Hi, Pasan. What is the static key word stand for within the Formatter struct?

Basically, there are two different types of methods and properties:

• Instance methods and instance properties
• Type methods and type properties

Instance methods and instance properties

These can only be called or accessed on an instance of a class. With the first example, you have to create and instance of UIColor first, before you can call the blackColor method or access the one variable. That is a concept you might be already familiar with. You have full access to all other methods and properties.

class UIColor {

   var one: Int = 1  

   func blackColor() -> UIColor {
       // Create black color here and return it...
   }
}

// Create an instance of UIColor
let color = UIColor()

// Call method on instance of UIColor
let blackColor = color.blackColor()

// Access property on instance of UIColor
let one = color.one

Type methods and type properties

Sometimes referred to class methods // properties. These can be called and accessed on the class itself, no need to create an instance of UIColor first. This is often used for convenience methods and properties, just as UIColor. The below example shows the actual implementation of the convenience method to create a black color.

class UIColor {

    // Note this uses the static keyword,
    // not class. Find the explanation below
    static var one: Int = 1  

    class func blackColor() -> UIColor {
       // Create black color here and return it...
   }
}

// Access the blackColor method on the class
// without having to create an instance of UIColor
let blackColor = UIColor.blackColor()

// Access the one property directly
let one = UIColor.one // 1

Important!

It is important to know that class and static methods and properties don't have access to instance methods and properties! The following example does not compile:

struct Test {

    let testing = "Testing"

    static func test() -> String {
        // In static or class methods, we cannot access
        // instance methods and properties
        return testing
    }
}

Class vs. Static methods and properties

As the name suggests, you can have class methods only with classes, not structs. That makes sense, as structs don't have the concept of inheritance, unlike classes. However you can have static methods and properties on classes. The key difference is that class methods and properties can be overwritten in subclasses whereas static methods and properties can't be overridden.

Hope that helps :)