Who told you that Swift is statically-typed language?

OK, I lied about it. Swift is indeed statically-typed. But if you have ever tried using JSON in it, you’ll know what I mean & where the pain is.

This is a pretty simple functional helper but it took me nearly an hour to finally figure it out what the heck was really going on:

json["features"].array?.map({ item in (item.string as String) })

First you need to ensure features from json is optional/mandatory(!), then in map you’ll still need to explicitly downcast a strong-typed String to a String using as.

Oops…did I forget to mention that the json object is a JSONValue which has been handled by SwiftJSON to help you to get rid of tons of ? and ! already?

Swift looks so great from the very first sign only, when digging deeper and deeper, it’s a schizophrenic language which is just trying to make itself looks dynamic while its statically-typed from its blood and deep inside its heart, and, it’s incomplete.