Book Image

Swift Protocol-Oriented Programming - Fourth Edition

By : Jon Hoffman
Book Image

Swift Protocol-Oriented Programming - Fourth Edition

By: Jon Hoffman

Overview of this book

Protocol-oriented programming is an incredibly powerful concept at the heart of Swift's design. Swift's standard library was developed using POP techniques, generics, and first-class value semantics; therefore, it is important for every Swift developer to understand these core concepts and take advantage of them. The fourth edition of this book is improved and updated to the latest version of the Swift programming language. This book will help you understand what protocol-oriented programming is all about and how it is different from other programming paradigms such as object-oriented programming. This book covers topics such as generics, Copy-On-Write, extensions, and of course protocols. It also demonstrates how to use protocol-oriented programming techniques via real-world use cases. By the end of this book, you will know how to use protocol-oriented programming techniques to build powerful and practical applications.
Table of Contents (11 chapters)

Inheritance for reference types only

In object-oriented programming, inheritance refers to one class (known as a sub or child class) being derived from another class (known as a super or parent class). The subclass will inherit methods, properties, and other characteristics from the superclass. With inheritance, we can also create a class hierarchy where we can have multiple layers of inheritance.

Let's look at how we could create a class hierarchy with classes in Swift. We will start off by creating a base class named Animal:

class Animal { 
    var numberOfLegs = 0  
    func sleeps() { 
       print("zzzzz") 
    } 
    func walking() { 
       print("Walking  on \(numberOfLegs) legs") 
    } 
    func speaking() { 
       print("No sound") 
    } 
} 
 

In the Animal class, we defined one property (numberOfLegs) and three methods (sleeps(...