Getting the string value from a NSArray

Question

I have a `NSArrayController` and I when I get the `selectedObjects` and create a NSString with the value of `valueForKey:@"Name"` it returns ``` ( "This is still a work in progress " ) ``` and all I want to have is the text in the `""` how would I get that? also, this my code: ``` NSArray *arrayWithSelectedObjects = [[NSArray alloc] initWithArray:[arrayController selectedObjects]]; NSString *nameFromArray = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"%@", [arrayWithSelectedObjects valueForKey:@"Name"]]; NSLog(@"%@", nameFromArray); ``` Edit: I also have other strings in the array

Accepted Answer

When you call `valueForKey:` on an array, it calls `valueForKey:` on each of the elements contained in the array, and returns those values in a new array, substituting `NSNull` for any `nil` values. There's also no need to duplicate the `selectedObjects` array from the controller because it is immutable anyway.

If you have multiple objects in your array controller's selected objects, and you want to see the value of the name key of all items in the selected objects, simply do:

```
NSArray *names = [[arrayController selectedObjects] valueForKey:@"name"];

for (id name in names)
    NSLog (@"%@", name);
```

Of course, you could print them all out at once if you did:

```
NSLog (@"%@", [[arrayController selectedObjects] valueForKey:@"name"]);
```

If there's only one element in the `selectedObjects` array, and you call `valueForKey:`, it will still return an array, but it will only contain the value of the key of the lone element in the array. You can reference this with `lastObject`.

```
NSString *theName = [[[arrayController selectedObjects] valueForKey:@"name"] lastObject];
NSLog (@"%@", theName);
```

Getting the string value from a NSArray

Solution

Problem