Swift offers better readability and interference, allowing developers to write clean and consistent codes without any hindrances.
Swift is an industrial-quality, powerful, intuitive programming language with an interactive and concise syntax. It incorporates robust type inference and patterns resonating with a modern, lightweight syntax. Additionally, the code is much easier to read, write and maintain.
Below are a few pointers showcasing the pitfalls and efficiencies of Swift’s programming language.
Efficiencies of Swift
Here are a few advantages of Swift.
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Allows Rapid Development and is Easier to Scale
Swift is a clean and expressive language with a simplified syntax which allows more effortless reading and writing of code. Unlike Objective-C, Swift is concise and requires a developer to write limited code to perform the same task. Automatic Reference Counting (ARC) effectively tracks and manages the application’s memory usage. This allows the developers to spend less time and effort in doing the same manually.
In addition to faster development time, Swift can get developers a future-ready product that can be modified with new features. Therefore, projects created with Swift are easier to scale, allowing the addition of more developers to the team if required. Furthermore, the onboarding process is rapid due to the simplicity and conciseness of the codebase.
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Strong Interoperability with Objective-C and Offers Automatic Management with ARC
Due to its robust interoperability with Objective-C, developers can add new features in Swift to the existing Objective-C codebase, which can be used interchangeably within the same project. This feature is useful when large projects are being extended or updated since Swift allows adding more features leveraging the existing Objective-C codebase making the porting process easier and risk-free.
Additionally, it utilizes Automatic Reference Counting (ARC), which aims to add a garbage collector function. These garbage collectors are used to decrease the memory footprint but can add up to data to the CPU. Therefore, Swift’s ARC determines which instances are no longer in use and gets rid of them on your behalf, increasing the app’s performance without lagging the CPU’s memory.
Pitfalls of Swift
With lists of solid efficiencies, Swift is still finding its way to perfection. Many businesses are cautious about switching to Swift due to these reasons.
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Swift is Still Naïve about Restrictive Talent Pool
Swift was introduced recently and is quite naïve compared to Objective C platforms introduced in the 80s. Therefore, it needs more time to evolve from common growing-up pains since developers prefer specifically targeted resources, tools, and native libraries to resolve the issues rapidly.
Additionally, the Swift community is not evolved as any other open-source community. Furthermore, Swift developers lack the willingness to share knowledge and adequate guidance on real-life coding scenarios. As per a recent report by Statista, only 4.91% use Swift, while 65.36% prefer JavaScript. Therefore, businesses are often cautious about switching to Swift due to a limited talent pool with adequate experience.
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Compatibility Issues and Weak Interoperability with Third-Party Tools and IDE
Swift is radically evolving; hence it suffers from backward compatibility issues making it unstable sometimes.
Developers must know that a new version of Swift does not actively support the earlier versions. This means the projects processed in 1.0 and 2.0 versions of Swift can’t be further altered and maintained in Swift 3.0.
Due to the lack of tools to assist the process, regular updates are often difficult with Swift. Swift’s IDE, Xcode trails in terms of tooling and solid support. Developers might encounter issues like syntax highlighting, autocomplete, refactoring tools, and compilers.
Swift is evolving to be a mature language with upcoming updates. It is also believed to escalate with a stable ABI over its platforms that extend platform support with the continuous addition of new features.
