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Ignore the haters—Swift is an enjoyable and productive language that gives you a lot of advanced features if you want them, but lets you ignore them and almost

Ignore the haters—Swift is an enjoyable and productive language that gives you a lot of advanced features if you want them, but lets you ignore them and almost treat it like a scripting language. Adding first-class wasm support could help it become a more reasonable choice for development outside the Apple platform.

solardev 2y ago
Wow, thanks for saying this. I had no idea it was even usable outside the Apple ecosystem. Seems like other IDEs support it too (https://www.swift.org/tools/ https://www.swift.org/tools/). How would UIs work on other platforms, though?
- thewebguyd 2y ago
  > How would UIs work on other platforms, though? I think for right now, you'd have to use the C interop and link against something like GTK or other GUI library. I don't think SwiftUI specifically would ever work well cross-platform, it has so many Apple-isms. There's also Swift/Win32, but it's MVC. You could also use the interop and use QT as well. I don't think any of those are necessarily good solutions, but they are there.
  - wahnfrieden 2y ago
    TokamakUI And https://skip.tools https://skip.tools
    - solardev 2y ago
      Hmm, Tokamak seems abandoned (hasn't been touched in years) and skip.tools requires xCode and is Android-only =/ Thank you though.
      - wahnfrieden 2y ago
        Yes there’s nothing all in one yet. But these are promising directions. Tokamak isn’t abandoned, members are involved in core Swift changes that it depends on and have made progress recently with embedded Swift.
  - achierius 2y ago
    What sort of things are you referring to when you say "Apple-isms"? Not that I doubt your claim -- I just don't do much UI development so I don't have a good reference for what things might be 'platform specific' in that way.
- dagmx 2y ago
  As with other languages, you’d need bindings to another UI framework. In that sense, I wish SwiftUI had a different name because it seems intrinsic to Swift when it’s really no different than UIKit. There’s stuff like SwiftCrossUI that does multiple backend bindings https://github.com/stackotter/swift-cross-ui https://github.com/stackotter/swift-cross-ui And Qt was exploring some bindings using the new C++ interoperability.
  - loic-sharma 2y ago
    There’s also Shaft, which is Flutter ported to Swift: https://github.com/ShaftUI/Shaft https://github.com/ShaftUI/Shaft Like Flutter, this paints everything itself. It doesn’t need to bind to a UI framework directly. Instead, it needs the platform to provide primitives like a surface to draw into and input events.
jonhohle 2y ago
Rust, Go, and Swift were all coming up around the same time. Rust looked ugly, Go underwhelmed me, and Swift aeemed like the best “language” at the time, with many opinions that aligned with my own. Having now spent time in all three, swift feels the most ergonomic and has features that make me feel productive. I still feel like there isn’t much “there” in Go, and rust makes me feel like I’m solving for the compiler rather than working on whatever problem I was needing to work on. Edit to add: SwiftUI, however, is a mess that I loathe. I may be in the minority of enjoying the IoC choices in Interface Builder and AppKit.
- jkubicek 2y ago
  SwiftUI is just amazing for the first 30 minutes you use it... then you make a minor syntax error deep in some nested views and you're selectively commenting out coded blocks to hone in on the error like a caveman. It makes print-statement debugging look cutting edge.
  - turnsout 2y ago
    As an early adopter of SwiftUI, this hasn't been my experience—but I understand that a lot of people struggle with it. I think it's pretty opinionated, and if you stick to the "preferred" way of doing things, life is easier. The biggest (and known) issue with SwiftUI is the complex error messages you get, and the fact that the type checker will give up and ask you to break up your view into "distinct sub-expressions." Really the issue is almost never the complexity of a view, but some simple syntax error (passing the wrong type to a function, etc).
    - troupo 2y ago
      > The biggest (and known) issue with Isn't this literally what the person above is talking about? > Really the issue is almost never the complexity of a view, but some simple syntax error (passing the wrong type to a function, etc). The issue is that this is a big, known, common problem that cannot be solved, apparently
      - 2y ago
jchw 2y ago
My only fear with Swift is Apple. The language itself seems largely fine, very interesting even, which makes me feel deeply conflicted. While Apple has been big on pushing multi-platform Swift right now and distancing itself a bit from the Swift branding in some ways (e.g. it having its own GitHub organization) they've historically had quite an ebb and flow to this behavior. If their priorities changed, what happens to the non-Apple projects that adopted Swift? It would be better if there were multiple parties that had stake and some control in the future of Swift. I have similar worries with Microsoft and .NET, although it's a bit different owing to the fact that Microsoft is quite a different company with different problems. It's actually kind of bizarre that it never really felt like Google was a problem for Go, but I guess that's because unlike Apple Swift and Microsoft .NET, Go mostly targets and is almost entirely developed on platforms that Google has little control over. (Though that doesn't mean that their presence is entirely unnoticed, but even stuff like the module proxy has been more well-received than expected. It's an odd area where Google has managed to maintain some goodwill, though it could evaporate over night.)
- turnsout 2y ago
  I think you hit the nail on the head. By extending Go to many platforms, it doesn't feel like you're using a corporate-sponsored language (though you are). The Swift team is aware that they need to help the language thrive in other contexts, which is why they're working on projects like Embedded Swift [0]. I hope they fully embrace wasm as well! [0]: https://www.swift.org/getting-started/embedded-swift/
- odyssey7 2y ago
  The rug-pull of Swift from TensorFlow came from Google rather than Apple.
  - jchw 2y ago
    Hey, I didn't say you should trust other Google projects. The Google Graveyard meme should be enough evidence of that.
  - saagarjha 2y ago
jbverschoor 2y ago
Either as shebang/interpreted script, or just compile to a binary for great startup speed. I actually only recently found out you could use swift for scripting. Turns out, you can also access all the other Apple APIs :-) #!/usr/bin/env swift I made this small "shebang thing runner script" that either runs your script interpreted, or compiles and executes it. Depending on if you're on a TTY or not. I'm also changing it to simply check for the number of executions since last modified, and then compile. In some cases the extra time is well appreciated. You still get the convenience of interpreting, but also the performance of native. It's basically a drop-in replacement: #/path/to/autocompile_or_interpret_swift Very noticeable difference. real 0m0.212s user 0m0.159s sys 0m0.045s vs real 0m0.014s user 0m0.004s sys 0m0.008s
- turnsout 2y ago
  Ha, nice! I've used the Swift shebang before, but honestly once you have something that works as a "script," it's so easy to convert it to a real command line utility via Swift Argument Parser [0] that I usually spend the 5 minutes to wrap it up. [0]: https://github.com/apple/swift-argument-parser
  - jbverschoor 2y ago
    That's pretty sweet the argparser It's kind of nice to be able to access all native libraries. I usually use ruby, but having something compiled and strict is super nice. Shellscripting it one big minefield. Compiling is a simple step ofc. But it's nice to only have the scriptfile and it's nice to not have your directory cluttered with binaries. I'll see if I can post it tomorrow. It's very small anyway
  - saagarjha 2y ago
    Yes, but then you have to compile it to use it, since scripts can’t use dependencies. Personally I just use getopt which sounds insane but it’s part of the standard library (imported from C).
satvikpendem 2y ago
> Ignore the haters—Swift is an enjoyable and productive language Sure, if you are on Apple devices. If you are not, better to use other languages like Rust, Go, or even Dart.
- palata 2y ago
  Is Dart still a thing? Genuinely interested.
  - cogman10 2y ago
    Yup. It got it's second life because Flutter adopted it as it's language. It was pretty dead for a few years (despite what the googlers will tell you...)
  - FuturisticGoo 2y ago
    It absolutely is and its a pleasant language to work with. Although it is in a kinda-symbiotic relationship with Flutter, I've found myself using it for small scripts and cli tools instead of Python because of its strong+static typing with null safety. Relevant to the topic, Dart (and Flutter) supports targeting wasm.
  - mdhb 2y ago
    Not only a thing but is growing at a crazy rate. Easily my favourite language out there for the last few years.
- izacus 2y ago
  The direct competitor to Swift is most likely Kotlin and I bet it'll win out as a cross platform solution of choice in a couple of years as KMP stabilizes.

solardev 2y ago

Wow, thanks for saying this. I had no idea it was even usable outside the Apple ecosystem. Seems like other IDEs support it too (https://www.swift.org/tools/ https://www.swift.org/tools/). How would UIs work on other platforms, though?

thewebguyd 2y ago
> How would UIs work on other platforms, though? I think for right now, you'd have to use the C interop and link against something like GTK or other GUI library. I don't think SwiftUI specifically would ever work well cross-platform, it has so many Apple-isms. There's also Swift/Win32, but it's MVC. You could also use the interop and use QT as well. I don't think any of those are necessarily good solutions, but they are there.
- wahnfrieden 2y ago
  TokamakUI And https://skip.tools https://skip.tools
  - solardev 2y ago
    Hmm, Tokamak seems abandoned (hasn't been touched in years) and skip.tools requires xCode and is Android-only =/ Thank you though.
    - wahnfrieden 2y ago
      Yes there’s nothing all in one yet. But these are promising directions. Tokamak isn’t abandoned, members are involved in core Swift changes that it depends on and have made progress recently with embedded Swift.
- achierius 2y ago
  What sort of things are you referring to when you say "Apple-isms"? Not that I doubt your claim -- I just don't do much UI development so I don't have a good reference for what things might be 'platform specific' in that way.
dagmx 2y ago
As with other languages, you’d need bindings to another UI framework. In that sense, I wish SwiftUI had a different name because it seems intrinsic to Swift when it’s really no different than UIKit. There’s stuff like SwiftCrossUI that does multiple backend bindings https://github.com/stackotter/swift-cross-ui https://github.com/stackotter/swift-cross-ui And Qt was exploring some bindings using the new C++ interoperability.
- loic-sharma 2y ago
  There’s also Shaft, which is Flutter ported to Swift: https://github.com/ShaftUI/Shaft https://github.com/ShaftUI/Shaft Like Flutter, this paints everything itself. It doesn’t need to bind to a UI framework directly. Instead, it needs the platform to provide primitives like a surface to draw into and input events.

jonhohle 2y ago

Rust, Go, and Swift were all coming up around the same time. Rust looked ugly, Go underwhelmed me, and Swift aeemed like the best “language” at the time, with many opinions that aligned with my own. Having now spent time in all three, swift feels the most ergonomic and has features that make me feel productive. I still feel like there isn’t much “there” in Go, and rust makes me feel like I’m solving for the compiler rather than working on whatever problem I was needing to work on. Edit to add: SwiftUI, however, is a mess that I loathe. I may be in the minority of enjoying the IoC choices in Interface Builder and AppKit.

jkubicek 2y ago
SwiftUI is just amazing for the first 30 minutes you use it... then you make a minor syntax error deep in some nested views and you're selectively commenting out coded blocks to hone in on the error like a caveman. It makes print-statement debugging look cutting edge.
- turnsout 2y ago
  As an early adopter of SwiftUI, this hasn't been my experience—but I understand that a lot of people struggle with it. I think it's pretty opinionated, and if you stick to the "preferred" way of doing things, life is easier. The biggest (and known) issue with SwiftUI is the complex error messages you get, and the fact that the type checker will give up and ask you to break up your view into "distinct sub-expressions." Really the issue is almost never the complexity of a view, but some simple syntax error (passing the wrong type to a function, etc).
  - troupo 2y ago
    > The biggest (and known) issue with Isn't this literally what the person above is talking about? > Really the issue is almost never the complexity of a view, but some simple syntax error (passing the wrong type to a function, etc). The issue is that this is a big, known, common problem that cannot be solved, apparently
    - 2y ago

jchw 2y ago

My only fear with Swift is Apple. The language itself seems largely fine, very interesting even, which makes me feel deeply conflicted. While Apple has been big on pushing multi-platform Swift right now and distancing itself a bit from the Swift branding in some ways (e.g. it having its own GitHub organization) they've historically had quite an ebb and flow to this behavior. If their priorities changed, what happens to the non-Apple projects that adopted Swift? It would be better if there were multiple parties that had stake and some control in the future of Swift. I have similar worries with Microsoft and .NET, although it's a bit different owing to the fact that Microsoft is quite a different company with different problems. It's actually kind of bizarre that it never really felt like Google was a problem for Go, but I guess that's because unlike Apple Swift and Microsoft .NET, Go mostly targets and is almost entirely developed on platforms that Google has little control over. (Though that doesn't mean that their presence is entirely unnoticed, but even stuff like the module proxy has been more well-received than expected. It's an odd area where Google has managed to maintain some goodwill, though it could evaporate over night.)

turnsout 2y ago
I think you hit the nail on the head. By extending Go to many platforms, it doesn't feel like you're using a corporate-sponsored language (though you are). The Swift team is aware that they need to help the language thrive in other contexts, which is why they're working on projects like Embedded Swift [0]. I hope they fully embrace wasm as well! [0]: https://www.swift.org/getting-started/embedded-swift/
odyssey7 2y ago
The rug-pull of Swift from TensorFlow came from Google rather than Apple.
- jchw 2y ago
  Hey, I didn't say you should trust other Google projects. The Google Graveyard meme should be enough evidence of that.
- saagarjha 2y ago

jbverschoor 2y ago

Either as shebang/interpreted script, or just compile to a binary for great startup speed. I actually only recently found out you could use swift for scripting. Turns out, you can also access all the other Apple APIs :-) #!/usr/bin/env swift I made this small "shebang thing runner script" that either runs your script interpreted, or compiles and executes it. Depending on if you're on a TTY or not. I'm also changing it to simply check for the number of executions since last modified, and then compile. In some cases the extra time is well appreciated. You still get the convenience of interpreting, but also the performance of native. It's basically a drop-in replacement: #/path/to/autocompile_or_interpret_swift Very noticeable difference. real 0m0.212s user 0m0.159s sys 0m0.045s vs real 0m0.014s user 0m0.004s sys 0m0.008s

turnsout 2y ago
Ha, nice! I've used the Swift shebang before, but honestly once you have something that works as a "script," it's so easy to convert it to a real command line utility via Swift Argument Parser [0] that I usually spend the 5 minutes to wrap it up. [0]: https://github.com/apple/swift-argument-parser
- jbverschoor 2y ago
  That's pretty sweet the argparser It's kind of nice to be able to access all native libraries. I usually use ruby, but having something compiled and strict is super nice. Shellscripting it one big minefield. Compiling is a simple step ofc. But it's nice to only have the scriptfile and it's nice to not have your directory cluttered with binaries. I'll see if I can post it tomorrow. It's very small anyway
- saagarjha 2y ago
  Yes, but then you have to compile it to use it, since scripts can’t use dependencies. Personally I just use getopt which sounds insane but it’s part of the standard library (imported from C).

satvikpendem 2y ago

> Ignore the haters—Swift is an enjoyable and productive language Sure, if you are on Apple devices. If you are not, better to use other languages like Rust, Go, or even Dart.

palata 2y ago
Is Dart still a thing? Genuinely interested.
- cogman10 2y ago
  Yup. It got it's second life because Flutter adopted it as it's language. It was pretty dead for a few years (despite what the googlers will tell you...)
- FuturisticGoo 2y ago
  It absolutely is and its a pleasant language to work with. Although it is in a kinda-symbiotic relationship with Flutter, I've found myself using it for small scripts and cli tools instead of Python because of its strong+static typing with null safety. Relevant to the topic, Dart (and Flutter) supports targeting wasm.
- mdhb 2y ago
  Not only a thing but is growing at a crazy rate. Easily my favourite language out there for the last few years.
izacus 2y ago
The direct competitor to Swift is most likely Kotlin and I bet it'll win out as a cross platform solution of choice in a couple of years as KMP stabilizes.