Comparing String.Index values - string

Question

Is it possible to compare two String.Index values in Swift? I'm trying to process a string character by character, and several times I need to check if I am at the end of the string. I've tried just doing
while (currentIndex < string.endIndex) {
//do things...
currentIndex = currentIndex.successor()
}
Which complained about type conversions. Then, I tried defining and overload for < as such:
#infix func <(lhs: String.Index, rhs: String.Index) -> Bool {
var ret = true //what goes here?
return ret
}
Which gets rid of compilation errors, but I have no clue what to do in order to compare lhs and rhs properly. Is this the way I should go about using String.Index, or is there a better way to compare them?

Answer 1

The simplest option is the distance() function:
var string = "Hello World"
var currentIndex = string.startIndex
while (distance(currentIndex, string.endIndex) >= 0) {
println("currentIndex: \(currentIndex)")
currentIndex = currentIndex.successor()
}
Beware distance() has O(N) performance, so avoid it for large strings. However, the entire String class doesn't currently handle large strings anyway — you should probably switch to CFString if performance is critical.
Using an operator overload is a bad idea, but just as a learning exercise this is how you'd do it:
var string = "Hello World"
var currentIndex = string.startIndex
#infix func <(lhs: String.Index, rhs: String.Index) -> Bool {
return distance(lhs, rhs) > 0
}
while (currentIndex < string.endIndex) {
currentIndex = currentIndex.successor()
}

Answer 2

String indexes support = and !=. String indexes are an opaque type, not integers and can not be compared like integers.
Use: if (currentIndex != string.endIndex)
var currentIndex = string.startIndex
while (currentIndex != string.endIndex) {
println("currentIndex: \(currentIndex)")
currentIndex = currentIndex.successor()
}

Answer 3

I believe this REPL/Playground example should illuminate what you (and others) need to know about working with the String.Index concept.
// This will be our working example
let exampleString = "this is a string"
// And here we'll call successor a few times to get an index partway through the example
var someIndexInTheMiddle = exampleString.startIndex
for _ in 1...5 {
someIndexInTheMiddle = someIndexInTheMiddle.successor()
}
// And here we will iterate that string and detect when our current index is relative in one of three different possible ways to the character selected previously
println("\n\nsomeIndexInTheMiddle = \(exampleString[someIndexInTheMiddle])")
for var index: String.Index = exampleString.startIndex; index != exampleString.endIndex; index = index.successor() {
println(" - \(exampleString[index])")
if index != exampleString.startIndex && index.predecessor() == someIndexInTheMiddle {
println("current character comes after someIndexInTheMiddle")
} else if index == someIndexInTheMiddle {
println("current character is the one indicated by someIndexInTheMiddle")
} else if index != exampleString.endIndex && index.successor() == someIndexInTheMiddle {
println("Current character comes before someIndexinTheMiddle")
}
}
Hopefully that provides the necessary information.

Answer 4

Whatever way you decide to iterator over a String, you will immediately want to capture the iteration in a function that can be repeatedly invoked while using a closure applied to each string character. As in:
extension String {
func each (f: (Character) -> Void) {
for var index = self.startIndex;
index < self.endIndex;
index = index.successor() {
f (string[index])
}
}
}
Apple already provides these for C-Strings and will for general strings as soon as they get character access solidified.