How can I make a generic extension in Swift?

Question

I want make a generic extension for avoiding me to repeating my code for deferent types. here is my code need to get fixed!

    extension Bool {
    
    func print() { Swift.print(self.description) }
    
}

extension Int {
    
    func print() { Swift.print(self.description) }
    
}

extension String {
    
    func print() { Swift.print(self.description) }
    
}

---

 extension <T> {
    
    func print() { Swift.print(self.description) }
    
}



 

question from:https://stackoverflow.com/questions/65546821/how-can-i-make-a-generic-extension-in-swift

Answer 1

Your extension is not "generic" in the sense that it can apply to any type. It can only apply to types that have a description property. Well, which types have a description property? Every type that conforms to CustomStringConvertible does!

So you should create an extension of CustomStringConvertible:

extension CustomStringConvertible {
    
    func print() { Swift.print(self.description) }
    
}

_{(Note that there could be a type that have a description property, but does not conform to CustomStringConvertible, but most types in the standard libraries aren't like this)}

Truly generic extensions are something else, and is currently being proposed, i.e. not part of Swift yet.