There's a difference between returning a void type and returning nothing. An instance of Void is a catch-all 'something' which conforms to no protocols, which can be quite useful with generic types.
On Thu, Jul 21, 2016 at 5:59 PM, Xiaodi Wu via swift-evolution < swift-evolution@swift.org> wrote: > Quite frankly, I think the ship has long sailed for renaming Void. > > > On Thu, Jul 21, 2016 at 11:52 AM, Matthew Johnson via swift-evolution < > swift-evolution@swift.org> wrote: > >> >> >> Sent from my iPad >> >> > On Jul 21, 2016, at 11:42 AM, Daniel Steinberg via swift-evolution < >> swift-evolution@swift.org> wrote: >> > >> > This may be a silly question - given that one of Swift’s design >> principles is to be a language for new programmers and for APIs to read >> like English phrases, should we replace the typealias of Void for the >> return type () with Nothing. >> >> Nothing was one of the names considered for the bottom type that replaces >> @noreturn ( >> https://github.com/apple/swift-evolution/blob/master/proposals/0102-noreturn-bottom-type.md). >> I think it would be confusing to rename Void to Nothing. >> >> If we consider renaming it Unit is the obvious way to go ( >> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_type) >> >> > >> > So >> > >> > f: ( input: Int) -> Void >> > >> > becomes >> > >> > f: ( input: Int) -> Nothing >> > >> > Instead of saying “f takes an Int and returns a Void” I read this as “f >> takes an Int and returns nothing”. >> > >> > I’ve been using f:(input: Int) -> () because it’s easier to explain >> than Void to non-experienced programmers. Experienced programmers have no >> problem with Void. But Void seems to be something we’re using just because >> we have for a while - like x++ and C-style for loops. >> > >> > Best, >> > >> > Daniel >> > _______________________________________________ >> > swift-evolution mailing list >> > swift-evolution@swift.org >> > https://lists.swift.org/mailman/listinfo/swift-evolution >> >> _______________________________________________ >> swift-evolution mailing list >> swift-evolution@swift.org >> https://lists.swift.org/mailman/listinfo/swift-evolution >> > > > _______________________________________________ > swift-evolution mailing list > swift-evolution@swift.org > https://lists.swift.org/mailman/listinfo/swift-evolution > >
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