Storyboards should provide support for "external objects".

Originator:oliver
Number:rdar://27213719 Date Originated:2016-07-07
Status:Open Resolved:
Product:macOS SDK Product Version:
Classification:Enhancement Reproducible:N/A
 
Summary:
In XIB files it is possible to add an External Object when loading a NIB using instantiateWithOwner:topLevelObjects: 

This is not possible in an NSStoryboard (or a UIStoryboard for that matter).

This would be useful, for example, to enable a developer to supply singleton style objects to storyboard view controllers.  One example of this might be a NSDocumentController.

"Fortunately" in the case of NSDocumentController the 2nd invocation of init returns a shared instance so you can fake this in a storyboard by putting an NSObject (of type NSDocumentController) in a storyboard "scene".  However this behaviour, although documented, is quite weird and a better architecture would be to allow storyboards to supply external objects to scenes via some form of dependency injection that could be referenced in the storyboard.

Steps to Reproduce:
N/A

Expected Results:
That Storyboards should support external top level objects.

Actual Results:
You can not supply external top level objects to a storyboard.

Version:
Xcode Version 7.3.1 (7D1014), macOS X 10.11.5 (15F34)

Notes:


Configuration:


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