Where did my object go? :(

Question

I'm having a bit of trouble passing an object from one view to the next and I was really hoping someone could give me a hand.
I am using a table view that when an item is clicked, an object is passed to the next view based on the selected item. When the user clicks an object I retrieve the appropriate object for that row and then set the item property of the view controller they are being sent to:
iPhoneHelloWorldAppDelegate *appDelegate = (iPhoneHelloWorldAppDelegate *)[[UIApplication sharedApplication] delegate];
Item *item = (Item *)[appDelegate.items objectAtIndex:indexPath.row];
if(self.itemView == nil) {
ItemViewController *viewController = [[ItemViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"ItemViewController" bundle:[NSBundle mainBundle]];
self.itemView = viewController;
[viewController release];
[self.itemView setItem: item]; *// ITEM IS SET HERE FOR NEXT VIEW*
[self.navigationController pushViewController:self.itemView animated:YES];
self.itemView.title = [item itemName];
If I step through the code and go to the line after the Item property is set I can call self.itemView.item and the correct object is returned to me. However, after the view is pushed if I stop the debugger in viewDidLoad of ItemViewController, the item property is now nil.
My item property is defined as follows in the ItemViewController.h:
@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet Item *item;
So what I want to know is... where did my item go after I set it and pushed the view to current?
P.S. Why do these forums completely destroy source code...

Answer 1

My mistake, I misunderstood what you had said about how to format it.
I did some further tests to check the integrity of my object. In my item object's constructor I initialized a string with a random number in it. Stepping through I found that the constructor is only getting hit once, but even so by the time my object reaches the ItemViewController all of its fields have been nulled. Could someone show me how to manually implement my properties so that they are not generated for me? I'd like to slap some breakpoints in the setters to see if I can get a better feel for what's going on.
RootViewController.m (excerpt)
(void)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView didSelectRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
// Navigation logic -- create and push a new view controller
iPhoneHelloWorldAppDelegate *appDelegate = (iPhoneHelloWorldAppDelegate *)[[UIApplication sharedApplication] delegate];
Item *item = (Item *)[appDelegate.items objectAtIndex:indexPath.row];
if(self.itemView == nil) {
ItemViewController *viewController = [[ItemViewController alloc] initWithNibName:@"ItemViewController" bundle:[NSBundle mainBundle]];
self.itemView = viewController;
[viewController release];
[self.itemView setItem: item]; // self.itemView.item is always nil. even when item is not
[self.navigationController pushViewController:self.itemView animated:YES];
self.itemView.title = [item itemName];
//[item release];
//[self.itemView.itemDescription setText:[item itemDescription]]; // This call works fine.
ItemViewController.h
@interface ItemViewController : UIViewController {
IBOutlet UITextView *itemDescription;
Item *item;
SellViewController *sellView;
NSString *unique;
@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet UITextView *itemDescription;
@property (nonatomic, retain) IBOutlet Item *item;
@property (nonatomic, retain) SellViewController *sellView;
@property (readwrite, assign) NSString *unique;
-(IBAction) sellItem : (id)sender;
@end
Item.h
@interface Item : NSObject {
NSString *itemName;
NSString *itemDescription;
int *itemPrice;
NSString *unique;
@property (nonatomic, retain) NSString *itemName;
@property (nonatomic, copy) NSString *itemDescription;
@property (readwrite, assign) int *itemPrice;
@property (nonatomic, retain) NSString *unique;
-(id)initWithName:(NSString*)name description:(NSString*)desc price:(int*)price;