Swift, an open source and compiled programming language developed by Apple in 2014 for iOS, watchOS and tvOS, will help IBM’s next journey with enterprise to advance its mobile strategy.
“Swift is very attractive to developers because it is a modern programming language. It allows the developer to easily discover issues while writing the code, rather than doing it while running it. This is much more cost effective,” said IBM Mobile and Process Transformation VP Michael Gilfix in an interaction with Deccan Herald.
IBM is betting big on Swift as a server-side language for enterprise as it helps develop application on the client and the business logic on the server. As part of the initiative, the company has launched Swift Sandbox, an interactive website that lets you write Swift code for server-side programming on the top of Linux, in December 2015.
“There are more than 1.5 million code runs from developers in 133 countries already. India is the fifth most active country in Swift Sandbox. Bengaluru is the eighth most active city in Swift Sandbox,” Gilfix said.
People who are not on iOS/ Mac are also using Swift Sandbox and more than half of all sessions in Swift Sandbox are from users on operating systems other than iOS/Mac. As it is a key part of IBM’s developer-focused strategy, Swift helps developers use the skills they have to develop apps on the front-end and on the back-end.
Gilfix has global responsibility for business management and product evolution for mobile application development, as well as business process management and decision management technologies.
IBM has also launched the Swift Package Catalog this February. “More than 1,500 packages have been submitted to the Swift Package Catalog, which is a 400% increase. The response from developers has been tremendous,” he said.
For Mac Developers, IBM announced last week the beta version of IBM Cloud tools for Swift, which is meant to simplify the management and deployment of server-side assets on the IBM Cloud.
“For enterprise developers, this past week we announced Swift support for LinuxONE, IBM’s Linux-only enterprise system, to create applications that connect into the hybrid cloud. By running Swift on LinuxONE, developers can combine the programming language they know with the system's speed, security and scale,” he said.