Quickly adding single pin to MKMapView?

Question

I have a GPS coordinate (latitude, longitude) and I quickly want to place a single pin on a MKMapView showing that position. Everything works just fine, but as I only need a single pin with no callout is there a quicker way to do this or is what I have below what needs to be done?

- (MKAnnotationView *)mapView:(MKMapView *)mapView viewForAnnotation:(id < MKAnnotation >)annotation {
    MKPinAnnotationView *pinView = [[MKPinAnnotationView alloc] initWithAnnotation:annotation reuseIdentifier:@"DETAILPIN_ID"];
    [pinView setAnimatesDrop:YES];
    [pinView setCanShowCallout:NO];
    return pinView;
}

NB: I don't need to check for reusable annotation views as I am only using the pin to show a position in a detail view (which is destroyed and recreated the next time a detail view is requested).

Drews

Answer 1

Instead of using the -mapView:viewForAnnotation: method, just put the code for an MKPointAnnotation into your -viewDidLoad method. It won't animate the drop, but it is very easy.

// Place a single pin
MKPointAnnotation *annotation = [[MKPointAnnotation alloc] init];
[annotation setCoordinate:centerCoordinate];
[annotation setTitle:@"Title"]; //You can set the subtitle too
[self.mapView addAnnotation:annotation];

Swift version:

let annotation = MKPointAnnotation()
let centerCoordinate = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 41, longitude:29)
annotation.coordinate = centerCoordinate
annotation.title = "Title"
mapView.addAnnotation(annotation)

Branson

is it possible to animate the drop of an MKPointAnnotation? – Knell

You can't easily animate the drop. If you want the animation, use the mapView:viewForAnnotation: delegate method. – Branson

Answer 2

You can set the point and also the region like this:

CLLocationCoordinate2D coord = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(lat, lon);

MKCoordinateSpan span = MKCoordinateSpanMake(0.1, 0.1);
MKCoordinateRegion region = {coord, span};

MKPointAnnotation *annotation = [[MKPointAnnotation alloc] init];
[annotation setCoordinate:coord];

[self.staticMapView setRegion:region];
[self.staticMapView addAnnotation:annotation];

Frink

Answer 3

Simply you can add it like:

    mapView.mapType = MKMapType.standard

    let location = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 23.0225,longitude: 72.5714)

    let span = MKCoordinateSpanMake(0.05, 0.05)
    let region = MKCoordinateRegion(center: location, span: span)
    mapView.setRegion(region, animated: true)

    let annotation = MKPointAnnotation()
    annotation.coordinate = location
    annotation.title = "Javed Multani"
    annotation.subtitle = "Surat, India"
    mapView.addAnnotation(annotation)

It looks like:

Optimal

Answer 4

Swift version of add pin in MKMapView:

func addPin() {
    let annotation = MKPointAnnotation()
    let centerCoordinate = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 20.836864, longitude:-156.874269)
    annotation.coordinate = centerCoordinate
    annotation.title = "Lanai, Hawaii"
    mapView.addAnnotation(annotation)
}

Swift version of focusing a region or pin

func focusMapView() {
    let mapCenter = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(20.836864, -156.874269)
    let span = MKCoordinateSpanMake(0.1, 0.1)
    let region = MKCoordinateRegionMake(mapCenter, span)
    mapView.region = region
}

To learn more details visit "Load MKMapView using Swift".

Gearing

Answer 5

The easiest and simplest method to drop a pin and displaying Current Location in Map View is to simply add this code in your viewDidLoad method. (Assuming that user's current location is already fetched by you).

NSString *display_coordinates=[NSString stringWithFormat:@"Latitude is %f and Longitude is %f",coordinate.longitude,coordinate.latitude];

MKPointAnnotation *annotation = [[MKPointAnnotation alloc] init];
[annotation setCoordinate:coordinate];
[annotation setTitle:@"Click Labs"];            
[annotation setSubtitle:display_coordinates];
[mapView addAnnotation:annotation];

Coco

Answer 6

Since you want to animate the drop, you will need to implement viewForAnnotation as you've done because that property is NO by default.

If you don't need to animate the drop, you could eliminate the viewForAnnotation method implementation completely and to disable the callout, set the annotation's title to nil or blank when adding the annotation instead.

If you do need the pin drop animation and you're also showing the user's location (blue dot), you'll also need to check for MKUserLocation in viewForAnnotation and return nil.

Otherwise, you could remove the whole viewForAnnotation method and the default red pin will appear without animation, the callout will show if title is not blank, and the user location will show as a blue dot.

Sambo

Thats a good point, I did try not implementing viewForAnnotation but I did not realise that both my title and subtitle were pointing to NSStrings. I am not overly attached to the pin drop, but I think now its in a will leave it as it is. Thank you very much for your answer, very helpful and certainly something I will use in the future. – Drews