ivanh

IreneW said:

beowulfschmidt said:

IreneW said:

ivanh said:

SWIFT is 30 years behind dBase IV in application development. We need application generator, not coding.

Never did much real development, did you?

Perhaps he hasn't, but I have, and while his comment is more rhetoric than fact, the point remains valid.

That bit the article mentions about the ABI stands out.  Having not used Swift, I won't comment on the specifics, but I will comment on the general case.  Maintaining compatibility of interface between applications and modules built with different versions of a compiler is almost an absolute must.  Effectively cutting a new application off from old modules is a really dumb idea.  Lack of compatibility means that any modules I want to reference must also be recompiled, even if they're working fine.  This rebuild brings with it risk, since the new compiler might have changes that change the way the code works, or removes a feature used by the old code (these aren't issues most of the time, but I've seen them both, especially with some C compilers), which means the old module has to be reworked to work around the compiler issue.

Not to mention the fact that the older build might still be required by still other modules, which means maintaining multiple versions, with potentially multiple versions of the source as well.  Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.  No thanks.

Now, that doesn't mean the interface shouldn't evolve and improve, by any means.  Maintaining compatibility isn't that tough for a well designed compiler, and can be implemented in a number of ways.  As interfaces evolve, perhaps include the backwards compatibility for old builds in every newly built application.  Obviously this means including code might not ever be used.  Or perhaps a compiler switch that says "include compatibility for version X.X modules."  Better still if that detection were built into the compiler, so that when an older module is referenced, the needed compatibility is automatically included.

Lack of compatibility for modules built with older versions of the compiler (unless it's something like a security issue) just creates more, in most cases unnecessary, work for developers, including Apple's own developers.

No doubt about it, I absolutely agree that a stable ABI is fundamental and that Swift is still too immature for (my) professional use.
My comment were about the "application generator", a concept that is usable for a very small subset of the SW running in CPUs today. I have tried different generations, including the really expensive model--based engineering tools and the latest AI/ML magic. Code is still king.