I was wondering if it is possible to write inline in swift in any other language?
From the Objective-C times, there was a possibility to write assembly using macros __asm__(/*Assembly*/);
I know that it's possible to use Objective-C from swift, and in Objective-C you still could wrap anything that was possible before.
I just curious, is there any 'native' support for any other language in the swift compiler?
Related
I want to import a Swift framework called "Beethoven" into Objective-C project. I import this framework via cocoapods.
The problem is that framework is written in pure swift. Since the classes are not subclass of NSObject they can't be used directly in my objC classes.
I am newbie in Swift and intermediate in objC, but I think there may be 2 solutions for that:
1-Modifying the whole library: which is probably not an optimal solution.
2-Using a new class which behaves as an interface between swift framework and my objC code. I think second solution will be a better alternative in terms of time and effort needed.
Actually below given post explains modifying the pure swift classes but I don't know how to apply this in my case.
How to use Swift non-NSObject subclass in Objective-C
As I mentioned I am not a very capable programmer and there may be better solutions for that problem. I would be grateful if someone can help me and suggest the best solution for integrating pure Swift framework into my objC project.
NSObject is usually not the only problem. Swift has many features that are not supported by Objective-C. To name a few: swift value types (struct's), swift enums with attached values. If a library uses any of those, it will not be possible to auto-generate an Objective-C header (.h) for it.
Adapting the code of the library on the spot might work, but it is likely more work long term in case if you ever need to update that library again.
Your 2nd approach sounds better: create a layer that is compatible with Objective-C on top of the library which exports methods that need to be exported with #objc and adapts the types. If you go that way consider making a PR contribution to the original library so that everyone could use it in Objective-C projects, and you share responsibility of updating it when the swift code changes.
The 3rd approach would be actually to rewrite some parts of you app to Swift. That might or might not be easier depending on the size of the part of the app that is using the library and how well it is isolated from the rest of the app.
I am building a new framework. The project is to be coded into Swift language, however the clients using this framework have the freedom of using either swift or Objective-C framework.
The question is how do I start. There could be numerous issues like
using structs in swift code but it cannot be made available in
objective C framework.
optionals are missing objective c
Even if I
write different set of files for Swift and Objective C, how will I
map them onto different frameworks under the same project.
Enums with other than Int as rawValue can't be used.
Tuples would not work
I know there have been a few questions around this but none have any satisfactory answer.
PS - Any link to a tutorial or blog would be super helpful too
I did this and got some unexpected results: I have trouble integrating the framework in Swift application. Objective-C works just fine.
You mentioned some of the caveats here.
I suggest doing this iteratively while writing test application in Objective-C which uses all the features. This way if there is some feature that does not cross Swift to Objective-C boundary well, it will be discovered as early as possible.
Your remarks about issues are generally correct with one small exception: optionals are not missing from Objective-C, they appear as nullable/nonnull modifiers on variables and method parameters. Although this does not replace optionals fully, it helps detecting issues early in the process.
Here is a random list of some other issues I discovered:
Bridging between Swift Error and NSError used in Objective-C. The conversion is not always as smooth at it could be, so better use NSError in exported code.
If you mix Objective-C and Swift in your framework, you cannot use bridging header, instead using modulemap files which tend to turn pretty large and complex.
Since you cannot embed frameworks inside a framework, you have to make sure that the application sets ALWAYS_EMBED_SWIFT_STANDARD_LIBRARIES flag for its target. This has to be clearly indicated in the documentation. Also, when creating fat library for your framework, you have to strip these files from the distributed SDK.
And, as I said in the beginning, I still have no success using the resulting mixed language framework in Swift application.
Hope, this will add to your list of things to take into account when developing the library.
I want to use the openCV2 framework in my iOS app, however, I am more comfortable with swift. I can read and understand obj-c well enough to understand the framework and write the methods I need from it in a bridging header, but I'm not comfortable writing the whole app in obj-C. Unfortunately, there are some data types, (cv::Mat, cv::MserManager, etc) that I will need to use in my datamodel, or possibly elsewhere. Is there a way to include datatypes in my bridging header so that I can work with them in swift?
You cannot use C++ types in code called from Swift. However, you can use them in Objective-C++ files, the ones that have the .mm extension. You can mix Objective-C and C++ code in Objective-C++, and can expose Objective-C methods that don't reference C++ in their declarations to Swift via the bridging wrapper. These functions can still use C++ in their implementations, which are not visible in Swift via the bridging header.
You also need to be careful about the language linkage (remember extern "C"?).
Here are some answers that provide examples:
1) Video processing with OpenCV in IOS Swift project
2) Include C++ header file in Swift
3) How to access Swift-objects from a c++ class?
Unfortunately, you cannot bridge C++ and Objective-C++ directly into Swift. On the bright side, you can still work with the openCV2 framework in your app, but you'll need to write C or Objective-C wrappers for your types as described in a related question here: Can I mix Swift with C++? Like the Objective - C .mm files
In Java, we can build up expressions to be called using ScriptEngine. This is nice for building up frameworks based on a common naming convention. In JavaScript, there is of course eval(). Does Swift have some sort of mechanism for evaluating a string which contains a swift expression? I'm aware that this could be potentially abused; however, it would simplify my present development.
No. Swift is a compiled language, and the runtime doesn't include the compiler. The iOS SDK doesn't provide a way to evaluate run-time Swift code.
You can execute JavaScript using JavaScriptCore, and JavaScriptCore makes it pretty easy to expose Swift objects and functions to the script. Maybe that will help you.
I believe, Swift is a compile time language.
But Im not sure whether it works on top of Objective C or it's a stand alone language.
Can someone please explain this?
-shoan
It's a separate language, with its own compiler. It interoperates with Objective-C and can use all of the existing Objective-C libraries.