Shallows
Shallows is a generic abstraction layer over lightweight data storage and persistence. It provides a Storage
type, instances of which can be easily transformed and composed with each other. It gives you an ability to create highly sophisticated, effective and reliable caching/persistence solutions.
Shallows is deeply inspired by Carlos and this amazing talk by Brandon Kase.
Shallows is a really small, component-based project, so if you need even more controllable solution – build one yourself! Our source code is there to help.
Usage
struct City : Codable {
let name: String
let foundationYear: Int
}
let diskStorage = DiskStorage.main.folder("cities", in: .cachesDirectory)
.mapJSONObject(City.self) // Storage
let kharkiv = City(name: "Kharkiv", foundationYear: 1654)
diskStorage.set(kharkiv, forKey: "kharkiv")
diskStorage.retrieve(forKey: "kharkiv") { (result) in
if let city = try? result.get() { print(city) }
}
Guide
A main type of Shallows is Storage
. It's an abstract, type-erased structure which doesn't contain any logic -- it needs to be provided with one. The most basic one is MemoryStorage
:
let storage = MemoryStorage<String, Int>().asStorage() // Storage
Storage instances have retrieve
and set
methods, which are asynhronous and fallible:
storage.retrieve(forKey: "some-key") { (result) in
switch result {
case .success(let value):
print(value)
case .failure(let error):
print(error)
}
}
storage.set(10, forKey: "some-key") { (result) in
switch result {
case .success:
print("Value set!")
case .failure(let error):
print(error)
}
}
Transforms
Keys and values can be mapped:
let storage = DiskStorage.main.folder("images", in: .cachesDirectory) // Storagelet images = storage .mapValues(to: UIImage.self, transformIn: { data in try UIImage.init(data: data).unwrap() }, transformOut: { image in try UIImagePNGRepresentation(image).unwrap() }) // Storage enum ImageKeys : String { case kitten, puppy, fish } let keyedImages = images .usingStringKeys() .mapKeys(toRawRepresentableType: ImageKeys.self) // Storage keyedImages.retrieve(forKey: .kitten, completion: { result in /* .. */ })
NOTE: There are several convenience methods defined on Storage
with value of Data
: .mapString(withEncoding:)
, .mapJSON()
, .mapJSONDictionary()
, .mapJSONObject(_:)
.mapPlist(format:)
, .mapPlistDictionary(format:)
, .mapPlistObject(_:)
.
Storages composition
Another core concept of Shallows is composition. Hitting a disk every time you request an image can be slow and inefficient. Instead, you can compose MemoryStorage
and FileSystemStorage
:
let efficient = MemoryStorage<Filename, UIImage>().combined(with: imageStorage)
It does several things:
- When trying to retrieve an image, the memory storage first will be checked first, and if it doesn't contain a value, the request will be made to disk storage.
- If disk storage stores a value, it will be pulled to memory storage and returned to a user.
- When setting an image, it will be set both to memory and disk storage.
Read-only storage
If you don't want to expose writing to your storage, you can make it a read-only storage:
let readOnly = storage.asReadOnlyStorage() // ReadOnlyStorage
Read-only storages can also be mapped and composed:
let immutableFileStorage = DiskStorage.main.folder("immutable", in: .applicationSupportDirectory) .mapString(withEncoding: .utf8) .asReadOnlyStorage() let storage = MemoryStorage<Filename, String>() .backed(by: immutableFileStorage) .asReadOnlyStorage() // ReadOnlyStorage
Write-only storage
In similar way, write-only storage is also available:
let writeOnly = storage.asWriteOnlyStorage() // WriteOnlyStorage
Different ways of composition
Compositions available for Storage
:
.combined(with:)
(see Storages composition).backed(by:)
will work the same ascombined(with:)
, but it will not push the value to the back storage.pushing(to:)
will not retrieve the value from the back storage, but will push to it onset
Compositions available for ReadOnlyStorage
:
.backed(by:)
Compositions available for WriteOnlyStorage
:
.pushing(to:)
Single element storage
You can have a storage with keys Void
. That means that you can store only one element there. Shallows provides a convenience .singleKey
method to create it:
let settings = DiskStorage.main.folder("settings", in: .applicationSupportDirectory)
.mapJSONDictionary()
.singleKey("settings") // Storage
settings.retrieve { (result) in
// ...
}
Synchronous storage
Storages in Shallows are asynchronous by design. However, in some situations (for example, when scripting or testing) it could be useful to have synchronous storages. You can make any storage synchronous by calling .makeSyncStorage()
on it:
let strings = DiskStorage.main.folder("strings", in: .cachesDirectory)
.mapString(withEncoding: .utf8)
.makeSyncStorage() // SyncStorage
let existing = try strings.retrieve(forKey: "hello")
try strings.set(existing.uppercased(), forKey: "hello")
Mutating value for key
Shallows provides a convenient .update
method on storages:
let arrays = MemoryStorage<String, [Int]>()
arrays.update(forKey: "some-key", { $0.append(10) })
Zipping storages
Zipping is a very powerful feature of Shallows. It allows you to compose your storages in a way that you get result only when both of them completes for your request. For example:
let strings = MemoryStorage<String, String>()
let numbers = MemoryStorage<String, Int>()
let zipped = zip(strings, numbers) // Storage
zipped.retrieve(forKey: "some-key") { (result) in
if let (string, number) = try? result.get() {
print(string)
print(number)
}
}
zipped.set(("shallows", 3), forKey: "another-key")
Isn't it nice?
Recovering from errors
You can protect your storage instance from failures using fallback(with:)
or defaulting(to:)
methods:
let storage = MemoryStorage<String, Int>()
let protected = storage.fallback(with: { error in
switch error {
case MemoryStorageError.noValue:
return 15
default:
return -1
}
})
let storage = MemoryStorage<String, Int>()
let defaulted = storage.defaulting(to: -1)
This is especially useful when using update
method:
let storage = MemoryStorage<String, [Int]>()
storage.defaulting(to: []).update(forKey: "first", { $0.append(10) })
That means that in case of failure retrieving existing value, update
will use default value of []
instead of just failing the whole update.
NSCacheStorage
Using NSCache
is a tricky class: it supports only reference types, so you're forced to use, for example, NSData
instead of Data
and so on. To help you out, Shallows provides a set of convenience extensions for legacy Foundation types:
let nscache = NSCacheStorage<NSURL, NSData>()
.toNonObjCKeys()
.toNonObjCValues() // Storage
Making your own storage
To create your own caching layer, you should conform to StorageProtocol
. That means that you should define these two methods:
func retrieve(forKey key: Key, completion: @escaping (Result<Value, Error>) -> ())
func set(_ value: Value, forKey key: Key, completion: @escaping (Result<Void, Error>) -> ())
Where Key
and Value
are associated types.
NOTE: Please be aware that you are responsible for the thread-safety of your implementation. Very often retrieve
and set
will not be called from the main thread, so you should make sure that no race conditions will occur.
To use it as Storage
instance, simply call .asStorage()
on it:
let storage = MyStorage().asStorage()
You can also conform to a ReadOnlyStorageProtocol
only. That way, you only need to define a retrieve(forKey:completion:)
method.
Installation
Swift Package Manager
Starting with Xcode 11, Shallows is officially available only via Swift Package Manager.
In Xcode 11 or greater, in you project, select: File > Swift Packages > Add Pacakage Dependency
In the search bar type
https://github.com/dreymonde/Shallows
Then proceed with installation.
If you can't find anything in the panel of the Swift Packages you probably haven't added yet your github account. You can do that under the Preferences panel of your Xcode, in the Accounts section.
For command-line based apps, you can just add this directly to your Package.swift file:
dependencies: [
.package(url: "https://github.com/dreymonde/Shallows", from: "0.11.0"),
]
Manual
Of course, you always have an option of just copying-and-pasting the code.
Deprecated dependency managers
Last Shallows version to support Carthage and Cocoapods is 0.10.0. Carthage and Cocoapods will no longer be officially supported.
Carthage:
github "dreymonde/Shallows" ~> 0.10.0
Cocoapods:
pod 'Shallows', '~> 0.10.0'