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Aside from graphics/GUI programming; there is little advantage to Objective C or Swift. The "language" may be "open sourced"; but will the important Cocoa impl

Aside from graphics/GUI programming; there is little advantage to Objective C or Swift. The "language" may be "open sourced"; but will the important Cocoa implementations be open sourced? It shouldn't be to too tough to re-implement Swift; unless Apples starting suing people for doing it. The exact meaning of Apples announcement needs some clarification.

zethraeus 11y ago
The language itself is lovely. What parts of cocoa feel essential to you?
- seivan 11y ago
  Actually, if you want to do backends, nothing is essential from Cocoa itself. I think Foundation might be necessary though, even if you just use Swift structs (Array, Dictionary, etc)
  - oddevan 11y ago
    This. I'm SUPER excited to have a Swift backend for a web app, and/or I've been toying around with the core logic of another app. Either idea doesn't need anything in the way of GUI, just the standard library and maybe a few things from Foundation that should be in the standard library anyway (like pseudorandom number generation).
- tosseraccount 11y ago
  "Essential" ? Any of the objects that can give a "dashboard" interface and maybe draw a picture. I'd love a portable GUI API that satisfies some harsh conditions: 1) Portable between mac,linux,windows,android,ios. [ must re-compile to target ] 2) Compilable into a single static binary. 3) New developments don't break backwards compatibility.
yarrel 11y ago
I'm unfamiliar with Swift but Objective-C is an excellent language. I much prefer it to C++. Cocoa won't be made Free, no, but perhaps Swift could be used with GnuStep's implementation of the libraries. It's better to not re-invent the wheel.
- tosseraccount 11y ago
  Yeah. C++ just got too ornate. The "just bolt on objects" to C in "Objective C" ( though a complete hack ) was all that was "needed".
melling 11y ago
Swift could be a cross-platform option for Android and Windows mobile. There will soon be hundreds of open source Swift libraries. Swift could also be an alternative to Java, which has large 3rd party library support.

zethraeus 11y ago

The language itself is lovely. What parts of cocoa feel essential to you?

seivan 11y ago
Actually, if you want to do backends, nothing is essential from Cocoa itself. I think Foundation might be necessary though, even if you just use Swift structs (Array, Dictionary, etc)
- oddevan 11y ago
  This. I'm SUPER excited to have a Swift backend for a web app, and/or I've been toying around with the core logic of another app. Either idea doesn't need anything in the way of GUI, just the standard library and maybe a few things from Foundation that should be in the standard library anyway (like pseudorandom number generation).
tosseraccount 11y ago
"Essential" ? Any of the objects that can give a "dashboard" interface and maybe draw a picture. I'd love a portable GUI API that satisfies some harsh conditions: 1) Portable between mac,linux,windows,android,ios. [ must re-compile to target ] 2) Compilable into a single static binary. 3) New developments don't break backwards compatibility.

yarrel 11y ago

I'm unfamiliar with Swift but Objective-C is an excellent language. I much prefer it to C++. Cocoa won't be made Free, no, but perhaps Swift could be used with GnuStep's implementation of the libraries. It's better to not re-invent the wheel.

tosseraccount 11y ago
Yeah. C++ just got too ornate. The "just bolt on objects" to C in "Objective C" ( though a complete hack ) was all that was "needed".

melling 11y ago

Swift could be a cross-platform option for Android and Windows mobile. There will soon be hundreds of open source Swift libraries. Swift could also be an alternative to Java, which has large 3rd party library support.