I have little experience with iOS auto-layout (and iOS development in general), but auto-layout engines on every OS or framework are always hard to get into exa

I have little experience with iOS auto-layout (and iOS development in general), but auto-layout engines on every OS or framework are always hard to get into exactly because automatic layout of interface is a hard problem - and solving it properly requires quite a high level of abstraction. Which always seem too hard to digest to developers that are just getting into the framework are only trying to position elements at fixed points on the screen, without giving any serious thought to automatic layout. As a result, most of the projects that I inherited as a maintainer almost never used advanced auto-layout features and every change in the interface required re-positioning all other elements by hand. So, auto-layout ends up right there with static typing and unit tests: technologies that are of little use to the original developers who are only trying to "get shit done" up and running, but are so important for maintainers that end up with this mess later.