How does having a GitHub organization tangibly impact the implied goal of making Swift more impactful outside of apples devices?
July 2010 started, June 2014 publicly released (!) feels like yesterday.
- Xcode is terrible
- Documentation is barely existent
- you can’t really reuse your code in any other context
- you have to pay them money to even release your software
- they steal 30% of your revenue
- they reserve the right to shut you down at any point, for any reason and provide almost zero recourse.
I get why people had to use it historically but it seems like a really bad choice to try and build any kind of reliable future on top of in 2024.
Depends on the thing. And there is a large community with examples online, which helps.
> you can’t really reuse your code in any other context
Not everyone cares. If I’m only targeting an iOS app the fact the code doesn’t run on Android or Windows isn’t a problem for me.
> you have to pay them money to even release your software
On Apple’s App Store, sure. Or if you want your stuff signed. If you want to release open source or don’t mind shipping unsigned stuff it’s free free free.
> they steal 30% of your revenue > they reserve the right to shut you down at any point, for any reason and provide almost zero recourse.
Only if you’re in their App Store or want your stuff signed.
> I get why people had to use it historically but it seems like a really bad choice to try and build any kind of reliable future on top of in 2024.
The bargain is the same as it ever was. I’m OK with it. I made stuff in Xcode for my Mac just for me for a long time without hassle or paying a cent. The costs only cost if you want to distribute pre-built binaries to others.
If you want to see what open source Swift is going to end up like, just look at GNU objective C. It will likely follow the same pattern of adoption over time and be hobbled on non-Apple platforms.
Maybe it still does, but probably not, because AppCode was sunsetted at the end of 2022 and stopped receiving updates in 2023 (https://blog.jetbrains.com/appcode/2022/12/appcode-2022-3-re...). Which is really unfortunate.
If Swift ever gets good support outside of Apple, I wouldn’t be surprised if JetBrains starts working on their Swift plugin again and releases it for IntelliJ and CLion. But despite this migration, my understanding is that Swift on Linux and the new Foundation (non-Apple standard library) is still lacking.
I loved AppCode because I could go into a clients iOS app and the linter would immediately show so many problems that were easily fixable but Xcode would never show. I was sad to see it go.
Tried it out a month ago (on Linux using neovim) and the autocompletion was on par with golang lsp in terms of speed. Didnt check the lsp capabilities though.
https://www.swift.org/getting-started/library-swiftpm/
† The doc is about building a library, but building an executable works the same.
As an iOS developer I’ve been getting into some firmware stuff on ESP-32. It’s my first time writing C++ and while it’s been better than I expected, I really miss Swift and especially the safety it brings.
* Enhancement of VSCode support (and any editor that integrates LSP)
* Increasing supported linux and windows platforms
* Increasing support for constrained environments (embeded? dunno)
* Continued support of community products like Vapor (web framework)
