As of Swift 2, this can now be achieved with protocol extensions,
which provide method and property implementations to conforming types
(optionally restricted by additional constraints).
A simple example: Define a method for all types conforming
to SequenceType
(such as Array
) where the sequence element is a String
:
extension SequenceType where Generator.Element == String {
func joined() -> String {
return "".join(self)
}
}
let a = ["foo", "bar"].joined()
print(a) // foobar
The extension method cannot be defined for struct Array
directly, but only for all types
conforming to some protocol (with optional constraints). So one
has to find a protocol to which Array
conforms and which provides all the necessary methods. In the above example, that is SequenceType
.
Another example (a variation of How do I insert an element at the correct position into a sorted array in Swift?):
extension CollectionType where Generator.Element : Comparable, Index : RandomAccessIndexType {
typealias T = Generator.Element
func insertionIndexOf(elem: T) -> Index {
var lo = self.startIndex
var hi = self.endIndex
while lo != hi {
// mid = lo + (hi - 1 - lo)/2
let mid = lo.advancedBy(lo.distanceTo(hi.predecessor())/2)
if self[mid] < elem {
lo = mid + 1
} else if elem < self[mid] {
hi = mid
} else {
return mid // found at position `mid`
}
}
return lo // not found, would be inserted at position `lo`
}
}
let ar = [1, 3, 5, 7]
let pos = ar.insertionIndexOf(6)
print(pos) // 3
Here the method is defined as an extension to CollectionType
because
subscript access to the elements is needed, and the elements are
required to be Comparable
.