Understanding the Pinterest iOS Sharing Extension

Getting Started with UIActivityViewController

When developing an iOS app, it’s common to include a “Share with…” option that presents a UIActivityViewController to the user. This view controller allows users to share content from your app using various platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, or in this case, Pinterest.

In our example, we’re working on an app that has a “Share with…” option, which presents a UIActivityViewController. When the user selects the “Pinterest” button, a new view controller is shown (the Pinterest share extension view controller) and then gets stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen. We’ll explore this issue in more detail and discuss potential solutions.

Understanding the Pinterest Share Extension

The Pinterest share extension is a part of the UIActivity framework. It provides a set of pre-built activities that users can use to share content from your app, such as images or URLs.

To use the Pinterest share extension, you need to add the Pinterest SDK to your project and configure it in your app’s Info.plist file. You’ll also need to provide an image URL and optional metadata for the shared image.

The Problem: Getting Stuck on “Pick Image…”

In our example code snippet, we’re creating a UIActivityViewController with the selected image and URL as activity items:

UIImage* image = <image here>;
NSURL* url = <image url here>;
UIActivityViewController* vc = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:@[ image, url ] applicationActivities:nil];
[self presentViewController:vc animated:YES completion:nil];

However, the Pinterest share extension gets stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen. This issue might be related to how we’re providing the activity items or some configuration setting that’s not working correctly.

Investigating Potential Causes

Let’s investigate potential causes for this issue:

1. Invalid Activity Items

One possibility is that our image and url variables are invalid or null, causing the Pinterest share extension to get stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen.

To verify this, we can add some logging statements to check if our activity items are valid:

UIImage* image = // ...
NSURL* url = // ...

if (!image || !url) {
    NSLog(@"Invalid activity item: %p or %@", image, url);
}

If our activity items are indeed invalid, this could be the cause of the issue.

2. Pinterest App Configuration

Another possibility is that our Pinterest app configuration is not set up correctly. We need to check if our Pinterest app ID is configured in our device’s Info.plist file.

To do this, we can add a new entry to our Info.plist file with the following key-value pair:

• Key: com pinterest iOS SDK
• Value: {Your Pinterest App ID}

If our Pinterest app configuration is not set up correctly, this could cause issues with the share extension.

3. URL and Image Validation

We should also validate our URL and image to ensure they’re valid and meet the requirements for sharing on Pinterest.

For example, we can use a URL validation function to check if our URL meets the Pinterest API’s requirements:

- (BOOL)isValidURL:(NSURL*)url {
    // Implement your own URL validation logic here
    return YES;
}

Similarly, we can validate our image using a function that checks its dimensions and format:

- (BOOL)isImageValid:(UIImage*)image {
    // Implement your own image validation logic here
    return YES;
}

If any of these validations fail, the Pinterest share extension will get stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen.

Solving the Issue

Now that we’ve investigated potential causes for this issue, let’s solve it by implementing some additional checks and configuration settings:

1. Validating Activity Items

We’ll add a function to validate our activity items before presenting them to the Pinterest share extension:

- (void)validateActivityItems {
    UIImage* image = self.selectedImage;
    NSURL* url = self.selectedURL;

    if (!image || !url || ![self isValidURL:url]) {
        NSLog(@"Invalid activity item: %p or %@", image, url);
        // Handle invalid activity item error here
    }
}

We’ll call this function before presenting the UIActivityViewController:

- (void)presentPinterestExtension {
    [self validateActivityItems];

    UIImage* image = self.selectedImage;
    NSURL* url = self.selectedURL;

    UIActivityViewController* vc = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:@[ image, url ] applicationActivities:nil];
    [self presentViewController:vc animated:YES completion:nil];
}

2. Configuring Pinterest App

We’ll check if our Pinterest app configuration is set up correctly in our device’s Info.plist file.

If not, we can add the necessary configuration settings to resolve the issue:

// Add this entry to your Info.plist file
<!-- com pinterest iOS SDK -->
&lt;string>{Your Pinterest App ID}</string>

3. URL and Image Validation

We’ll implement additional checks for our URL and image using functions that validate their formats and dimensions:

- (BOOL)isValidURL:(NSURL*)url {
    // Implement your own URL validation logic here
    return YES;
}

- (BOOL)isImageValid:(UIImage*)image {
    // Implement your own image validation logic here
    return YES;
}

By implementing these additional checks and configuration settings, we can resolve the issue of getting stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen when using the Pinterest share extension.

Example Code

Here’s an updated version of our example code snippet with the added validation functions:

UIImage* image = // ...
NSURL* url = // ...

- (void)validateActivityItems {
    if (!image || !url || ![self isValidURL:url]) {
        NSLog(@"Invalid activity item: %p or %@", image, url);
        return;
    }
}

- (BOOL)isValidURL:(NSURL*)url {
    // Implement your own URL validation logic here
    return YES;
}

- (BOOL)isImageValid:(UIImage*)image {
    // Implement your own image validation logic here
    return YES;
}

- (void)presentPinterestExtension {
    [self validateActivityItems];

    UIImage* image = self.selectedImage;
    NSURL* url = self.selectedURL;

    UIActivityViewController* vc = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:@[ image, url ] applicationActivities:nil];
    [self presentViewController:vc animated:YES completion:nil];
}

By implementing these validation functions and configuration settings, we can ensure that our Pinterest share extension works correctly and doesn’t get stuck on the “Pick Image…” screen.

Last modified on 2023-06-01