When Apple introduced SwiftUI a few years ago, it was a big step forward for implementing user interfaces on all kinds of devices made by Apple. From the beginning, we liked the declarative, code-centric approach and the reactive programming model provided by Combine. We did notice, though, that writing a lot of view tests, which you still need with a model—view—viewmodel (MVVM) pattern, was not really sensible with the XCUITest automation framework provided by Apple. This gap has been closed by ViewInspector. A final hurdle was the minimum OS version required. At the time of release, only the very latest versions of iOS and macOS could run applications written with SwiftUI, but because of Apple’s regular cadence of updates, SwiftUI apps can now run on practically all versions of macOS and iOS that receive security updates.
Apple has taken a big step forward with their new SwiftUI framework for implementing user interfaces on the macOS and iOS platforms. We like that SwiftUI moves beyond the somewhat kludgy relationship between Interface Builder and Xcode and adopts a coherent, declarative and code-centric approach. You can now view your code and the resulting visual interface side by side in Xcode 11, making for a much better developer experience. The SwiftUI framework also draws inspiration from the React.js world that has dominated web development in recent years. Immutable values in view models and an asynchronous update mechanism make for a unified reactive programming model. This gives developers an entirely native alternative to similar reactive frameworks such as React Native or Flutter. SwiftUI definitely represents the future of Apple UI development, and although new, it has shown its benefits. We've been having great experience with it — and its shallow learning curve. It's worth noting that you should know your customer's use case before jumping into using SwiftUI, given that it doesn't support iOS 12 or below.
Apple has taken a big step forward with their new SwiftUI framework for implementing user interfaces on macOS and iOS platforms. We like that SwiftUI moves beyond the somewhat kludgy relationship between Interface Builder and XCode and adopts a coherent, declarative and code-centric approach. You can now view your code and the resulting visual interface side by side in XCode 11, making for a much better developer experience. The SwiftUI framework also draws inspiration from the React.js world that has dominated web development in recent years. Immutable values in view models and an asynchronous update mechanism make for a unified reactive programming model. This gives developers an entirely native alternative to similar reactive frameworks such as React Native or Flutter. Although SwiftUI definitely represents the future of Apple UI development, it is quite new and it will take time to smooth out the rough edges. We look forward to improved documentation and a community of developers who can establish a set of practices for testing and other engineering concerns.
