Weekly Comment
It’s been over 20 years since “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” first hit theaters. With recent theatrical re-releases, I’ve started revisiting this classic series, having just watched the third installment, “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” yesterday.
Watching one film per week has allowed me to not only appreciate the storylines but also quickly observe the characters’ growth and the technological advancement in filmmaking over the nearly decade-long production. It’s evident that the visual quality and production value improved with each installment. However, one crucial point stands out: regardless of how magnificent and grand the scenes became, in the Harry Potter films, these special effects remained faithful to serving the story itself, enhancing the narrative rather than overshadowing it.
In the past five or six years, I’ve rarely encountered blockbuster films that have left a lasting impression. Despite significant improvements in special effects technology and reduced costs, I often forget the plot of many films before even leaving the theater. All that lingers are vague memories of dazzling special effects, while the film’s intended message gets lost in an endless array of technological applications. It seems that as the film industry gained access to more resources, it somehow lost its ability to tell stories with grace.
This phenomenon of technology overshadowing substance reminds me of the current AI development landscape. In today’s rapidly evolving AI era, many creators are eagerly embracing AI. However, as individuals, we should maintain a clear perspective: to stay competitive in the AI age, the key isn’t blindly chasing the latest technology, but rather leveraging AI to enhance our own capabilities instead of becoming addicted to its short-term conveniences.
Take the currently popular Cursor as an example - while it can significantly boost development efficiency, over-reliance on its convenience can inadvertently dull our coding intuition and gradually erode our deeper understanding of technology. Master technology, don’t let it master you — at least for me, this is a warning that needs to be constantly remembered.
Originals
Comprehensive Guide to Mastering KeyPath in Swift
In the world of Swift, KeyPath is a powerful yet often underestimated feature. Many developers use it inadvertently in their daily programming without fully realizing its potential and importance. This article aims to delve deeply into the functional characteristics of KeyPath, revealing its unique charm in Swift programming, and helping you transform it into a powerful assistant in your development process.
Recent Selections
SwiftUI Craftsmanship: View Contracts
This article is the first in the “SwiftUI Craftsmanship” series, where Danny Bolella emphasizes the importance of thoughtfully considering the question, “What is this view meant to do?” when designing SwiftUI views. By defining appropriate view contracts (interfaces), developers can avoid rigid dependencies on specific data types, enhancing flexibility and reusability. Bolella provides an analogy: a skilled carpenter knows the larger project they are building, but for each part, they must ask, “What is this piece supposed to do?” and ensure it fits into the broader design.
Exploring Swift Macros in Business Development
Since the introduction of macros in Swift 5.9, more developers have realized the significant role macros play in improving development efficiency. In addition to using predefined macros, creating custom macros tailored to specific business needs can greatly streamline workflows and simplify code. In this article, tit not only delves into the basics and advanced usage of Swift macros but also demonstrates how customized macros reduce redundancy and enhance development processes within the Bilibili membership center module.
AnyView is Everywhere in Xcode 16
In this article, Toomas Vahter highlights a key change in Xcode 16: in debug builds, all SwiftUI views are wrapped in AnyView. This design aims to accelerate mode switching and improve preview performance by sharing build artifacts. However, in some cases (such as with List), this approach may hinder performance optimizations. Vahter advises developers to be aware of this change to avoid unnecessary debugging efforts and performance issues.
Cursor
Recently, articles about using Cursor for development in the Apple ecosystem have surged, with each offering unique insights and perspectives.
- Thomas Ricouard shares his experience with Cursor in How to Use Cursor for iOS Development, providing detailed configuration steps and recommendations for iOS developers.
- Junping focuses on using Inject to build Xcode-like preview experiences within Cursor, showcasing how to replace traditional tools with a new workflow.
- Ethan Huang is producing a series of videos, focusing on how to achieve seamless switching between Cursor and Xcode, offering developers more flexibility in using multiple tools.
These insights not only demonstrate the diverse applications of Cursor but also provide Apple developers with more versatile options in their development workflows.
Swift Testing
Swift Testing is a testing framework designed specifically for Swift and is integrated into Xcode 16, making it the officially recommended testing tool. Its powerful features are likely to captivate developers upon use. Last week, several well-known bloggers published articles related to Swift Testing.
In Vapor and Swift Testing: Running Tests in Parallel, Antoine van der Lee shares how he optimized testing performance using Swift Testing in the backend of his Vapor-based project and explores the advantages and challenges of parallel testing.
Additionally, Majid Jabrayilov and Donny Wals have released introductory guides on Swift Testing: Introducing Swift Testing. Basics and Swift Testing Basics Explained. These tutorials offer clear, practical insights and techniques for developers to get started with Swift Testing.