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  1. Alternative to instanceType in Swift

    Tuesday, August 23, 2016

    In case you have not noticed, there is no straight forward alternative to using 'instanceType' in Swift. You might have tried using "Self" in place of instanceType like shown in the below code snippet.

    But turns out it gives an error saying the object cannot be converted to type Self. I found this elegant solution posted by Martin R on StackOverflow and it uses Generics.



  2. Steps for using Swift Class in Objective C iOS project

    • Drag and drop our Swift file to our project. Make sure to prefix you're Swift class with @ObjC as shown in image below.


    • You will be asked if a "Bridging-header" file should be added to the  project as shown below. Select "Create Bridging Header"


    • Assuming a project name "MyProject", this will create a file named "MyProject-Bridging-Header.h". This file is important to achieve what we are looking for even though we will not be adding anything to this file.
    • Open Build Settings and configure some of the below mentioned values
      • Defines Module - YES
      • Embedded Content Contains Swift - YES
      • Install Objective-C Compatibility Header - YES 
    • Now that you are in Build Settings screen, just search for "Swift Compiler", notice an entry is created for "Objective-C Generated interface Header Name" which will be a *-Swift.h file. 


    • You will need to import this file in your Objective-C header file that where you would want the Swift class to be available. In my case it will be "MyProject-Swift.h". 
    • After importing, you're Swift class should be accessible from the Objective-C file, if it still isn't, then just try some below trouble shooting methods. Sometimes the Swift Interface file will not be generated.
      • Do a Clean Build and Run your code
      • Delete Derived Data and repeat previous step.