In last week’s post on UICollectionView, I did not go into detail how to actually use it. Matt Thompson wrote an NSHipster post that does just that. Comparing the UICollectionView API to UITableView, Matt nicely outlines the design similarities between the two components. He also explains how collection views implement their dynamic layouts, making them so much more flexible than tables.

UICollectionView is a central component for Apple to enable better app design for multiple screen sizes, especially for bigger screens where table views just don’t cut it:

Since the introduction of the iPad, there has been a subtle, yet lingering tension between the original UI paradigms of the iPhone, and the demands of this newer, larger form factor. With the iPhone 5 here, and a rumored “iPad mini” on the way, this tension could have threatened to fracture the entire platform, had it not been for UICollectionView (as well as Auto-Layout).

Matt shares my enthusiasm for the design of the class:

There are a million ways Apple could (or could not) have provided this kind of functionality, but they really knocked it out of the park with how they designed everything.

The clean, logical separation between data source and layout; the clear division between cell, supplementary, and decoration views; the extensive set of layout attributes that are automatically animated… a lot of care and wisdom has been put together with these APIs.

As a result, the entire landscape of iOS apps will be forever changed. With collection views, the aesthetic shift that was kicked off with the iPad will explode into an entire re-definition of how we expect apps to look and behave.