Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by kitsunesoba 1119 days ago
I think many also find its syntax more approachable compared to that of Rust. It's got a lot of bells and whistles, but newcomers don't have to use them right away and can pick up more advanced bits as they become comfortable with doing so.
2 comments

> I think many also find its syntax more approachable compared to that of Rust.

Chris Lattner (of LLVM fame) did design the language with the goal of hiding complexity until it is needed.

> The concept of progressive disclosure in Swift, where you can start with something very simple and then learn complexity as you go, was totally driven by making it teachable. I personally spent a lot of time trying to make sure that the introduction to Swift could just be print("Hello World"). No semicolons, no \ns, none of that public static void main stuff. Making it simple and approachable was a strong goal, and not in a weird way where in a teaching environment there is this “Swift Prime” language that’s similar but different.

https://oleb.net/blog/2017/06/chris-lattner-wwdc-swift-panel...

I did the Swift tutorial a short while ago and it was a breeze. I found it more approachable than Rust (I do like Rust).