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HaeJu Lee
3,811 PointsQuestion About findApt(“101”)?.toInt() and ? mark for optionals
1) Why should I write a code like findApt(“101”)?.toInt() ? Does ?. in findApt(“101”)?.toInt() mean something meaningful, or ?. is just a syntax(grammar) for synthesizing 2 lines of code to one? (?. is just a systax for optional chainging, and I don't have to think about its meaning deeply?)
2) I only saw ? used when clarifying type of a variable or constant, for example, var index: Int? = 3. Can I see any other applications of ? for optionals, except findApt(“101”)?.toInt() ?
My question is a bit long. Thanks for reading :)
3 Answers
Jhoan Arango
14,575 PointsHello HaeJu Lee :
What you are doing with findApt(“101”)?.toInt() is making it an optional. For example..
I’m assuming that findApt() is a function that iterates through some apartment numbers, and if it finds it then it will do something with it. But what if there is no apartment 101 ? it will return nil because it’s an optional. The toint() is converting the string “101” to an Int. Meaning from text to a number, and its doing it by means of casting.
Hope it helps you understand a bit more.
Mauro Javier Aguirre Sanroman
11,510 Pointsthe ? mark means it is an optional, You use optionals in situations where a value may be absent, so the value could be nil or the type you are referring to, if the value you are intending to retrieve fails, it returns nil, that's why you want to use optional chaining(if let =findApt(“101”)?.toInt(){} ), to prevent your app from crashing if the variable's or constant's value happens to be nil.
GIUSEPPE GRAMMATICO
9,255 PointsI'm new to Swift and Optional seems a bit confusing to me. Am I wrong or another way to get the same result would be to compare the "let constant" against a nil result and then use ! to get the "non optional" value (if it exists)?
i come from other languages and the "optional thing" appears not so much convenient... is an idea that will disappear as I go more in the code?
(sorry for bad english)