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Simple Text Drawing

If you need to draw a small amount of text quickly, the simplest way to do it is using the methods of NSString and NSAttributedString. The Application Kit defines methods on these classes that support drawing the string in the current context. For an NSString object, you can apply basic attributes (such as font, color, and style settings) to the entire string during drawing. For an NSAttributedString object, you can apply multiple sets of attributes to different parts of the string.

Prior to Mac OS X v10.4, the NSString and NSAttributedString classes were intended for rendering text occasionally in your program. The performance of these drawing methods was not as good as the performance you could get by rendering text using the Cocoa text system. Also, the layout for strings is limited to a simple rectangular area in the current view. In Mac OS X v10.4, performance of the string drawing methods improved significantly and is useful in many situations; of course, you should always measure the performance yourself and see if it is adequate for your program. If you need to do more complex text layout, you should still consider using the Cocoa text system.

For information on string drawing methods, see NSString Additions or NSAttributedString additions in Application Kit Framework Reference.

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