Objective C's Sadness

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Created Aug ’16

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Dear developers, I suddenly have a massive confusion about the undergoing big programming revolution inside apple developers. I understand swift has been officially announced since 2014. As a normal iOS mobile developer, I respect and follow all the new policy from apple. But I just had such thoughts and doubts: What makes Objective C so weak comparing to Swift? Is that because all the banks use Java as programming language? Is objective cannot easily access windows system? Is Swift wrapped with Objective C or Swift is totally a brand new programming language? How many new hardware interface have been available to access by accepting Swift? Is Objective C going to disappear within next 5 years? How many years will it take apple to stable its own programming language? NOTE: I met a lot of iOS mobile developers change to learn JAVA, Become an android developer. eg: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/samplecode/Reachability/Introduction/Intro.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/DTS40007324-Intro-DontLinkElementID_2

The sample code from apple documents was still written in Objective C @2016, Are we going to use Swift or Objective C? and some of the APIs documents are not completed, class initializer cannot be accessed such as https://developer.apple.com/library/tvos/documentation/SystemConfiguration/Reference/SCNetworkReachabilityRef/index.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40007260-CH101-SW4

but was writted beautifully in apple documents.

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Macho Man Randy Savage OP

Aug ’16

>As a normal iOS mobile developer, I respect and follow all the new policy from apple. But I just had such thoughts and doubts: What makes Objective C so weak comparing to Swift?

If you are asking me, ObjC is not weak at all. The language is older than I am and I like it alot. Most complaints about ObjC seem kind of childish to me. Some people complain about because ObjC has square brackets and most other languages do not. Some complain about ObjC conventions like long method names...though code completion pretty much takes care of the typing problem. Swift has some extra features ObjC does not have though.

Is Swift wrapped with Objective C or Swift is totally a brand new programming language?

From: h t t p s : //swift.org/about/

One of the most exciting aspects of developing Swift in the open is knowing that it is now free to be ported across a wide range of platforms, devices, and use cases.

Our goal is to provide source compatibility for Swift across all platforms, even though the actual implementation mechanisms may differ from one platform to the next. The primary example is that the Apple platforms include the Objective-C runtime, which is required to access Apple platform frameworks such as UIKit and AppKit. On other platforms, such as Linux, no Objective-C runtime is present, because it isn’t necessary.

The Swift core libraries project aims to extend the cross-platform capabilities of Swift by providing portable implementations of fundamental Apple frameworks (such as Foundation) without dependencies on the Objective-C runtime. Although the core libraries are in an early stage of development, they will eventually provide improved source compatibility for Swift code across all platforms.

> Is Objective C going to disappear within next 5 years?

Nobody knows for sure...only the Apple Gods know. Objective-C is not deprecated. You can still use ObjC to develop apps on Apple platforms.

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