Managing local notifications using UUID

Often times you will need to be able to manage your notifications, by being able to keep track of them and cancel them.

Track a notification

You can assign a UUID (universally unique identifier) to a notification, so you can track it:

Swift

let notification = UILocalNotification()
let uuid = NSUUID().uuidString
notification.userInfo = ["UUID": uuid]
UIApplication.shared.scheduleLocalNotification(notification)

Objective-C

UILocalNotification *notification = [[UILocalNotification alloc] init];
NSString *uuid = [[NSUUID UUID] UUIDString];
notification.userInfo = @{ @"UUID": uuid };
[[UIApplication sharedApplication] scheduleLocalNotification:notification];

Cancel a notification

To cancel a notification, we first get a list of all the notifications and then find the one with a matching UUID. Finally, we cancel it.

Swift

let scheduledNotifications = UIApplication.shared.scheduledLocalNotifications

guard let scheduledNotifications = scheduledNotifications else {
    return
}

for notification in scheduledNotifications where "\(notification.userInfo!["UUID"]!)" == UUID_TO_CANCEL {
    UIApplication.sharedApplication().cancelLocalNotification(notification)
}

Objective-C

NSArray *scheduledNotifications = [[UIApplication sharedApplication] scheduledLocalNotifications];

for (UILocalNotification *notification in scheduledNotifications) {
    if ([[notification.userInfo objectForKey:"UUID"] compare: UUID_TO_CANCEL]) {
        [[UIApplication sharedApplication] cancelLocalNotification:notification];
        break;
    }
}

You would probably want to store all of these UUID’s in Core Data or Realm.

Found a mistake? Have a question or improvement idea? Let me know.

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