Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has unveiled a developer preview of version 3.0 of its Swift programming language.
The preview is available as part of Apple's Xcode 8 beta 1 IDE for iOS and MacOS development, along with Ubuntu 14.04 and 15.10.
Developer Christopher Allen told InfoWorld that the new preview includes "broader Swift community support" and other features.
"This release is more incremental than major," he stated. "Most of the changes are to improving dealing with legacy Objective-C APIs and names and otherwise attempt to make syntax more consistent across the language."
#Apple's #Swift 3 developer preview arrives for #MacOS and #Linux https://t.co/54gUnrIIhu via @infoworld
— Sander Rossel (@sanderrossel) June 16, 2016
The new Swift release is due for general availability later this year.
So how has the development community responded to the Swift 3 preview? Some developers pointed out that the preview showed Apple is committed to creating an "open" development community.
That's what 'open' is all about: "Open Source Community Helps Shape New Swift 3.0 Developer Preview" -- ADTmag https://t.co/4Q0jzFmsUW
— developerWorks Open (@IBMdwOpen) June 17, 2016
Other developers were searching for immediate Swift improvements and were satisfied with Swift's syntax enhancements.
@SwiftLang please stabilize your syntax!! Re: swift 3.0. :)
— Gregory Casamento (@bheron) June 14, 2016
The preview also revealed that many developers may be able to use Swift 3 to accelerate their build times going forward.
Improved Swift 3.0 build times. My line of code requiring 5s, now builds in 3.5s. Need to test with more code. #swiftlang #WWDC
— Robert Gummesson (@RobertGummesson) June 13, 2016