[swift-evolution] Swift's Optional Int as NSNumber in Objective-C

[John McCall]

> On May 12, 2017, at 10:10 AM, Yarik Arsenkin via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> does anyone know if there is a reason why bridging of the Swift’s `Int?` type doesn’t work for Objective-C? I mean, it could be exposed as an `NSNumber` with nullable attribute, no?

I assume you're talking about the type restrictions on exporting Swift functions as @objc.  We have the technical ability to bridge any Swift value to Objective-C as an opaque object, but that wouldn't actually produce meaningful APIs on the ObjC side; we have to have some sort of tighter policy than that.  Today, that policy is to allow export when there's an obvious, idiomatic analogue in Objective-C.  Exporting Int? as an optional NSNumber does not feel obvious and idiomatic when we would export Int as NSInteger.  It feels like reaching for an arbitrary solution.

John.