Higher Order Functions in Swift 2
Where you have a nested array that simply needs joining with an additional array of values placed between each use
join(). If you have an array that needs to be flattened and needs additional values appended as a suffix or prefix to each nested array useflatMap(). If you require a one off initial value and possibly to append values before or after nested values usereduce().[…]
The focus of this post has been arrays, but actually there are things that can be done with dictionaries as well.
Update (2015-07-27): Natasha Murashev:
In other words,
flatMapis specifically overloaded to deal with Optionals. It will take an array of optionals and return an array of unwrapped optionals without any nils.[…]
The idea of thinking of
flatMapas dealing with containers vs just arrays makes things a lot clearer!
Update (2015-09-25): Giovanni Lodi:
A good use case for
mapandflatMapin the context ofOptionalis to simplify code usingif lets.
