[miffy900]

As someone who first began using Swift in 2021, after almost 10 years in C#/.NET land, I was already a bit grumpy at how complex C# was, (C# was 21 years at that point), but then coming to Swift, I couldn't believe how complex Swift was compared to C# - Swift was released in 2014, so would've been 8 years old in 2022. How is a language less than half the age of C# MORE complex than C#?

And this was me trying to use Swift for a data access layer + backend web API. There's barely any guidance or existing knowledge on using Swift for backend APIs, let alone a web browser of all projects.

There's no precedent or existing implementation you can look at for reference; known best practices in Swift are geared almost entirely towards using it with Apple platform APIs, so tons of knowledge about using the language itself simply cannot be applied outside the domain of building client-running apps for Apple hardware.

To use swift outside its usual domain is to become a pioneer, and try something truly untested. It was always a longshot.

[VerifiedReports]

I started using it around 2018. After being reasonably conversant in Objective-C, I fully adopted Swift for a new iOS app and thought it was a big improvement.

But there's a lot of hokey, amateurish stuff in there... with more added all the time. Let's start with the arbitrary "structs are passed by value, classes by reference." And along with that: "Prefer structs over classes."

But then: "Have one source of truth." Um... you can't do that when every data structure is COPIED on every function call. So now what? I spent so much time dicking around trying to conform to Swift's contradictory "best practices" that developing became a joyless trudge with glacial progress. I finally realized that a lot of the sources I was reading didn't know WTF they were talking about and shitcanned their edicts.

A lot of the crap in Swift and SwiftUI remind me of object orientation, and how experienced programmers arrived at a distilled version of it that kept the useful parts and rejected dumb or utterly impractical ideas that were preached in the early days.

[ChrisMarshallNY]

I think Swift was developed to keep a number of constituencies happy.

You can do classic OOP, FP, Protocol-Oriented Programming, etc., or mix them all (like I do).

A lot of purists get salty that it doesn’t force implementation of their choice, but I’m actually fine with it. I tend to have a “chimeric” approach, so it suits me.

Been using it since 2014 (the day it was announced). I enjoy it.

[zffr]

Prefer structs over classes != only use structs.

There are plenty of valid reasons to use classes in Swift. For example if you want to have shared state you will need to use a class so that each client has the same reference instead of a copy.

[raw_anon_1111]

> But there's a lot of hokey, amateurish stuff in there... with more added all the time. Let's start with the arbitrary "structs are passed by value, classes by reference." And along with that: "Prefer structs over classes."

This is the same way that C# works and C and C++ why is this a surprise?

[sumuyuda]

> when every data structure is COPIED on every function call

Swift structs use copy on write, so they aren’t actually copied on every function call.

[fingerlocks]

Nowhere does it say structs provide “one source of truth”. It says the opposite actually- that classes are to be used when unique instances are required. All classes have a unique ID, which is simply it’s virtual memory address. Structs by contrast get memcpy’d left and right and have no uniqueness.

You can also look at the source code for the language if any it’s confusing. It’s very readable.

[librasteve]

In the last years, simplistic languages such as Python and Go have “made the case” that complexity is bad, period. But when humans communicate expertly in English (Shakespeare, JK Rowling, etc) they use its vast wealth of nuance, shading and subtlety to create a better product. Sure you have to learn all the corners to have full command of the language, to wield all that expressive power (and newcomers to English are limited to the shallow end of the pool). But writing and reading are asymmetrical and a more expressive language used well can expose the code patterns and algorithms in a way that is easier for multiple maintainers to read and comprehend. We need to match the impedance of the tool to the problem. [I paraphrase Larry Wall, inventor of the gloriously expressive https://raku.org]

[grey-area]

Not sure how I feel about Shakespeare and JK Rowling living in the same parenthesis!

Computer languages are the opposite of natural languages - they are for formalising and limiting thought, the exact opposite of literature. These two things are not comparable.

If natural language was so good for programs, we’d be using it - many many people have tried from literate programming onward.

[integralid]

>But writing and reading are asymmetrical and a more expressive language used well can expose the code patterns and algorithms in a way that is easier for multiple maintainers to read and comprehend.

It's exactly the opposite. Writing and reading are asymmetrical, and that's why it's important to write code that is as simple as possible.

It's easy to introduce a lot of complexity and clever hacks, because as the author you understand it. But good code is readable for people, and that's why very expressive languages like perl are abhorred.

[spongebobism]

Perlis's 10th epigram feels germane:

> Get into a rut early: Do the same process the same way. Accumulate idioms. Standardize. The only difference(!) between Shakespeare and you was the size of his idiom list - not the size of his vocabulary.

[belmont_sup]

Not to mention how heated my laptop gets when I try to compile a new vapor template. On an m1.

[i_am_a_peasant]

same. i thought it would have been as quick to pick up as rust. nowhere near. i spent weeks trying to go through every feature of the language at least once. time in which i could’ve read several rust books and already start hacking up some interesting projects. so much in swift is pointless syntax sugar. why do i need 50 ways to do exactly the same thing, it’s just nonsense. then i have to look up the language reference whenever i read a new codebase

[fud101]

So did you go back to and keep using C#/NET?

[miffy900]

well for backend development, yes - I technically never stopped as I had existing projects to maintain. But after trying out Swift a couple times, I've dropped it entirely for backend. For new backend work it's C#/.NET all the way.

I wanted to try using a native language other than C++ and Swift ostensibly seemed easier to pick up. I continue to use Swift for iOS app development though where it is much easier to use; but that has its own share of compromises and trade-offs - but not centred around Swift, around SwiftUI vs UIKit.