Namespaces in Swift, resolving collisions.

Though Swift does support namespaces, it is not obvious what the namespace is for the standard libraries. This can easily create conflicts when we want to name a function of our own making and happen to pick the same name as a standard function. And there are a lot of standard functions...

Often enough the argument list of a function will prove to be sufficient for the compile to figure out which function we did intent to call, but there are cases where the compiler needs some assistance.

For example the UNIX accept function is defined as follows:

int accept(int, struct sockaddr * __restrict, socklen_t * __restrict)

I defined an accept function with the following signature:

class SocketUtils {

        

    static func accept(socket: Int32, interval: NSTimeInterval?, timeout: NSTimeInterval? = nil) -> AcceptResult { .. }

}

Unfortunately the compiler will nag when I try to use the Unix accept function:

Obviously the compiler thinks that my own accept function should be used, while I want to use the accept from the UNIX system library.

The solution is simple: use the fully qualified name for the system function.

Turns out, the fully qualified name for any system function starts with the name of the project:

let connectionDescriptor = MyGreatProject.accept(socket, &connectedAddrInfo, &connectedAddrInfoLength)

Works just fine!

Note: The fully qualified name for my own accept function is of course:

MyGreatProject.SocketUtils.accept

Happy coding...

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