Closure SPM 📦

🔗 Check out Closure

git clone git@github.com:0xLeif/Closure.git

Defining a Closure

“A Closure is a block of code that can be executed by reference of a variable or name. Closures in Swift are normally unnamed and passed in as a parameter variable or stored as a variable.”

🔗 source

Closure.swift

When we define a Closure we can assume that it will always have an Input and an Output. Either value could be Void in the case that a value doesn’t exist. Knowing this we can expect that our object look something like, Closure<Input, Output>. We will need an actual closure when we initialize our Closure object. This value should look something like this, (Input) -> Output.

/// A Struct that defines a Closure with a given Input and a given Output
public struct Closure<Input, Output> {
  /// The Closure passed in during initialization
  public let method: (Input) -> Output
  
  /// Initialize a Closure without any scoped state
  public init(
    _ closure: @escaping (Input) -> Output
  ) {
    method = closure
  }
}

Notice that we must specify that the closure is @escaping. This is becuase we will store it in a variable that we can keep for the lifetime of the object. In other words @escaping means that the closure can leave the scope of the function it is passed into.

Running the Closure

Now that we have defined the basic Closure object we can start running the closure! Currently we would need to reach into the object. You will also notice that we need to pass in () which is the Void type.

let sayHello = Closure {
    print("Hello 👋")
}

sayHello.method(())

In this example, sayHello is of type Closure<Void, Void>.

Extending Closure

Now we will create a function to run the Closure with the required Input and potentially a completion handler. This will make it easier to call the method instead of having to reach into the object.

public extension Closure {
  /// Run the Closure with Input and a Completion Handler
  func run(
    input: Input,
    onCompletion onCompletionHandler: () -> Void = {}
  ) -> Output {
    defer {
      onCompletionHandler()
    }
    return method(input)
  }
}

Void Input Closures

Now that we have a run function, we can add another extension for when the Input is Void. We will add another run function where it doesn’t require an Input and defaults the value to ().

extension Closure where Input == Void {
    func run(
        onCompletion onCompletionHandler: () -> Void = {}
    ) -> Output {
        run(
            input: (),
            onCompletion: onCompletionHandler
        )
    }
}

Chaining Closures

To be able to chain closures, we would need to receive some new closure to run. We can expect that this closure will look very similar to the closure we already have, but it could have some new output. The closure should look similar to this, @escaping (Output) -> NewOutput.

extension Closure {
  /// Chain another Closure with a NewOutput
  func then<NewOutput>(
    _ closure: @escaping (Output) -> NewOutput
  ) -> Closure<Input, NewOutput> {
    Closure<Input, NewOutput> { input in
      closure(method(input))
    }
  }
}

Looking at this function, note that we pass the Output of method(input) into the new closure. Using then, we are able to make a new Closure where we still pass in the same type of Input, but now the NewOutput could be the same or different than Output.

Chaining Closures Example

Psuedo Code

Closure<Void, Void> -> Closure<Void, Int> -> Closure<Void, Void>

let sayHello: Closure<Void, Void> = Closure {
    print("Hello")
}
.then {
    Int.random(in: 0 ... 9)
}
.then { randomInt in
    print("I got this random int: \(randomInt) 🤷‍♂️")
}

In this example, sayHello is still of type Closure<Void, Void>.

Stateful Closure

🤔 What is a stateful closure?

Could we have a Closure that has some state? For example, could we have a closure that returns a value and each time we run it it increments one to the value.

let statefulCount: Closure<Void, Int> = ...

for _ in 0 ... 9 {
    print(statefulCount.run())
}

/** Output
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
*/

To do this we need a new init!

public struct Closure<Input, Output> {
    // ...
    
    /// Initialize a Closure with potential scoped state
    public init(
        _ closure: () -> ((Input) -> Output)
    ) {
        method = closure()
    }
}

In the example above where we have statefulCount. The Closure was defined with the following code.

let statefulCount: Closure<Void, Int> = Closure {
    var count = 0
    
    return { _ in
        defer {
            count += 1
        }
        
        return count
    }
}

Extra Examples

No State

let noStateCount = Closure<String, String> { text in
  String(repeating: text, count: 4)
}
.then { string in
  Int(string) ?? 0
}


XCTAssertEqual(noStateCount.method("5"), 5555)
XCTAssertEqual(noStateCount.method("5"), 5555)
XCTAssertEqual(noStateCount.method("5"), 5555)

State

let stateCount: Closure<String, Int> = Closure<String, String> {
  var count = 1
  
  return { text in
    defer {
      count += 1
    }
    
    return String(repeating: text, count: count)
  }
}
.then { string in
  Int(string) ?? 0
}

XCTAssertEqual(stateCount.method("5"), 5)
XCTAssertEqual(stateCount.method("5"), 55)
XCTAssertEqual(stateCount.method("5"), 555)

⬆️ Back to the Top

Closure SPM

by: 0xLeif