Cocoa is the new Carbon: The Future of Apple’s Beloved Framework

In this talk, Adrian provides lots of speculation and highly arguable unverified gossip, about how the design of Swift will lead Apple to redesign Cocoa into new directions, and maybe replacing it altogether. Some code examples will help him defend a point that nobody outside of Cupertino can sustain for sure.

Presentation given in Zürich, Switzerland, February 26th, 2015.

The speech of the presentation can be found here:
https://akos.ma/blog/cocoa-is-the-new-carbon-the-future-of-apples-beloved-framework/

Transcript

1. Cocoa is the new Carbon
   The Future of Apple’s Beloved Framework
   © akosma 2015 1
   

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2. Adrian Kosmaczewski
   @akosma
   https://github.com/akosma
   © akosma 2015 2
   

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3. “Everything changes
   and nothing stands
   still.”
   Heraclitus of Ephesus, (535 - 475 BC)
   © akosma 2015 3
   

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4. “Πάντα χωρεῖ καὶ
   οὐδὲν μένει”
   Ἡράκλειτος
   © akosma 2015 4
   

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5. © akosma 2015 5
   

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6. © akosma 2015 6
   

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7. 6502 → 68000 → PowerPC → Intel → ARM
   © akosma 2015 7
   

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8. 8 bit → 16 bit → 32 bit → 64 bit
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9. Integer Basic
   → Object Pascal & MacApp
   → C++ & Metrowerks PowerPlant
   → Objective-C & Cocoa
   → Swift & Standard Library
   © akosma 2015 9
   

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10. Procedural → Object Oriented →
    Functional
    © akosma 2015 10
    

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11. “"Plus ça change,
    plus c'est la même
    chose."”
    Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (1808 - 1890)
    © akosma 2015 11
    

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12. Heraclitus ! Jean-Baptiste
    © akosma 2015 12
    

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13. Transitional Technologies
    © akosma 2015 13
    

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14. Mac 68k
    Emulator
    1992 - 2008 (!)
    © akosma 2015 14
    

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15. Macintosh
    Application
    Environment
    1994 - 1998
    © akosma 2015 15
    

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16. Classic
    Environment
    Deprecated in
    OS X 10.5
    "Leopard"
    2000 - 2008
    © akosma 2015 16
    

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17. Carbon
    Deprecated in OS X 10.8 "Mountain
    Lion"
    2000 - 2012
    #if __i386__
    #include
    #else
    #include
    #endif
    © akosma 2015 17
    

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18. The LLVM Compiler Infrastructure
    2003 - now
    © akosma 2015 18
    

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19. Rosetta
    Deprecated in
    OS X 10.7 "Lion"
    2006 - 2011
    © akosma 2015 19
    

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20. Universal Binaries
    © akosma 2015 20
    

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21. Objective-C 2.0 (1/2)
    2006 - now
    // Before
    @implementation SomeClass
    - (NSObject *)stuff {
    return _stuff;
    }
    - (void)setStuff:(NSObject *)newStuff {
    [newStuff retain];
    [_stuff release];
    _stuff = newStuff;
    }
    @end
    © akosma 2015 21
    

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22. Objective-C 2.0 (2/2)
    2006 - now
    // After
    @interface SomeClass
    @property (nonatomic, strong) NSObject *stuff;
    @end
    © akosma 2015 22
    

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23. LLVM
    Around 2009
    → Xcode Static Analyzer
    → Automatic Resource Counting (ARC)
    © akosma 2015 23
    

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24. Cocoa
    1988 - now
    Deprecated in 5… 4… 3… !
    @import Cocoa;
    © akosma 2015 24
    

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25. nullable Objective-C Pointers 1 !
    @interface LocationDataController : NSObject
    @property (nonnull, nonatomic) NSArray *locations;
    @property (nullable, nonatomic) Location *latestLocation;
    - (void)addPhoto:(nonnull Photo *)photo
    forLocation:(nonnull Location *)location;
    - (nullable Photo *)photoForLocation:(nonnull Location *)location;
    @end
    1 "Swift 1.2" by Nate Cook
    © akosma 2015 25
    

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26. Cocoa should remain for
    backwards compatibility during
    10 years
    at least, until 2025!
    © akosma 2015 26
    

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27. © akosma 2015 27
    

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28. What is Swift?
    © akosma 2015 28
    

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29. Modern
    Safe
    Fast
    Interoperable
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30. © akosma 2015 30
    

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31. Features
    © akosma 2015 31
    

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32. Protocols, Pattern Matching
    Generics, Tuples, Optionals, Enums
    Strong Typing, Type Inference
    Structs, Functions
    © akosma 2015 32
    

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33. OOP features of Swift are based in
    Functional
    primitives and mechanisms!
    © akosma 2015 33
    

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34. Inspiration
    © akosma 2015 34
    

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35. C#, JavaScript,
    Haskell, Erlang,
    Ruby, C++, Java, Scala
    © akosma 2015 35
    

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36. © akosma 2015 36
    

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37. How would the successor of Cocoa
    look like?
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38. Gedankenexperiment !
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39. © akosma 2015 39
    

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40. Swift Standard Library
    let array = [10, 200, 3000]
    for (pos, value) in enumerate(array) {
    println("\(pos): \(value)")
    }
    // 0: 10
    // 1: 200
    // 2: 3000
    © akosma 2015 40
    

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41. LINQ (1/2)
    public void linq()
    {
    List products = GetProductList();
    var expensive =
    from p in products
    where p.Stock > 0 && p.Price > 1000
    select p;
    foreach (var product in expensive)
    {
    Console.WriteLine(product.Name);
    }
    }
    © akosma 2015 41
    

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42. LINQ (2/2)
    func linq(){
    let products = productsList()
    let expensive = products
    .find { p in p.stock > 0 && p.price > 1000 }
    for p in expensive {
    println(p.name)
    }
    }
    © akosma 2015 42
    

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43. © akosma 2015 43
    

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44. Dollar.swift
    let double = { (params: Int...) -> [Int] in
    return $.map(params) { $0 * 2 }
    }
    let subtractTen = { (params: Int...) -> [Int] in
    return $.map(params) { $0 - 10 }
    }
    let doubleSubtractTen = $.compose(double, subtractTen)
    doubleSubtractTen(5, 6, 7)
    => [0, 2, 4]
    © akosma 2015 44
    

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45. Alamofire
    let user = "user"
    let password = "password"
    Alamofire.request(.GET, "http://somewhere.over/the.rainbow")
    .authenticate(user: user, password: password)
    .validate(statusCode: 200..<300)
    .responseString { (_, _, string, _) in
    println(string)
    }
    .responseJSON { (_, _, JSON, _) in
    println(JSON)
    }
    © akosma 2015 45
    

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46. Notification Center (1/3)
    struct Notification {
    let name: String
    }
    func postNotification(note: Notification, value: A) {
    let userInfo = ["value": Box(value)]
    let center = NSNotificationCenter.defaultCenter()
    center.postNotificationName(note.name,
    object: nil,
    userInfo: userInfo)
    }
    © akosma 2015 46
    

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47. Notification Center (2/3)
    class NotificationObserver {
    let observer: NSObjectProtocol
    init(notification: Notification, block aBlock: A -> ()) {
    let center = NSNotificationCenter.defaultCenter()
    observer = center.addObserverForName(notification.name,
    object: nil,
    queue: nil) { note in
    if let value = (note.userInfo?["value"] as? Box)?.unbox {
    aBlock(value)
    }
    }
    }
    deinit { … }
    }
    © akosma 2015 47
    

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48. Notification Center (3/3)
    let notif: Notification = Notification(name: "Global panic")
    let myError: NSError = NSError(domain: "io.objc.sample",
    code: 42,
    userInfo: [:])
    postNotification(notif, myError)
    let observer = NotificationObserver(notification: notif) { err in
    println(err.localizedDescription)
    }
    © akosma 2015 48
    

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49. Events (1/2)
    class Event {
    typealias EventHandler = T -> ()
    private var eventHandlers = [EventHandler]()
    func addHandler(handler: EventHandler) {
    eventHandlers.append(handler)
    }
    func raise(data: T) {
    for handler in eventHandlers {
    handler(data)
    }
    }
    }
    © akosma 2015 49
    

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50. Events (2/2)
    let event = Event()
    event.addHandler { println("Hello") }
    event.addHandler { println("World") }
    event.raise()
    // What?
    let event = Event<(String, String)>()
    event.addHandler { a, b in println("Hello \(a), \(b)") }
    event.raise("First", "Second")
    © akosma 2015 50
    

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51. SwiftyUserDefaults
    Defaults["color"] = "red"
    Defaults["launchCount"] = 0
    Defaults["color"] ?= "white"
    Defaults["firstLaunchAt"].date // returns NSDate?
    Defaults["launchCount"] += 1
    if !Defaults.hasKey("hotkey") {
    Defaults.remove("hotkeyOptions")
    }
    © akosma 2015 51
    

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52. SwiftMoment
    let today = moment()
    let before = moment("2015-01-19")
    let earlier = before < today // true
    let soon = today + 1.hours
    let duration = 5.hours + 56.minutes
    let format = "EE yyyy/dd MMMM HH:mm"
    let birthday = moment("Tue 1973/4 September 12:30", format)!
    let str = birthday.format(dateFormat: "EE QQQQ yyyy/dd/MMMM")
    // "Tue 3rd quarter 1973/04/September"
    © akosma 2015 52
    

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53. Are we there yet?
    Hint: no.
    © akosma 2015 53
    

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54. Protocols, Pattern Matching
    Generics, Tuples, Optionals, Enums
    Strong Typing, Type Inference
    Structs, Functions
    © akosma 2015 54
    

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55. Functions and structs
    instead of objects and classes
    © akosma 2015 55
    

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56. Not all is OK
    What about reflection? Documentation? UI?
    © akosma 2015 56
    

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57. Time will tell !
    © akosma 2015 57
    

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58. Thanks! !
    © akosma 2015 58
    

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59. Adrian Kosmaczewski
    @akosma
    https://github.com/akosma
    © akosma 2015 59
    

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60. Special thanks to
    Junior Bontognali @bontojr for the organisation
    Fabrice Truillot de Chambrier @fabricetdc
    And the great people I follow on Twitter
    © akosma 2015 60
    

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61. Slides created with Deckset
    © akosma 2015 61
    

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