After 20 years of Objective-C, Apple is now trying out its own with a language apparently years in the making. The new language (Swift), emphasizes speed, safety and an interactive approach to development. Developers what are nervous about having to move wholesale into a new language can be reassured that Swift code can work alongside the Objective-C in the same application. For new developers accustomed to Java/C#/C++ syntax this new language will shorten the learning curve for IOS development.

Here are some of the highlights of the language according to Apple:

• Closures (similar to blocks in C and Objective-C) unified with function pointers
• Tuples and multiple return values
• Generics
• Fast and concise iteration over a range or collection
• Structs that support methods, extensions, protocols
• Functional programming patterns, e.g.: map and filter

Apple has published an eBook on Swift, which can be downloaded for free, here.