority Inversion and Priority Inheritance.

If high priority thread waits for low priority thread, this is called Priority Inversion. if low priority thread temporarily inherit the priority of the highest priority thread, this is called Priority Inheritance.

Where do we use Dependency Injection ?

We use a storyboard or xib in our iOS app, then we created IBOutlets. IBOutlet is a property related to a view. These are injected into the view controller when it is instantiated, which is essentially a form of Dependency Injection.

There are forms of dependency injection: constructor injection, property injection and method injection.

What is RGR ( Red — Green — Refactor ) ?

Red, Green and Refactor are stages of the TDD (Test Driven Development).

Red: Write a small amount of test code usually no more than seven lines of code and watch it fail. Green: Write a small amount of production code. Again, usually no more than seven lines of code and make your test pass. Refactor: Tests are passing, you can make changes without worrying. Clean up your code. There are great workshop notes here.

Please explain SOAP and REST Basics differences ?

Both of them helps us access Web services. SOAP relies exclusively on XML to provide messaging services. SOAP is definitely the heavyweight choice for Web service access. Originally developed by Microsoft.

REST ( Representational State Transfer ) provides a lighter weight alternative. Instead of using XML to make a request, REST relies on a simple URL in many cases. REST can use four different HTTP 1.1 verbs (GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE) to perform tasks.

What kind of JSONSerialization have ReadingOptions ?

mutableContainers Specifies that arrays and dictionaries are created as variables objects, not constants. mutableLeaves Specifies that leaf strings in the JSON object graph are created as instances of variable String. allowFragments Specifies that the parser should allow top-level objects that are not an instance of Array or Dictionary.

Please explain types of notifications.

There are two type of notifications: Remote and Local. Remote notification requires connection to a server. Local notifications don’t require server connection. Local notifications happen on device.

What is you favorite Visualize Chart library ?

Charts has support iOS,tvOS,OSX The Apple side of the cross platform MPAndroidChart.

Core Plot is a 2D plotting framework for macOS, iOS, and tvOS

TEAChart has iOS support

When is a good time for dependency injection in our projects?

There is a few guidelines that you can follow.

Rule 1. Is Testability important to us? If so, then it is essential to identify external dependencies within the class that you wish to test. Once dependencies can be injected we can easily replace real services for mock ones to make it easy to testing easy.

Rules 2. Complex classes have complex dependencies, include application-level logic, or access external resources such as the disk or the network. Most of the classes in your application will be complex, including almost any controller object and most model objects. The easiest way to get started is to pick a complex class in your application and look for places where you initialize other complex objects within that class.

Rules 3. If an object is creating instances of other objects that are shared dependencies within other objects then it is a good candidate for a dependency injection.

REST, HTTP, JSON — What’s that?

HTTP is the application protocol, or set of rules, web sites use to transfer data from the web server to client. The client (your web browser or app) use to indicate the desired action:

GET: Used to retrieve data, such as a web page, but doesn’t alter any data on the server. HEAD: Identical to GET but only sends back the headers and none of the actual data.

POST: Used to send data to the server, commonly used when filling a form and clicking submit.

PUT: Used to send data to the specific location provided.

DELETE: Deletes data from the specific location provided.

REST, or REpresentational State Transfer, is a set of rules for designing consistent, easy-to-use and maintainable web APIs.

JSON stands for JavaScript Object Notation; it provides a straightforward, human-readable and portable mechanism for transporting data between two systems. Apple supplies the JSONSerialization class to help convert your objects in memory to JSON and vice-versa.

What is the difference between LLVM and Clang?

Clang is the front end of LLVM tool chain ( “clang” C Language Family Frontend for LLVM ). Every Compiler has three parts .

  1. Front end ( lexical analysis, parsing )
  2. Optimizer ( Optimizing abstract syntax tree )
  3. Back end ( machine code generation )

Front end ( Clang ) takes the source code and generates abstract syntax tree ( LLVM IR ).

What is Class ?

A class is meant to define a functionality of an object. In this way, a class is like a blueprint of an object.

What is Object?

Entity that representable in code, holds memory address.

Underlying entity exposes interface and functionality.

What is the difference between property and instance variable?

A property is an instance variable with associated getter and setter methods. Property syntax creates all three components implicitly. A calculated (readonly) property is a getter method with no underlying instance variable.

Explain difference between SDK and Framework ?

SDK is a more broad set of software development tools. This set is used for creation of applications.

Framework is basically a platform which is used for developing software applications. It provides the necessary foundation on which the programs can be developed for a specific platform. SDK and Framework complement each other, and SDKs are available for frameworks.

What is Downcasting ?

When we’re casting an object to another type in Objective-C, it’s pretty simple since there’s only one way to do it. In Swift, though, there are two ways to cast — one that’s safe and one that’s not .

  • In swift:

    • as used for upcasting and type casting to bridged type

    • as? used for safe casting, return nil if failed

    • as! used to force casting, crash if failed. should only be used when we know the downcast will succeed.

  • In Objc: (Object *)variable

What is bitcode ?

Bitcode refers to to the type of code: “LLVM Bitcode” that is sent to iTunes Connect. This allows Apple to use certain calculations to re-optimize apps further (e.g: possibly downsize executable sizes). If Apple needs to alter your executable then they can do this without a new build being uploaded.

What is the difference SVN and Git ?

SVN relies on a centralised system for version management. It’s a central repository where working copies are generated and a network connection is required for access.

Git relies on a distributed system for version management. You will have a local repository on which you can work, with a network connection only required to synchronise.

What are the most important application delegate methods a developer should handle ?

The operating system calls specific methods within the application delegate to facilitate transitioning to and from various states. The seven most important application delegate methods a developer should handle are:

  • application:willFinishLaunchingWithOptions

Method called when the launch process is initiated. This is the first opportunity to execute any code within the app.

  • application:didFinishLaunchingWithOptions

Method called when the launch process is nearly complete. Since this method is called is before any of the app’s windows are displayed, it is the last opportunity to prepare the interface and make any final adjustments.

  • applicationDidBecomeActive

Once the application has become active, the application delegate will receive a callback notification message via the method applicationDidBecomeActive.

This method is also called each time the app returns to an active state from a previous switch to inactive from a resulting phone call or SMS.

  • applicationWillResignActive

There are several conditions that will spawn the applicationWillResignActive method. Each time a temporary event, such as a phone call, happens this method gets called. It is also important to note that “quitting” an iOS app does not terminate the processes, but rather moves the app to the background.

  • applicationDidEnterBackground

This method is called when an iOS app is running, but no longer in the foreground. In other words, the user interface is not currently being displayed. According to Apple’s UIApplicationDelegate Protocol Reference, the app has approximately five seconds to perform tasks and return. If the method does not return within five seconds, the application is terminated.

  • applicationWillEnterForeground

This method is called as an app is preparing to move from the background to the foreground. The app, however, is not moved into an active state without the applicationDidBecomeActive method being called. This method gives a developer the opportunity to re-establish the settings of the previous running state before the app becomes active.

  • applicationWillTerminate

This method notifies your application delegate when a termination event has been triggered. Hitting the home button no longer quits the application. Force quitting the iOS app, or shutting down the device triggers the applicationWillTerminate method. This is the opportunity to save the application configuration, settings, and user preferences.

What does code signing do?

Signing our app allows iOS to identify who signed our app and to verify that our app hasn’t been modified since you signed it. The Signing Identity consists of a public-private key pair that Apple creates for us.

What problems does delegation solve?

  • Avoiding tight coupling of objects

  • Modifying behavior and appearance without the need to subclass objects

  • Allowing tasks to be handed off to any arbitrary object

What is the difference between a delegate and an NSNotification?

Delegates and NSNotifications can be used to accomplish nearly the same functionality. However, delegates are one-to-one while NSNotifications are one-to-many.

Explain SiriKit Limitations

  • SiriKit cannot use all app types

  • Not a substitute for a full app only an extension

  • Siri requires a consistent Internet connection to work

  • Siri service needs to communicate Apple Servers.

Why do we use a delegate pattern to be notified of the text field’s events?

Because at most only a single object needs to know about the event.

Explain View Controller Lifecycle events order ?

There are a few different lifecycle event

  • loadView

Creates the view that the controller manages. It’s only called when the view controller is created and only when done programatically.

  • viewDidLoad

Called after the controller’s view is loaded into memory. It’s only called when the view is created.

  • viewWillAppear

It’s called whenever the view is presented on the screen. In this step the view has bounds defined but the orientation is not applied.

  • viewWillLayoutSubviews

Called to notify the view controller that its view is about to layout its subviews. This method is called every time the frame changes

  • viewDidLayoutSubviews

Called to notify the view controller that its view has just laid out its subviews. Make additional changes here after the view lays out its subviews.

  • viewDidAppear

Notifies the view controller that its view was added to a view hierarchy.

  • viewWillDisappear

Before the transition to the next view controller happens and the origin view controller gets removed from screen, this method gets called.

  • viewDidDisappear

After a view controller gets removed from the screen, this method gets called. You usually override this method to stop tasks that are should not run while a view controller is not on screen.

  • viewWillTransition(to:with:)

When the interface orientation changes, UIKit calls this method on the window’s root view controller before the size changes are about to be made. The root view controller then notifies its child view controllers, propagating the message throughout the view controller hierarchy.

What is the major purposes of Frameworks?

Frameworks have three major purposes:

  • Code encapsulation

  • Code modularity

  • Code reuse

You can share your framework with your other apps, team members, or the iOS community. When combined with Swift’s access control, frameworks help define strong, testable interfaces between code modules.

What is ARC ?

ARC is a compile time feature that is Apple’s version of automated memory management. It stands for Automatic Reference Counting. This means that it only frees up memory for objects when there are zero strong references/ to them. What is difference between BDD and TDD ?

The main difference between BDD and TDD is the fact that BDD test cases can be read by non-engineers, which can be very useful in teams.

iOS I prefer Quick BDD framework and its “matcher framework,” called Nimble.

How to educate app with Context ?

Education in context technique helping users interact with an element or surface in a way they have not done so previously. This technique often includes slight visual cues and subtle animation.

Please explain “Arrange-Act-Assert”

AAA is a pattern for arranging and formatting code in Unit Tests. If we were to write XCTests each of our tests would group these functional sections, separated by blank lines:

Arrange all necessary preconditions and inputs. Act on the object or method under test. Assert that the expected results have occurred.

What is the benefit writing tests in iOS apps ?

Writing tests first gives us a clear perspective on the API design, by getting into the mindset of being a client of the API before it exists. Good tests serve as great documentation of expected behavior. It gives us confidence to constantly refactor our code because we know that if we break anything our tests fail. If tests are hard to write its usually a sign architecture could be improved. Following RGR ( Red — Green — Refactor ) helps you make improvements early on.

What is five essential practical guidelines to improve your typographic quality of mobile product designs ?

  1. Start by choosing your body text typeface.
  2. Try to avoid mixing typefaces.
  3. Watch your line length.
  4. Balance line height and point size.
  5. Use proper Apostrophes and Dashes.

What does Yak Shaving mean ?

Yak shaving is a programing term that refers to a series of tasks that need to be performed before a project can progress to its next milestone.

What is the Test Driven Development of three simple rules ?

You are not allowed to write any production code unless it is to make a failing unit test pass. You are not allowed to write any more of a unit test than is sufficient to fail; and compilation failures are failures. You are not allowed to write any more production code than is sufficient to pass the one failing unit test.

Why it is better to use higher order functions?

Functions that take another function as a parameter, or return a function, as a result, are known as higher-order functions. Swift defines these functions as CollectionType. The very basic higher order function is a filter.

What is Concurrency ?

Concurrency is dividing up the execution paths of your program so that they are possibly running at the same time. The common terminology: process, thread, multithreading, and others. Terminology; Process, An instance of an executing app Thread, Path of execution for code Multithreading, Multiple threads or multiple paths of execution running at the same time.

Concurrency, Execute multiple tasks at the same time in a scalable manner. Queues, Queues are lightweight data structures that manage objects in the order of First-in, First-out (FIFO). Synchronous vs Asynchronous tasks

Grand Central Dispatch (GCD)

GCD is a library that provides a low-level and object-based API to run tasks concurrently while managing threads behind the scenes. Terminology; Dispatch Queues, A dispatch queue is responsible for executing a task in the first-in, first-out order.

Serial Dispatch Queue A serial dispatch queue runs tasks one at a time. Concurrent Dispatch Queue A concurrent dispatch queue runs as many tasks as it can without waiting for the started tasks to finish. Main Dispatch Queue A globally available serial queue that executes tasks on the application’s main thread.

Readers-Writers

Multiple threads reading at the same time while there should be only one thread writing. The solution to the problem is a readers-writers lock which allows concurrent read-only access and an exclusive write access. Terminology; Race Condition A race condition occurs when two or more threads can access shared data and they try to change it at the same time.

Deadlock A deadlock occurs when two or sometimes more tasks wait for the other to finish, and neither ever does.

Readers-Writers problem Multiple threads reading at the same time while there should be only one thread writing.

Readers-writer lock Such a lock allows concurrent read-only access to the shared resource while write operations require exclusive access. Dispatch Barrier Block Dispatch barrier blocks create a serial-style bottleneck when working with concurrent queues.

NSOperation — NSOperationQueue — NSBlockOperation

NSOperation adds a little extra overhead compared to GCD, but we can add dependency among various operations and re-use, cancel or suspend them. NSOperationQueue, It allows a pool of threads to be created and used to execute NSOperations in parallel. Operation queues aren’t part of GCD. NSBlockOperation allows you to create an NSOperation from one or more closures. NSBlockOperations can have multiple blocks, that run concurrently.

What is the difference between Synchronous & Asynchronous task ?

Synchronous: waits until the task has completed Asynchronous: completes a task in background and can notify you when complete

Explain #keyPath() ?

Using #keyPath(), a static type check will be performed by virtue of the key-path literal string being used as a StaticString or StringLiteralConvertible. At this point, it’s then checked to ensure that it

A) is actually a thing that exists and B) is properly exposed to Objective-C.

What is bounding box?

Bounding box is a term used in geometry; it refers to the smallest measure (area or volume) within which a given set of points.

What is Dynamic Dispatch ?

Dynamic Dispatch is the process of selecting which implementation of a polymorphic operation that’s a method or a function to call at run time.

This means, that when we wanna invoke our methods like object method. (Swift does not default to dynamic dispatch)

What’s Code Coverage ?

It is a metric used to measure the percentage of source code covered when tests run.

What’s Completion Handler ?

Completion handlers are super convenient when our app is making an API call, and we need to do something when that task is done, like updating the UI to show the data from the API call.

We’ll see completion handlers in Apple’s APIs like dataTaskWithRequest and they can be pretty handy in your own code. The completion handler takes a chunk of code with 3 arguments:(NSData?, NSURLResponse?, NSError?) that returns nothing: Void. It’s a closure. The completion handlers have to marked @escaping since they are executed some point after the enclosing function has been executed.

What is Functions ?

Functions let us group a series of statements together to perform some task. Once a function is created, it can be reused over and over in your code. If you find yourself repeating statements in your code, then a function may be the answer to avoid that repetition. Pro Tip, Good functions accept input and return output. Bad functions set global variables and rely on other functions to work.

What is ABI ?

ABIs are important when it comes to applications that use external libraries. If a program is built to use a particular library and that library is later updated, you don’t want to have to re-compile that application (and from the end-user’s standpoint, you may not have the source). If the updated library uses the same ABI, then your program will not need to change. ABI stability will come with Swift 5.0

Why is design pattern very important ?

Design patterns are reusable solutions to common problems in software design. They’re templates designed to help you write code that’s easy to understand and reuse. Most common Cocoa design patterns:

Creational: Singleton.

Structural: Decorator, Adapter, Facade.

Behavioral: Observer, and, Memento

Explain MVC

Models — responsible for the domain data or a data access layer which manipulates the data, think of ‘Person’ or ‘PersonDataProvider’ classes. Views — responsible for the presentation layer (GUI), for iOS environment think of everything starting with ‘UI’ prefix.

Controller/Presenter/ViewModel — the glue or the mediator between the Model and the View, in general responsible for altering the Model by reacting to the user’s actions performed on the View and updating the View with changes from the Model.

Explain MVVM

UIKit independent representation of your View and its state. The View Model invokes changes in the Model and updates itself with the updated Model, and since we have a binding between the View and the View Model, the first is updated accordingly.

Your view model will actually take in your model, and it can format the information that’s going to be displayed on your view. There is a more known framework called RxSwift. It contains RxCocoa, which are reactive extensions for Cocoa and CocoaTouch.

How to Prioritize Usability in Design ?

Broke down its design process to prioritize usability in 4 steps: Think like the user, then design the UX. Remember that users are people, not demographics. When promoting an app, consider all the situations in which it could be useful. Keep working on the utility of the app even after launch.

What’s the difference between the frame and the bounds?

The bounds of a UIView is the rectangle, expressed as a location (x,y) and size (width,height) relative to its own coordinate system (0,0). The frame of a UIView is the rectangle, expressed as a location (x,y) and size (width,height) relative to the superview it is contained within.

Application States

The iOS application states are as follows:

  • Not running state: The app has not been launched or was running but was terminated by the system.

  • Inactive state:

The app is running in the foreground but is currently not receiving events. (It may be executing other code though.) An app usually stays in this state only briefly as it transitions to a different state. The only time it stays inactive for any period of time is when the user locks the screen or the system prompts the user to respond to some event (such as an incoming phone call or SMS message).

  • Active state:

The app is running in the foreground and is receiving events. This is the normal mode for foreground apps.

  • Background state:

The app is in the background and executing code. Most apps enter this state briefly on their way to being suspended. However, an app that requests extra execution time may remain in this state for a period of time. In addition, an app being launched directly into the background enters this state instead of the inactive state.

  • Suspended state:

While suspended, an app remains in memory but does not execute any code. When a low-memory condition occurs, the system may purge suspended apps without notice to make more space for the foreground app.

What is Responder Chain ?

A ResponderChain is a hierarchy of objects that have the opportunity to respond to events received.

What kind of order functions can we use on collection types ?

map(:): Returns an array of results after transforming each element in the sequence using the provided closure. filter(:): Returns an array of elements that satisfy the provided closure predicate. reduce(::): Returns a single value by combining each element in the sequence using the provided closure. sorted(by:): Returns an array of the elements in the sequence sorted based on the provided closure predicate. To see all methods available from Sequence

What allows you to combine your commits ?

last commit - git rebase -i HEAD~1 combine - git squash

What is the difference ANY and ANYOBJECT ?

According to Apple’s Swift documentation:

Any can represent an instance of any type at all, including function types and optional types. AnyObject can represent an instance of any class type.

What is Regular expressions ?

Regular expressions are special string patterns that describe how to search through a string.

Objective-C

What is a property? How can you create one? What is the benefits to use properties?

@property, (auto)synthesize; getter/setter method (also send KVO notifications). Hides the iVars (safety and flexibility)

Method visibility

private/public – no protected. anyone can call a private

How to check an optional protocol method existence on an object?

Call respondsToSelector

+ and - methods

class vs instance methods

How to add a method to a class (extend) without the source of the class and without recompiling the class?

Categories

Difference between extensions () and (named) in categories implementations?

() should be only one and for main interface (name) for categories

Benefits of extension category?

private property declaration, compile time method check.

Can you re-declare a property in subclass or extension?

YES. If you declare a property in one class as readonly, you can redeclare it as readwrite in a class extension, in a protocol, or in a subclass.

Limitations and problems with categories?

Cannot override an existing method and call it in the extension method

What are formal and informal protocols?

Formal are the real protocols, informal are categories on NSObject (with optional methods)

Property modifiers and the meaning

nonatomic/atomic, assign/retain/copy/readonly vs strong/weak/unsafe_unretained, getter=, setter=

How to declare protected-like methods (accessible only for some dedicated classes)?

Separate header file with (named) category, and include it in other class

Explain Selectors in ObjC

In Objective-C, a selector is the name used to select a method to execute on an object, or, more succinctly, the unique identifier that replaces the name when the source code is compiled. A selector is represented by the special Objective-C type called SEL .

KVC — KVO

KVC adds stands for Key-Value Coding. It’s a mechanism by which an object’s properties can be accessed using string’s at runtime rather than having to statically know the property names at development time. KVO stands for Key-Value Observing and allows a controller or class to observe changes to a property value. In KVO, an object can ask to be notified of any changes to a specific property, whenever that property changes value, the observer is automatically notified.

What is interface?

Defines the functions and properties of an object that is exposed to outside

How many different annotations available in Objective-C ?

_Null_unspecified, which bridges to a Swift implicitly unwrapped optional. This is the default. _Nonnull, the value won’t be nil it bridges to a regular reference. _Nullable the value can be nil, it bridges to an optional. _Null_resettable the value can never be nil, when read but you can set it to know to reset it. This is only apply property.

What is made up of NSError object?

There are three parts of NSError object a domain, an error code, and a user info dictionary. The domain is a string that identifies what categories of errors this error is coming from.

Why do we use @synchronized ?

synchronized guarantees that only one thread can be executing that code in the block at any given time.

What is @synthesize in Objective-C ?

synthesize generates getter and setter methods for your property.

What is @dynamic in Objective-C ?

We use dynamic for subclasses of NSManagedObject. @dynamic tells the compiler that getter and setters are implemented using dynamic dispatch of Objective-C runtime.

What is the difference strong, weak, readonly and copy ?

strong, weak, assign property attributes define how memory for that property will be managed. Strong means that the reference count will be increased and the reference to it will be maintained through the life of the object Weak ( non-strong reference ), means that we are pointing to an object but not increasing its reference count. It’s often used when creating a parent child relationship. The parent has a strong reference to the child but the child only has a weak reference to the parent. Every time used on var Every time used on an optional type Automatically changes itself to nil Read only, we can set the property initially but then it can’t be changed. Copy, means that we’re copying the value of the object when it’s created. Also prevents its value from changing. for more details check this out

Why don’t we use strong for enum property in Objective-C ?

Because enums aren’t objects, so we don’t specify strong or weak here. (C Enum)

Swift

What is Protocol Extensions?

We can adopt protocols using extensions as well as on the original type declaration. This allows you to add protocols to types you don’t necessarily own.

Why do we use availability attributes ?

Apple wants to support one system version back, meaning that we should support iOS9 or iOS8. Availability Attributes lets us to support previous version iOS.

What’s the difference optional between nil and .None?

There is no difference. Optional.None (.None for short) is the correct way of initializing an optional variable lacking a value, whereas nil is just syntactic sugar for .None.

How do you follow up clean code for this project ?

I follow style guide and coding conventions for Swift projects of Github and SwiftLint.

How many different ways to pass data in Swift ?

There are many different ways such as Delegate, KVO, Segue, and NSNotification, Target-Action, Callbacks.

When do you use optional chaining vs. if let or guard ?

We use optional chaining when we do not really care if the operation fails; otherwise, we use if let or guard. Optional chaining lets us run code only if our optional has a value.

Using the question mark operator like this is called optional chaining. Apple’s documentation explains it like this:

Optional chaining is a process for querying and calling properties, methods, and subscripts on an optional that might currently be nil. If the optional contains a value, the property, method, or subscript call succeeds; if the optional is nil, the property, method, or subscript call returns nil. Multiple queries can be chained together, and the entire chain fails gracefully if any link in the chain is nil.

Could you explain Associatedtype ?

If you want to create Generic Protocol we can use associatedtype. For more details check this out.

What is the difference Filter and Map Function ?

Map, we pass in a function that returns a value for each element in an array. The return value of this function represents what an element becomes in our new array.

Filter, we pass in a function that returns either true or false for each element. If the function that we pass returns true for a given element, then the element is included in the final array.

What is DispatchGroup ?

DispatchGroup allows for aggregate synchronization of work. We can use them to submit multiple different work items and track when they all complete, even though they might run on different queues. This behavior can be helpful when progress can’t be made until all of the specified tasks are complete. 

Explain subscripts ?

Classes, structures, and enumerations can define subscripts, which are shortcuts for accessing the member elements of a collection, list, or sequence.

What is Nil Coalescing & Ternary Operator ?

nil coalescing - ?? teranry - ? : It is an easily return an unwrapped optional, or a default value. If we do not have value, we can set zero or default value.

What is the Swift main advantage ?

To mention some of the main advantages of Swift:

Optional Types, which make applications crash-resistant.

Built-in error handling.

Closures.

Generics, Protocol Extensions and Constraints make it easy to reuse code and implement new functionality.

Faster in execution when using best practices (Slower in compilation).

Type-safe language.

Supports pattern matching.

More human readable code.

What is the difference CollectionViews & TableViews ?

TableViews display a list of items, in a single column, a vertical fashion, and limited to vertical scrolling only.

CollectionViews also display a list of items, however, they can have multiple columns and rows.

What is Alamofire doing ?

Alamofire uses URL Loading System in the background, so it does integrate well with the Apple-provided mechanisms for all the network development. This means, It provides chainable request/response methods, JSON parameter and response serialization, authentication, and many other features. It has thread mechanics and execute requests on a background thread and call completion blocks on the main thread.

Explain [weak self] and [unowned self] ?

unowned ( non-strong reference ) does the same as weak with one exception: The variable will not become nil and must not be an optional.

When you try to access the variable after its instance has been deallocated. That means, you should only use unowned when you are sure, that this variable will never be accessed after the corresponding instance has been deallocated.

However, if you don’t want the variable to be weak AND you are sure that it can’t be accessed after the corresponding instance has been deallocated, you can use unowned.

Every time used with non-optional types Every time used with let By declaring it [weak self] you get to handle the case that it might be nil inside the closure at some point and therefore the variable must be an optional. A case for using [weak self] in an asynchronous network request, is in a view controller where that request is used to populate the view.

Method Swizzling in Swift

Method Swizzling is a well known practice in Objective-C and in other languages that support dynamic method dispatching.

Through swizzling, the implementation of a method can be replaced with a different one at runtime, by changing the mapping between a specific #selector(method) and the function that contains its implementation.

To use method swizzling with your Swift classes there are two requirements that you must comply with:

The class containing the methods to be swizzled must extend NSObject The methods you want to swizzle must have the dynamic attribute

What is the difference Non-Escaping and Escaping Closures ?

The lifecycle of a non-escaping closure is simple:

Pass a closure into a function The function runs the closure (or not) The function returns Escaping closure means, inside the function, you can still run the closure (or not); the extra bit of the closure is stored some place that will outlive the function. There are several ways to have a closure escape its containing function:

Asynchronous execution: If you execute the closure asynchronously on a dispatch queue, the queue will hold onto the closure for you. You have no idea when the closure will be executed and there’s no guarantee it will complete before the function returns. Storage: Storing the closure to a global variable, property, or any other bit of storage that lives on past the function call means the closure has also escaped.

Explain generics ?

Generics create code that does not get specific about underlying data types.

Generics allow us to know what type it is going to contain.

Generics provide code reusability.

Explain lazy ?

An initial value of the lazy stored properties is calculated only when the property is called for the first time. There are situations when the lazy properties come very handy to developers.

Explain what is defer ?

defer keyword which provides a block of code that will be executed in the case when execution is leaving the current scope.

What is Enum ?

"OR" Type. Enum represents a group of all possible values the Object can represent.

What is Operator Overloading ?

Operator overloading allows us to change how existing operators behave with types that both already exist.

How to pass a variable as a reference ?

We need to mention that there are two types of variables: reference and value types. The difference between these two types is that by passing value type, the variable will create a copy of its data, and the reference type variable will just point to the original data in the memory. To pass value type as a reference we use &valueTypeVariable as an inout parameter in the function.

Please explain Swift’s pattern matching techniques

Tuple patterns are used to match values of corresponding tuple types. Type-casting patterns allow you to cast or match types. Wildcard patterns match and ignore any kind and type of value. Optional patterns are used to match optional values. Enumeration case patterns match cases of existing enumeration types. Expression patterns allow you to compare a given value against a given expression.

Please explain final keyword ?

By adding the keyword final in front of the method name, we prevent the method from being overridden. Can substitute final class keyword with a single word static and get the same behavior.

Final classes can't be subclassed

What is the difference open & public access level ?

open allows other modules to use the class and inherit the class; for members, it allows others modules to use the member and override it.

public only allows other modules to use the public classes and the public members. Public classes can no longer be subclassed, nor public members can be overridden.

What is the difference fileprivate, private and public private(set) access level ?

fileprivate is accessible within the current file, private is accessible within the current declaration.

public private(set) means getter is public, but the setter is private.

What is Internal access ?

Internal access enables entities to be used within any source file from their defining module, but not in any source file outside of the module.

Internal access is the default level of access. So even though we haven’t been writing any access control specifiers in our code, our code has been at an internal level by default.

Explain Forced Unwrapping

When we defined a variable as optional, then to get the value from this variable, we will have to unwrap it. This just means putting an exclamation mark at the end of the variable.

Explain Swift Standard Library Protocol ?

There are a few different protocol. Equatable protocol, that governs how we can distinguish between two instances of the same type. That means we can analyze. If we have a specific value is in our array. The comparable protocol, to compare two instances of the same type and sequence protocol: prefix(while:) and drop(while:) [SE-0045].

Swift 4 introduces a new Codable protocol that lets us serialize and deserialize custom data types without writing any special code.

Explain Swift Package Manager

The Swift Package Manager will help to vastly improve the Swift ecosystem, making Swift much easier to use and deploy on platforms without Xcode such as Linux. The Swift Package Manager also addresses the problem of dependency hell that can happen when using many interdependent libraries.

The Swift Package Manager only supports using the master branch. Swift Package Manager now supports packages with Swift, C, C++ and Objective-C.

How is an inout parameter different from a regular parameter?

An Inout is passed as function parameter.

Inside a function the local copy is modified

Before function returns it takes inout object and sets it's value equal to that local copy

So it seems like you pass parameter by reference, however it's not actually the case

What are benefits of Guard ?

There are two big benefits to guard. One is avoiding the pyramid of doom, as others have mentioned — lots of annoying if let statements nested inside each other moving further and further to the right. The other benefit is provide an early exit out of the function using break or using return.

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