Cannot place SwiftUI view outside the SafeArea when embedded in UIHostingController - swiftui

Question

I have a simple SwiftUI view that contains 3 text elements:
struct ImageDescriptionView: View {
var title: String?
var imageDescription: String?
var copyright: String?
var body: some View {
VStack(alignment: .leading) {
if let title = title {
Text(title)
.fontWeight(.bold)
.foregroundColor(.white)
.frame(maxWidth: .infinity, alignment: .leading)
}
if let imageDescription = imageDescription {
Text(imageDescription)
.foregroundColor(.white)
.fontWeight(.medium)
.frame(maxWidth: .infinity, alignment: .leading)
}
if let copyright = copyright {
Text(copyright)
.font(.body)
.foregroundColor(.white)
.frame(maxWidth: .infinity, alignment: .leading)
}
}
.background(
Color.blue
)
}
}
The SwiftUI View is embedded within a UIHostingController:
class ViewController: UIViewController {
private var hostingController = UIHostingController(rootView: ImageDescriptionView(title: "25. November 2021", imageDescription: "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.", copyright: "Bild © Unknown"))
override func viewDidLoad() {
super.viewDidLoad()
setUpHC()
}
private func setUpHC() {
hostingController.view.backgroundColor = .red
view.addSubview(hostingController.view)
hostingController.view.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
hostingController.view.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leadingAnchor),
hostingController.view.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.trailingAnchor),
hostingController.view.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor)
])
addChild(hostingController)
hostingController.didMove(toParent: self)
}
}
The result looks like this:
The UIHostingController is always bigger than the view. Also, it will always make the SwiftUI view respect the safe area (which in my case, I do not want)
The look I want:
(please don't comment the usability of the home indicator, that's not the case here)
What's the problem with UIHostingController? I tried setting .edgesIgnoreSafeArea(.all) on all Views within ImageDescriptionView, did not help.

Answer 1

On the UIHostingControllers property try the following
viewController._disableSafeArea = true
that should do the trick.

Answer 2

Got a discussion here, and the detail here
extension UIHostingController {
convenience public init(rootView: Content, ignoreSafeArea: Bool) {
self.init(rootView: rootView)
if ignoreSafeArea {
disableSafeArea()
}
}
func disableSafeArea() {
guard let viewClass = object_getClass(view) else { return }
let viewSubclassName = String(cString: class_getName(viewClass)).appending("_IgnoreSafeArea")
if let viewSubclass = NSClassFromString(viewSubclassName) {
object_setClass(view, viewSubclass)
}
else {
guard let viewClassNameUtf8 = (viewSubclassName as NSString).utf8String else { return }
guard let viewSubclass = objc_allocateClassPair(viewClass, viewClassNameUtf8, 0) else { return }
if let method = class_getInstanceMethod(UIView.self, #selector(getter: UIView.safeAreaInsets)) {
let safeAreaInsets: #convention(block) (AnyObject) -> UIEdgeInsets = { _ in
return .zero
}
class_addMethod(viewSubclass, #selector(getter: UIView.safeAreaInsets), imp_implementationWithBlock(safeAreaInsets), method_getTypeEncoding(method))
}
objc_registerClassPair(viewSubclass)
object_setClass(view, viewSubclass)
}
}
}

Answer 3

I came across the same issue. You have to ignore the safe area at the SwiftUI view level.
var body: some View {
VStack(alignment: .leading) {
...
}
.ignoresSafeArea(edges: .all) // ignore all safe area insets
}

Answer 4

Happened to me too. When I aligned my view with the frame it worked, but to make it work with autolayout I had to consider the height of the safe area to make it work with UIHostingController, even though I didn't have to do that with a standard view.
code:
hostingVC.view.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor, constant: view.safeAreaInsets.bottom).isActive = true