What this book covers

Chapter 1, Getting Started with Xcode and Swift, introduces you to some Xcode features that are Swift-specific. This might sound a bit advanced for the first chapter, but it is not difficult and it is also very important, mainly for those people who would like to develop professionally.

Chapter 2, Standard Library and Collections, shows you how to manipulate arrays, dictionaries, sets, strings, and other objects using the Swift way. This chapter is very important for people who have been working with Objective-C.

Chapter 3, Using Structs and Generics, shows you how Swift structs are not the same as Objective-C (or even C) structs, and that generics is a feature that allows you to create functions that are not tied to only one type. Both features have their own tricks.

Chapter 4, Design Patterns with Swift, explains how to implement design patterns using Swift, especially if you like object-oriented programming.

Chapter 5, Multitasking, shows you how to use different types of multitasking, a feature that is present in almost every app nowadays.

Chapter 6, Playground, teaches you how to use Playground, a new Xcode feature that allows you to test your code before adding it to your project.

Chapter 7, Swift Debugging with Xcode, explains how to debug Swift code using Xcode, LLDB, and Instruments. Here, you learn some tricks for finding and solving bugs in your app.

Chapter 8, Integrating with Objective-C, shows you how Swift and Objective-C can live together and gives you a step-by-step guide on how to migrate your Objective-C app to Swift.

Chapter 9, Dealing with Other Languages, shows you how to use C, C++, and the assembly language with Swift since you already know Swift is not alone in iOS and OS X development.

Chapter 10, Data Access, shows you different ways of storing data, which can be local or remote.

Chapter 11, Miscellaneous, expounds some topics that are very important in the Swift development world, from new frameworks such as the WatchKit to the widely used ones.