Re: The Swift Programming Language: what is our position towards this?

[Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller]

Am 05.06.2014 um 07:47 schrieb Gregory Casamento:

​Nikolaus,​

On Thu, Jun 5, 2014 at 1:10 AM, Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller <hns@goldelico.com> wrote:

Am 04.06.2014 um 21:12 schrieb Lars Sonchocky-Helldorf:

> Hi 'steppers,
>
> I am sure the one or another of us has heard about that new language for Cocoa/Cocoa Touch that Apple has recently introduced:
>
> https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documentation/Swift/Conceptual/Swift_Programming_Language/AboutTheLanguageReference.html
>
> What is our position towards this? Is there already an official GNUstep position?

Developed within 3 days?

​

​Indeed.​

> If not, what are your opinions?

I don't see yet which problem the new language solves. Maybe removing some @ signs in code. In my view even Obj-C 1.0 was feature complete to do everything one wants in a rather neat and clean way. ObjC 2.x has simplified writing code at some places but introduced redundancy at others.

The problem it solves is a political one, not a technical one.  It allows people who are uncomfortable with Objective-C or C in general to use a language which is more akin to _javascript_.​  It also provides lock-in for Apple so that they have a captive developer base which doesn't allow them to move to other platforms since Swift doesn't exist there.

 

10 years ago I started to develop CocoaBasic and the language and integration of the Obj-C frameworks wasn't that much different from SWIFT: http://cocoadev.com/CocoaBasic

> Does anybody know about the legal status of this language, e.g. whether we're allowed to support it or not?

IMHO languages are not protected or protectable.

​This is true.​

Conclusion: a Swift (pre)compiler/translator would reduce the lock to move to other platforms...

Would it be difficult to write such a translator to standard Obj-C? IMHO no. Just some rolling up sleeves.

Perhaps someone (unrelated to GNUstep) will pick up and start a project on GitHub (even before we have discussed moving GNUstep there :).